CSPC: One Direction Popularity Analysis

One Direction Career CSPC Results

So, after checking all the figures, how many overall equivalent album sales has each One Direction album achieved? Well, at this point we hardly need to add up all of the figures defined in this article!

In the following results table, all categories display figures in equivalent album sales. If different, pure sales are listed between parentheses.

artist_spotify_id	#	Cover	Album	Studio albums (EAS)	sales_update_date	Other LPs (EAS)	Physical singles (units sold)	Digital singles (units sold)	Streams	Streams increase	Total EAS	valid_as_of	streams_updated_value	album_id
4AK6F7OLvEQ5QYCBNiQWHq	1		Up All Night	6,250,000	14.05.17	2,745,000	392,000 (55,000)	1,905,000 (12,700,000)	774,000 (05/14/17)	Av.: 0 LD: -2,666,180	12,066,000	20,230,608	774,000	1,259
4AK6F7OLvEQ5QYCBNiQWHq	2		Take Me Home	6,300,000	14.05.17	1,915,000	462,000 (20,000)	1,359,000 (9,060,000)	956,000 (05/14/17)	Av.: 0 LD: -2,961,970	10,992,000	20,230,608	956,000	1,260
4AK6F7OLvEQ5QYCBNiQWHq	3		Midnight Memories	5,250,000	14.05.17	604,000	518,000 (25,000)	1,365,000 (9,100,000)	1,108,000 (05/14/17)	Av.: 0 LD: -3,752,100	8,845,000	20,230,608	1,108,000	1,261
4AK6F7OLvEQ5QYCBNiQWHq	4		Four	3,400,000	14.05.17	0	618,000 (10,000)	555,000 (3,700,000)	1,048,000 (05/14/17)	Av.: 0 LD: -3,689,650	5,621,000	20,230,608	1,048,000	1,262
4AK6F7OLvEQ5QYCBNiQWHq	5		Made in the A.M.	2,700,000	14.05.17	0	0 (0)	645,000 (4,300,000)	1,626,000 (05/14/17)	Av.: 0 LD: -3,483,750	5,421,000	20,230,608	1,626,000	1,263
4AK6F7OLvEQ5QYCBNiQWHq	6		Orphan	0	14.05.17	1,086,000	33,000 (10,000)	285,000 (1,900,000)	118,000 (05/14/17)	N/A	1,522,000	20,230,608	118,000	1,713

As a reminder:

• Studio Album: sales of the original album
• Other Releases: sales of compilations generated thanks to the album
• Physical Singles: sales of physical singles from the album (ratio 3/10)
• Download Singles: sales of digital singles from the album (ratio 1,5/10)
• Streaming: equivalent album sales of all the album tracks (ratio 1/1500 for Audio stream and 1/6750 for Video stream)

See where the artist ranks among remaining singers

Logically, the first two albums secure their spot as the most successful albums from One Direction. With overall sales easily over 10 million, they both belong to the very top albums of the decade. If it wasn’t for the This Is Us music video, Midnight Memories would be very close to them. It still performs incredibly well at 8,8 million.

The last two LPs end with over 5 million units each, which in itself is huge. Streaming give them some pride back – while in pure album sales Made in the A.M. sold just over half the total of Midnight Memories. The overall total shows a ratio of over 60% in spite of the 2015 album failing to benefit from the release of a Tour DVD.

In total, One Direction are up to 44,5 million equivalent album sales. This represents an average of almost 9 million per album.

The following pages list their most successful songs. Do not forget to check our amazing cross-artists lists posted inside the CSPC: Data Collector which includes the full listing of all CSPC results compiled so far to better gauge their position in the history of the music industry.

As usual, feel free to comment and / or ask a question!

Sources: IFPI, Spotify, YouTube, Chartmasters.org.