Even the literary youths who get emo late at night don't feel sorry for NetEase Cloud anymore.

"It's time to start crying."

This was the standard opening line when the entire Chinese internet mocked "NetEase Cloud Music Blues" in 2020. At that time, the Chinese internet still maintained a warm and cheerful kind of sarcasm. People were happy to treat literati youths like Ah Q and also liked to have fun in the comment section of NetEase Cloud Music.

Every late night, countless people would flock to the bottom of those classic vinyl records on time, with a bit of curiosity and mockery, to read and make fun of those "made - up depression stories". You know, in the internet chronicle, "emotions" have always been a monetizable form of traffic, and NetEase Cloud Music has become a big winner through the emotion - based business.

Music is one of the best ways to release emotions. (Photo/ "Begin Again")

Agatha Christie said in "And Then There Were None": "It may be a good thing that one cannot foresee the future." But six years have passed. In the early summer of 2026, "Cloud Village" must be wondering how that joking remark back then turned into a prophecy.

NetEase Cloud Music has really entered its own "NetEase Cloud Music Blues moment".

The "March 2026 Online Music App Industry Report" released by QuestMobile on April 29 shows that as of March 2026, the monthly active users of Soda Music reached 156 million, surpassing NetEase Cloud Music's 147 million for the first time, pushing the latter from the perennial third place to the fourth.

When I heard this news, as a "Cloud Village resident" for more than a decade, I didn't feel sad for its misfortune or angry at its incompetence. I didn't seem to care much either.

I habitually glanced at the red - background vinyl icon on my phone screen. I used Apple Music for a while, but I didn't find it very convenient. Before writing this article, my impression of Soda Music was just "heard of it".

Over the years, as long as "Cloud Village" can still play music and hasn't gone bankrupt, whether it ranks third or fourth and how anxious it is, I have no urge to cheer it on or criticize it more.

I have no intention of uninstalling it. But it is the long - standing habits and retention of our group of old users over more than a decade that shows a bit of desolate warmth. In the first quarter of this year, NetEase Cloud's revenue increased by 6.6% year - on - year, but the revenue of 2 billion yuan remained basically unchanged quarter - on - quarter, the same as in the fourth quarter of last year.

Whether it's loyalty or indifference, we've stayed and then frozen in place together.

Users stayed because of nostalgia, but NetEase Cloud is no longer the same as in memory. (Photo/ "We Who Are Trying to Overcome Inferiority")

01

The 2.7 billion saved,

Can't buy Jay Chou

If we only look at the latest profit statement, NetEase Cloud Music seems to have presented a beautiful set of financial data.

Its annual performance announcement for 2025 shows that the platform's annual profit reached 2.75 billion yuan, a year - on - year increase of as high as 75.4%. In today's world, for a music platform in a vertical field to achieve a net profit of nearly 2.8 billion yuan, it's no small miracle.

But in fact, its annual revenue of 7.759 billion yuan in 2025 not only didn't increase but also showed the first year - on - year decline (-2.4%) since its listing. The revenue from social entertainment services, which was originally a cash cow, even plummeted by 32% year - on - year.

The profit soars while the revenue shrinks. Put simply, this is the result of extreme cost - cutting and revenue - increasing measures.

For example, the prosperity on NetEase Cloud Music's balance sheet largely stems from drastically cutting one - third of the marketing expenses in the past year, plus a tax incentive of over 700 million yuan. It no longer spends money lavishly to buy exclusive copyrights like before but has started to live a thrifty life.

NetEase Cloud has the confidence to do this precisely because of the "indifference" of us old villagers.

To be honest, my NetEase Cloud Music membership was even renewed for free as a gift from Taobao's 88 - member program. I might as well use it. As a fan of Mayday, during the years when the platform lost the copyright, I just silently listened to the music for the sake of convenience. Whether Jay Chou's music is available or not doesn't affect me. The daily recommendations occasionally bring me a few new songs, or I just loop through my old playlists. That's enough to meet my BGM needs for work and commuting.

Because there are a large number of die - hard fans like me who are extremely tolerant of major copyrights and highly dependent on the platform's usage habits, NetEase Cloud dares to rely on its past achievements and keep cutting the marketing budget.

It is because of the old fans who are highly dependent on the platform that NetEase Cloud keeps relying on its past achievements. (Photo/ "I May Not Love You")

In the past, many old users used to blame industry monopolies and Tencent for blocking NetEase Cloud. But after several years, although the barriers of exclusive copyrights have thawed under policy pressure, NetEase Cloud still hasn't been able to bring Jay Chou back.

On the one hand, the old debts haven't been settled. On the eve of the copyright expiration in 2018, NetEase Cloud's act of illegally reselling Jay Chou's songs after the expiration still hasn't won the forgiveness of JVR Music. This isn't something that can be solved simply by having money. On the other hand, the profit saved through cost - cutting can't withstand the trouble of getting involved in the copyright quagmire again.

According to a report released by DT Business Observation in 2025, among the top 4 online music platforms in terms of monthly active users, NetEase Cloud Music still has the most "literati - youth" user profile: users from first - and second - tier cities, with the highest proportion of post - 90s and post - 00s, and slightly more female users than male users.

But in 2019 when it was widely mocked, users under 25 accounted for as high as 83.5%, making it the youngest music platform on the entire internet. Now, many of those teenagers who "pretended to be sad for the sake of writing poems" are still there. Post - 90s still account for more than 40%, and post - 00s account for nearly 30%.

They are still the same people, just a few years older.

It's still the same group of people who love using NetEase Cloud. Everything seems to have remained the same, and the only thing that seems to have changed is the app. (Photo/ "Seorakdong")

02

Soda Music moves forward,

Cloud Village retreats

For the purpose of writing this article, I downloaded Soda Music from the app store for the first time.

Have to admit that sometimes human emotions are quite simple. When you step into the subway after a tiring day at work, your soul will have a "craving for carbohydrates after a workout", and it's hard to resist the short - video logic of "play as soon as you open, swipe down if you don't like it".

In this app, you can't see those theme playlists full of strong personal emotions, nor can you see the social entrance that guides you to find like - minded people. Even the playback interface is extremely streamlined. But maybe it was the wrong time or the wrong way to use it. I only used it for less than ten minutes before I felt a kind of exhaustion that middle - aged people feel when they have no time to explore the world.

For someone who has established a music - listening habit for more than a decade and has built a huge personal playlist library of thousands of songs on NetEase Cloud, it's an extremely troublesome and painful thing to go to a completely unfamiliar place to be re - trained by the recommendation algorithm and re - accumulate music.

Using an unfamiliar app means you have to spend a lot of time migrating data, which is a waste of time for people who are constantly on the go in a fast - paced society. (Photo/ "My Liberation Diary")

You need to tell the algorithm whether you like folk music or rock again, and you need to keep listening and collecting. It's a huge consumption. However, one person's meat is another person's poison. The trouble and internal consumption I feel can't represent the preferences of most people at all.

In many industry analyses, Soda Music's overtaking of NetEase Cloud is crudely described as "the complete victory of the algorithm over the classical music library", even though Soda Music has two more "traditional" mountains in front of it, QQ Music and Kugou Music.

As mentioned earlier, the QuestMobile data shows that Soda Music's monthly active users soared by 78% year - on - year in March this year, but it didn't take the market share from NetEase Cloud. During the same period, Kugou's monthly active users decreased by 6.3%, Kuwo's dropped by 15.4%, and NetEase's increased slightly by 1.5%.

Generally speaking, users who use two apps at the same time are called "wandering users". For example, I used QQ Music for the album of the Chinese animation "Scissor Seven", but I still spent most of my time in "Cloud Village". The data shows that the number of wandering users between QQ Music and NetEase Cloud Music is as high as 36.48 million, indicating that there are still a large number of users like me who switch back and forth.

But the switching targets are changing. The number of wandering users between QQ Music and Soda Music increased by 72.9% year - on - year, and that between Kugou Music and Soda Music increased by 63.9% year - on - year.

More importantly, the user overlap between Soda Music and QQ Music or NetEase Cloud Music is only 2% to 3%. It's not taking users from Tencent or NetEase. Instead, it's targeting those "general music users" who don't listen to music very often. According to the estimation of the Insight Data Research Institute, this group is as large as 500 million people.

Getting familiar with a new place is a very energy - consuming thing, so many users keep sticking to one app. (Photo/ "My Liberation Diary")

Light - users are turning to Soda Music, while NetEase Cloud Music is stuck in the middle and can't reach either side.

It has the most proud and stubborn user community on the entire internet. It has the highest proportion of users in first - tier and new first - tier cities, and its core users are those post - 90s in their thirties.

This group of middle - aged literati youths in high - tier cities has a high degree of path dependence and still has the obsession to "discover good music". They can't stand being trained and retrained. If they can stay in their own corner, it would be a good story.

03

The rent outside,

Has to be paid after all

But in the business world, growth is the most basic requirement. Loyalty can definitely be regarded as a brand's moat, but if there is no growth, even the deepest feelings are only enough to build a fence for "Cloud Village".

What will happen after the old capital is used up? At least I definitely don't want to see NetEase Cloud become the next Xiami.

But if the warmth and tolerance of old users are exhausted and the dividends of the new generation of users are all taken away, when it finally collapses, apart from a little bit of nostalgia, we probably won't be able to cry.

Not to mention that perhaps for survival or to expand the user base, its business and marketing actions are becoming extremely distorted.

The extreme distortion has consumed a lot of users' confidence in NetEase Cloud. (Photo/ Screenshot from social media)

Recently, NetEase Cloud Music was involved in the "border - crossing incident" in its official live - streaming rooms. In some of its official emotional chat and social live - streaming rooms, in order to pursue rewards and turnover, a series of vulgar marketing and suspected soft - porn border - crossing behaviors appeared.

What's even more suffocating is that when some loyal old users discovered this situation and carried out rights - protection and exposure on social platforms, the platform's first reaction was not to reflect and rectify but to quickly file a counter - complaint against the rights - protectors, trying to cover up this ugly scar with public relations means.

This action has the same underlying logic as many established consumer brands that, when facing traffic anxiety, have to