Against the backdrop of China’s continuing economic downturn, the piano education industry, which once symbolized the “standard offering” for middle-class families, is undergoing an unprecedented “major clearance.” With shrinking family wealth, the belief that “every child should learn the piano” is no longer prevalent. From piano manufacturers to frontline teachers, the entire industry chain has fallen into a cold spell, with even high-income families now starting to haggle over minimal tuition fee differences.
Recent days saw Shanghai blogger “Voice from the Seas” interviewing Shanghai post-2000s piano teacher Ms. Zhang. She has personally experienced the glory and decline of this industry.
Ms. Zhang mentioned that she started learning the piano from a young age and began part-time piano teaching after graduating from high school, as the piano industry was booming back then due to the piano craze. She has been teaching piano for 9 years now. She only teaches on weekends normally, but from Monday to summer vacation period, she teaches practically every day.
In recent years, as China’s economy has been trending downwards and consumer spending has scaled down, Ms. Zhang has directly felt the impact. She noted that since 2024, the number of piano students has significantly decreased.
She revealed that her boss’s piano studio has also downsized. It used to occupy two floors, but now it’s just one floor, with the other floor leased to someone else. Due to fewer classes and a decrease in students, they are experiencing losses.
Last year, Reuters reported that piano teacher Liu Hongyu started a music classroom in Beijing six years ago, but the number of students has decreased by over half. She is concerned that more students will discontinue their lessons.
In 2018, during good times, her music classroom had 70 students, with two full-time teachers and two part-time teachers. However, post the outbreak of the pandemic, demand rapidly declined and continued to be sluggish, forcing her to relocate to a smaller, more affordable location. She now only has two part-time teachers. She expressed her concern, saying, “I worry whether our current 30 students will continue their lessons after completing the pre-paid courses.”
Parents are also reluctant to prepay for long-term courses, fearing for their financial security and realizing that many schools have gone bankrupt.
This abandonment stems from serious practical considerations. An industry insider analyzed that in the current situation where “property prices in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen loosen, and major companies keep laying off employees,” learning the piano, previously seen as a “top-tier gold-swallowing beast” necessary for families, has now turned into an “investment that can be cut.”
During China’s piano craze era, the belief that “every child should learn the piano” became a national belief. In the 2010s, China was the absolute center of the global piano industry. According to The Economist, at its peak, there were over 40 million piano students in China, accounting for 80% of the global total. Stimulated by the explosive demand, China became the world’s largest producer and consumer of pianos. In 2019, the prosperity of the Chinese piano industry reached its zenith: annual sales exceeded 400,000 units (while the US sold only 30,000 units during the same period), with the total industrial output value approaching 200 billion yuan. Annual sales once exceeded 400,000 units.
On May 30, 2012, the state-owned Pearl River Piano, the mainland’s first listed piano company, went public. The same year, Helen Piano from Ningbo, Zhejiang, successfully listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, becoming the “first stock of a privately-owned piano enterprise in China.”
In places like Huzhou, Zhejiang, and Yichang, Hubei, massive piano industry clusters were formed, providing employment opportunities for tens of thousands. In just Luoshe Town, Huzhou, there are 114 piano-related companies, with about 4,000 employees, accounting for one-seventh of the national piano production.
The surge in demand brought great dividends, with numerous piano training institutions raking in profits, and piano teachers becoming one of the most lucrative professions at that time.
However, this trend came to an abrupt halt in 2024. According to statistics, more than 7,000 piano stores closed that year in China, and piano sales plummeted dramatically, almost halved compared to the peak.
Entering 2025, the piano industry is showing more ominous signs. In the first quarter, the performance of the two listed piano companies in the mainland was disappointing: Helen Piano suffered a net loss of 9.6848 million yuan, a 154.56% year-on-year decline, while Pearl River Piano suffered a loss of 51.6847 million yuan, a 162.52% year-on-year decrease.
A seasoned industry practitioner shared a video on social media, saying, “The piano industry is even more challenging than the real estate sector. What was once a symbol of elite parenting, the king in the world of instruments, has now degraded to a state where both piano manufacturers, sellers, and teachers are deserted and laid off.”
Ms. Zhang from Shanghai mentioned that her income from teaching has also decreased. In 2019, she charged 200 yuan per lesson, which increased later, but since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, prices have slowly decreased again, reverting to 200 yuan per lesson. This can be seen as another form of consumer downgrading, as people’s spending habits have generally decreased.
She said, “Some parents have directly told me, ‘Our family income can’t keep up anymore. We have two children, and it’s too strenuous. We have to let go of piano lessons for the kids.'”
“Because learning the piano requires a long-term vision. It’s not about how many lessons you take; it may not show results after one or two years but might take ten years to see an effect, making it a long-term investment. If there are no immediate results, parents might choose to give up.”
Ms. Zhang noted that in the past two years, parents’ attitudes towards their children learning the piano have also changed to a more hands-off approach. Previously, there were more demands, including having more lessons. Now, the number of classes has decreased, and the expectations have lowered.
A piano store owner in Beijing expressed his helplessness to local media, stating, “Last year was a collapse, and this year is a clearance. Many piano stores are starting to operate at a loss this year. Pianos that were originally priced at 50,000 yuan are now left unsold even at 5000 yuan.”
In June this year, Ms. Zheng, a recent graduate from a music college in Guangdong, said, “For my piano education, my parents spent tens of thousands. When I graduated, the institution only gave me a basic salary of 3000 yuan, with a 35% commission on lesson fees, and often struggled to attract students. It’s too ironic.”
Both of China’s listed piano companies, Pearl River Piano and Helen Piano, are in financial distress. Recently, Pearl River Piano announced it expects a net loss of 121 to 157 million yuan in the first half of 2025 after deducting non-recurrent gains and losses. In 2024, Pearl River Piano’s revenue was 677 million yuan, a nearly 40% year-on-year decline, with a net loss attributable to the parent company shareholders of 236 million yuan, a decrease of 4108.2%.
Ms. Zhang pointed out that during the piano craze, children learning the piano came from all kinds of family backgrounds, including modest grandparents bringing grandchildren to learn. The children who came to learn the piano were guided by parents who wanted them to have an additional interest.
Now, however, the children attending classes come from high-income families. She observed that children’s families live in villas, luxury homes, and drive luxury cars. Even in such households, parents haggle over a 50-yuan difference in lesson fees. She has encountered many such situations where parents mention the cheaper fees elsewhere to negotiate. They believe that learning the piano is not worth the high cost. They are reluctant to spend large amounts of money on their children anymore. A few years back, such situations didn’t arise; parents were more generous. Now, people are becoming more frugal with their expenses.
Ms. Zhang sees herself as a freelancer. She remarked that her peers and colleagues are all working because there’s no money without work. Despite being post-2000s with support from at least two generations in the family, everyone faces the pressure of intense competition.