U.S. vinyl album sales hit a modern-era high in the week ending Dec. 22, as 2.232 million copies were sold, according to Luminate. That marks the single-largest sales week for vinyl albums since Luminate began electronically tracking music sales in 1991. It’s also only the second time in the modern era (1991-onward) that weekly vinyl album sales have exceeded 2 million. It last happened a year ago, when vinyl had its previous modern-era-high by selling 2.115 million in the week ending Dec. 23, 2021.
Vinyl album sales grew by 46.7% in the week ending Dec. 22 (compared with the previous week), powered by holiday gift shopping. The top-selling vinyl album of the week was Taylor Swift’s Midnights, which sold 68,000 copies – the third-largest sales week of the year for an album on vinyl. (Midnights’ vinyl sales profit from its availability across five vinyl variants – all colored vinyl editions, including one exclusive to Target.)
Vinyl album sales made up 57% of overall album sales in the United States in the week ending Dec. 22 (2.232 million of 3.897 million) and 63% of all physical album sales (2.232 million of 3.526 million). (Overall album sales combine both physical and digital download album purchases. Physical album sales include vinyl albums, CDs and cassettes.)
Year-to-date vinyl album sales stand at 41.891 million – up 3.6% compared with the same point in 2021.
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