CSPC: Justin Timberlake Popularity Analysis

Digital Singles Sales

As a reminder, the weighting is done with a 10 to 1,5 ratio between one album and one digital single.

Justified (2002) – 1,215,000 equivalent albums

Señorita – 1,130,000
Like I Love You – 730,000
Cry Me a River – 2,780,000
Rock Your Body – 3,260,000
Remaining tracks – 200,000

FutureSex/LoveSounds (2006) – 4,350,000 equivalent albums

SexyBack – 11,310,000
My Love – 5,740,000
LoveStoned / I Think She Knows (Interlude) – 2,100,000
What Goes Around… / …Comes Around (Interlude) – 5,260,000
Summer Love / Set the Mood (Prelude) – 2,460,000
Until the End of Time – 1,530,000
Remaining tracks – 600,000

The 20/20 Experience (2013) – 1,829,000 equivalent albums

Suit & Tie – 4,850,000
Mirrors – 6,540,000
Remaining tracks – 800,000

The 20/20 Experience – 2 of 2 (2013) – 668,000 equivalent albums

TKO – 800,000
Take Back the Night – 670,000
Drink You Away – 710,000
Not a Bad Thing / Pair of Wings – 1,970,000
Remaining tracks – 300,000

Man of the Woods (2018) – 71,000 equivalent albums

Filthy – 210,000
Say Something – 210,000
Remaining tracks – 50,000

Orphan – 7,181,000 equivalent albums

Where is the Love? – 4,530,000
Signs – 950,000
Give It to Me – 3,600,000
Ayo Technology – 3,150,000
Rehab – 2,320,000
4 Minutes – 5,150,000
Dead and Gone – 6,700,000
Love Sex Magic – 2,050,000
Carry Out – 3,100,000
Holy Grail – 4,510,000
Love Never Felt So Good – 3,470,000
Can’t Stop the Feeling – 6,440,000
Remaining tracks – 1,900,000

Each era of Timberlake had a completely different context. Justified came out a couple of years before the creation of iTunes. The format needed a few years to grow, meaning all units achieved by hits like Cry Me A River and Rock Your Body happened when they were already catalog titles. With this in mind, the 8 million units sold by songs from this album are impressive.

FutureSex/LoveSounds was released and promoted while downloads and ringtones were booming. SexyBack is the best illustration of this situation as the song sold 4,9 million downloads and 3,6 million ringtones in the US alone. Its global total is at 11,3 million units. My Love and What Goes Around…Comes Around were big hits too with more than 5 million copies sold a piece. LoveStoned and Summer Love are both 2 million sellers while Until the End of Time ends on 1,5 million, with more than half of its sales coming via ringtones. This string of big hits push the total of digital sales for this era to a massive 29 million.

By the release of The 20/20 Experience, ringtones were dead but streaming was only just getting started. Both Mirrors and Suit & Tie were huge at 11,4 million combined, but when the promotion switched to the volume 2, results were no where near as good, although Not a Bad Thing sold 2 million units.

Man of the Woods comes out in a streaming world when downloads have been seriously damaged with the market down more than 50% during the last 4 years. Its singles are also recent with very modest sales up to date.

Aside from all album eras, Timberlake participated in several smashes. He sold more than 6 million units with his 2016 massive seller Can’t Stop the Feeling from the Soundtrack Trolls. The T.I. song Dead and Gone also sold well with sales surpassing 6 million. As many as 8 other collaborations, including titles with Madonna and Michael Jackson, sold in the 3 to 5 million range.

Combining all his songs, Timberlake cracks the 9-digits mark with some 102 million digital sales without involving streams.