Best-Selling Artists of All Time

Here you will find our up-to-date list of all-time best-selling artists.

Best-selling artists of all time

This ranking aggregates performance across multiple formats — physical sales, downloads, and streams — each assigned a specific weight to reflect its relative contribution to an artist’s success.

This approach is driven by our CSPC method. The ranking is refreshed daily.

The ranking

Want to see your favorite artist covered?
Vote for them in our requests leaderboard!

Why do we assign weights to different formats?

What ratios do we use here?

The table above shows the top artists of all time using the following ratios:

  • Studio album: sales of the original album (ratio 1/1)
  • Other LPs: sales of compilations generated thanks to the album (ratio 1/1)
  • Physical singles: sales of physical singles from the album (added to CSPC total with a ratio 3/10 for 2-tracks, 5/10 for EPs and Maxis)
  • Digital singles: sales of digital singles from the album (ratio 1.5/10 for CSPC total)
  • Streaming: equivalent album sales of all the album tracks (ratio 1/1500 for Audio stream and 1/6750 for Video stream)

    • How do we get accurate best-selling artists lists?
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    For decades, marketing tricks from labels and a lack of education from the media led to various myths about the best-selling artists of all time getting repeated so often that the general public assumed it was true.

    Today, the same lack of education on the matter continues to be a pain for accuracy lovers. Most of these lists floating around online are either flat lists of RIAA certifications or a mere sum of all certifications from all countries. The first are given only on request, sparsely for many artists, and relate to the US only. The latter are adding together apples and oranges by mixing distinct formats and different national streaming conversion methods.

    Our home-made solution: the CSPC and equivalent album sales

    To solve these flaws, we introduced several years ago the Commensurate Sales to Popularity Concept (CSPC).

    If you are not familiar with this concept, it consists of retrieving sales figures from every format and weighting them on par with album sales. That’s what we call equivalent album sales (EAS), or simply CSPC units.

    In doing so, we grant that comparisons between artists from different periods make sense, unlike lists based on raw record totals.

    The method also ensures that the same formula applies to all artists. So we are avoiding issues related to the varying conversion rate used for streaming in different markets, as well as by most labels in their communications.

    The sales compilation process

    When applying this concept to an artist, our team goes into the tank. We analyze all data available, from charts, certifications, internal reports, and official scanning systems. Through the years, we developed various methods to fill the holes, backing all numbers with meaningful indicators. In between, we have also discovered thousands of receipts.

    To make everything as transparent as it gets, all figures for sales have been detailed on each artist’s article, available through the link under their name. We also show dates of updates, both for sales and for streams.

    The column ‘Other LPs’ includes long formats made of already released material like greatest hits compilations, box sets, live records, bootlegs, and music videos.

    Digital singles include both downloads and ringtones. Streaming units include both audio and video streams.


    An ongoing process
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    Obviously, digging into the catalog of an artist takes time. It would be easy to simply copy/paste the RIAA’s most certified artists list in a minute. Given our ambition, the largest discographies require several weeks of study, with several people involved.

    Most top artists have been studied by now, but some are still missing. The main one is Bing Crosby.

    These omissions are listed on this page, which enables users to vote for the next pick. As soon as a CSPC article is released, we treat the new leader of the requests list. You can vote too!


    The automatic update of streams
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    As part of our process to get all artists treated at the same time, we have been implementing tools to automatically keep numbers up to date every day, whenever it is possible.

    We also developed a tool to retrieve updated Spotify streams by artist. Thus, we are able to increase accordingly the streaming units of artists part of our all-time top artists leaderboard.

    For further details, feel free to use the comment section.



    Bonus: best-selling artists by era

    The most successful artists ever. Numbers in equivalent album sales through all formats. Based on the original recordings’ release dates. Video created with Flourish.

    Best-selling artists by pure album sales

    To answer the question “Who’s the best-selling artist today?”, the table above includes all formats. But the more traditional way to understand that question is to focus on pure sales instead.

    If that’s what you wonder about, here is our ranking of best-selling artists in terms of pure album sales. The records we consider are studio albums, compilations, live albums, and box sets. Music videos, EPs, and singles are not considered.

    Some artists are missing because their analysis has not been done yet, or their breakdown by country isn’t available for now. Here is the complete list of covered artists.

    Want to see your favorite artist covered?
    Vote for them in our requests leaderboard!

    Best-selling artists by physical single sales

    The primary format until the 1960s was physical singles. While selling a million was the trademark of a super successful hit, some artists built outstanding career totals. We reveal the ranking of the best-selling artists by their physical single sales. Please note that pre-rock era (1958-now) artists have yet to be added, except Frank Sinatra.

    Best-selling artists by digital single sales

    From the mid-2000s to the mid-2010s, the music industry was dominated by digital sales. In the list below, we focus on the best-selling artists in terms of digital singles. Figures here include both downloads and ringtones.

    Most successful artists of all-time

    Sales numbers – even carefully weighted format by format – don’t always tell the full story. That’s why we’ve created the ASR score, a smarter way to look at musical success. Let’s take a different look at success.

    Best-selling doesn’t always mean most successful

    The following ranking doesn’t just show the best-selling artists: it highlights the most successful ones overall.

    What’s the difference?

    Success isn’t only about how many units of records are sold. It’s also about how an artist’s discography is built and presented.
    Some artists release mostly studio albums, meaning fans have to buy many of them to get all the hits. Others release well-curated compilations, like Greatest hits, that deliver everything in one go.

    To reflect this, we created a new way to measure success: the ASR (Artist Success Rating).

    This score, rated on a 0 to 1000 scale, combines:

    • EAS (Equivalent Album Sales) – which shows how many sales the artist’s catalog has generated;
    • EDS (Equivalent Discography Sales) – which reflects how often the catalog is consumed as a whole.

    In short, ASR rewards both impact and efficiency. Here’s the ranking of the most successful artists, according to this unique approach!

    Most successful artists list

    Please keep in mind that some artists are missing, because their analysis has not been done yet. Here is the complete list of covered artists.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    Who’s the best-selling artist of all time?

    The Beatles are the best-selling artists of all time with over 520 million equivalent album sales. More than 175 million sales behind, Michael Jackson is the runner-up ahead of Elvis Presley.

    Who’s the best-selling solo artist of all time?

    Michael Jackson is the best-selling solo artist of all time with over 340 million equivalent album sales. Elvis Presley is a close runner-up, with Madonna completing the top 3 lower down.

    Who’s the best-selling female artist of all time?

    Madonna is the best-selling female artist of all time with over 250 million equivalent album sales. Taylor Swift is quickly catching up, while Celine Dion is third.

    Who’s the best-selling artist in terms of physical singles?

    With over 135m copies sold, Elvis Presley is the best-selling artist for physical singles.

    Who’s the best-selling artist in terms of digital singles?

    With over 257m copies sold, Rihanna is the best-selling artist for digital singles.

    Who are the top artists currently?

    As revealed by our most-streamed artists on digital streaming platforms list, Drake, Taylor Swift, and Bad Bunny are the biggest artists worldwide in recent years, with the addition of BTS thanks to their heavy album sales.

    Are the Beatles and Elvis Presley over 1 billion records sold?

    No. While their success is indeed outstanding, as they rank 1st and 3rd among all-time top-sellers, the billion claims made in the early 80s were based on an outdated accounting method using singles equivalents, where each album sale was valued as 6 units. Under this method, each of the 22 artists with over 167 million equivalent album sales on this page would be over 1 billion “records” sold.

    We have more for you

    Artists

    360° analytics – Best-Selling Artists | by Decade
    Tools: Artist Dashboard | Artists Comparator

    Streaming deep dive – Most-Streamed Artists
    Tools: Playcounts | Royalties | Global Reach | Stats History

    Other KPIs – Monthly listeners | Followers | Top money makers

    Albums

    Best-Selling Albums
    Most-Streamed Albums
    Top Debuts

    Songs

    Best-Selling Songs
    Most-Streamed Songs

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