Ed Sheeran notches his sixth No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart (dated Oct. 14), as his latest studio effort, Autumn Variations, debuts atop the list. It sold 46,500 copies sold in the U.S. in the week ending Oct. 5, according to Luminate.
With the No. 1 bow of Autumn Variations, Sheeran is the only artist to earn at least two new No. 1s on Top Album Sales in 2023. Autumn’s arrival comes just five months after Sheeran last hit No. 1, when his previous studio set, – (Subtract), launched at No. 1 on the May 20-dated tally, spending a week in charge. Only one other act has had two albums at No. 1 in 2023, but they did so with a carryover title that first hit No. 1 in 2022: Taylor Swift. Her Midnights album had 14 weeks at No. 1 nonconsecutively from Nov. 5, 2022, through June 10, 2023, while her Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) debuted at No. 1 on the July 22, 2023, chart, logging two weeks at No. 1.
Autumn Variations was announced on Aug. 24, a little over a month before the album was released on Sept. 29.
Also in the top 10 of the new Top Album Sales chart: titles from NCT, Joe Hisaishi and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Wilco, Grateful Dead, Lil Peep all debut in the top 10, while Green Day’s Dookie re-enters the chart in the top 10 after its 30th anniversary reissue, and Jason Isbell’s Southeastern surges back onto the chart following its 10th anniversary reissue.
Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart ranks the top-selling albums of the week based only on traditional album sales. The chart’s history dates back to May 25, 1991, the first week Billboard began tabulating charts with electronically monitored piece count information from SoundScan, now Luminate. Pure album sales were the sole measurement utilized by the Billboard 200 albums chart through the list dated Dec. 6, 2014, after which that chart switched to a methodology that blends album sales with track equivalent album units and streaming equivalent album units. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both Twitter and Instagram.
Of Autumn Variations’ 46,500 first-week sales, physical sales comprise 33,500 (17,500 on CD and 16,000 on vinyl – his largest week ever on vinyl) and digital downloads comprise a little over 13,000. The set also launches at No. 1 on the Vinyl Albums chart, marking his fourth No. 1 on the 12-year-old tally. The album’s debut-week sales were bolstered by its availability across five vinyl variants, a signed CD and a deluxe digital edition of the album with live versions of each of the album’s songs.
Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts falls 1-2 on Top Album Sales with nearly 16,000 sold (down 31%). NCT’s Golden Age: The 4th Album debuts at No. 3 with 13,000 sold, marking the third top 10-charting effort for the Korean pop ensemble.
Joe Hisaishi and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra’s A Symphonic Celebration: Music From the Studio Ghibli Films of Hayao Miyazaki bows at No. 4, following its vinyl release on Sept. 29. The set was initially released via digital download and CD on June 30. In the week ending Oct. 5, the Celebration album sold 12,500 copies – with 12,000 of that sum on vinyl, marking the single biggest sales week for a classical album on vinyl since Luminate began electronically tracking music sales in 1991. (Its vinyl sales were enhanced by its availability in five vinyl variants.)
With 12,500 overall copies sold, Celebration logs the second-largest sales week for a classical album released in 2023, following Def Leppard’s Drastic Symphonies (15,000; June 3-dated chart).
Wilco logs its ninth top 10-charting effort on Top Album Sales as the band’s new studio set, Cousin, debuts at No. 5 with a little over 12,000 copies sold. Green Day’s Dookie re-enters the chart at No. 6 with 11,000 sold (up 1,744%) following its 30th anniversary deluxe reissue. The album peaked at No. 2 in 1995 and hasn’t been in the top 10 since April of that year. Grateful Dead’s Wake of the Flood debuts on Top Album Sales at No. 7 following its 50th anniversary reissue. The set, first released in 1973, sold nearly 10,500 copies in the tracking week (up from a negligible sum the previous week). Jason Isbell also celebrates an anniversary, as his Southeastern album re-enters at No. 8 – a new peak and its first week in the top 10 – with 10,000 sold (up 4,723%) after its 10th anniversary reissue. The album originally peaked at No. 23 in June of 2013.
The physical commercial debut of Lil Peep’s 2016 mixtape Hellboy prompts the album’s debut at No. 9 on Top Album Sales with nearly 10,000 sold. It was released via CD, vinyl and cassette on Sept. 29, but was previously available as a digital download (and via streaming services). It’s the fourth top 10-charting set for the late rapper, who died in 2017. All of his charting efforts on Top Album Sales debuted on the list following his passing.
Closing out the top 10 on Top Album Sales is V’s Layover, which falls 3-10 with 9,000 sold (down 22%).
In the week ending Oct. 5, there were 1.695 million albums sold in the U.S. (up 8.8% compared to the previous week). Of that sum, physical albums (CDs, vinyl LPs, cassettes, etc.) comprised 1.369 million (up 11.1%) and digital albums comprised 327,000 (down 0.1%).
There were 573,000 CD albums sold in the week ending Oct. 5 (up 6.7% week-over-week) and 784,000 vinyl albums sold (up 14.2%). Year-to-date CD album sales stand at 26.160 million (up 0.5% compared to the same time frame a year ago) and year-to-date vinyl album sales total 34.883 million (up 19.4%).
Overall year-to-date album sales total 75.521 million (up 6.0% compared to the same year-to-date time frame a year ago). Year-to-date physical album sales stand at 61.449 million (up 10.4%) and digital album sales total 14.071 million (down 9.7%).
