List of best-selling music artists
This is a non-definitive list of best selling recording artists, embracing worldwide singles and album sales.
Note
In general there is no organization that certifies worldwide record sales (such as the RIAA does for U.S. record sales). Thus, there are few if any reliable figures to go into this list. Fans, biographers, and record lables may grossly overestimate sales figures for publicity purposes. Many of bestselling artists from Asia, Africa and Latin America are still not included because of the lack of data. Thus, the list cannot be considered definitive, and must be taken with a grain of salt.
Volume (Total Albums and Singles)
Notes
Record companies usually displays very unaccurate numbers in order to make their own artists bigger than what they really are. In this chart, you'll find no Julio Iglesias at 250M, ABBA at 350M or whatever obvious phoney number they are trying to make people swallow. It's all about true sales.
Estimation Table
According to the RIAA, the World music market is estimated at $40 billion annually, and the U.S. recording industry accounts for one-third of the world market.
This table represents the album sales of artists that are popular both in the USA and in the world. The ratio between their US and worldwide album sales can be helpful in estimating the worlwide sales of artists that are similar in their US and worldwide exposure but only have US sales figures. However, this estimation technique cannot be used to estimate the WW sales of non-English-singing artists, as their US figures will likely be very low. This technique may also undercount artists who sometimes record in other languages in addition to English, since they will likely have a larger worldwide audience. Also since this technique is based on album sales, it will tend to undercount those artists popular in the 1960s and before, when singles were much more popular relative to albums than they have been since then.
| Artist | US Album Sales | Worldwide Album Sales | Ratio |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mariah Carey | 62 mil. | 184 mil. | 2.96 |
| Madonna | 63 mil. | 175 mil. | 2.77 |
| Céline Dion | 45.5 mil. | 185 mil. | 4.07 |
| Michael Jackson | 58.5 mil. | 173 mil. | 2.95 |
| Whitney Houston | 61 mil. | 134 mil. | 2.19 |
| Janet Jackson | 24 mil. | 76 mil. | 3.16 |
| Bon Jovi | 33.5 mil. | 100 mil. | 2.98 |
| Gloria Estefan | 22 mil. | 70 mil. | 3.18 |
Average Worldwide/US album sales ratio = 2.99.
Chart Statistics
Number of best sellers: 171.
By Country
| Genre | #N of bestsellers |
|---|---|
| United States | 76 |
| United Kingdom | 22 |
| Canada | 7 |
| Australia | 3 |
| France | 3 |
| Germany | 2 |
| Greece | 2 |
| Ireland | 3 |
| Italy | 2 |
| Spain | 2 |
| Sweden | 2 |
| Russia | 1 |
| Total | 115 |
By Genre
| Genre | #N of bestsellers |
|---|---|
| Pop | 52 |
| Rock | 22 |
| Country | 13 |
| Hard Rock | 9 |
| Disco | 8 |
| R&B | 6 |
| Jazz | 4 |
| Standards | 4 |
| Latino Pop | 2 |
| Opera | 1 |
| Gospel/Christian | 1 |
| Classic | 1 |
| Dance | 1 |
| Traditional Arab | 1 |
| Total genres | 121 |
See also
- World music market
- Best selling music artists in US
- List of popular music performers
- Biggest-selling female musician
External links
- Rockonthenet.Com - Contains information about US sales.
- http://www.xfm.co.uk/Article.asp?b=news&id=86590