Taylor Swift’s latest album, The Life of a Showgirl, is a record breaker.
Billboard reported on Friday (October 10), citing Luminate data, that the album sold over 3.4 million copies in its first week in the US alone – breaking the record for the most albums sold in a week in the United States.
The tally, Billboard reported, surpassed the ‘modern-era’ record previously held by Adele’s 25, which moved 3.378 million units during its opening week in November 2015.
Those figures represent pure album sales (which include physical and digital purchases).
Billboard reported today (October 13) that The Life of a Showgirl debuts at the top of the US albums chart (dated October 18) with 4.002 million equivalent album units (which takes into account pure album sales as well as streaming activity).
The publication notes that Swift’s first-week numbers, by both equivalent album units and pure album sales, mark the largest weekly album tallies since Luminate began collecting data electronically in 1991.
The album becomes Swift’s 15th No.1 in the market, which also breaks another record, as Swift now has more No.1 albums in the US than any other solo artist (surpassing Drake and JAY-Z who each have 14), though The Beatles still lead overall with 19 No.1 albums.
Tracks from the new album have also claimed the Top 12 positions on the latest Hot 100 chart, dated October 18, which Billboard noted today makes it “the first album ever to place all its songs uninterrupted from the top of the chart on down”.
Swift’s sales strategy involved 34 different album versions: 27 physical formats including 18 CDs, eight vinyl LPs and one cassette, plus seven download variants.
The approach included limited-time iTunes Store exclusives priced at $4.99, released daily from Monday through Thursday of the tracking week, according to Billboard. Each digital edition featured the album’s 12 standard tracks plus bonus acoustic versions and voice memos.
On Thursday (October 9), a digital download version of the album called The Life of a Showgirl (Deluxe So Punk on the Internet Version), dropped. It includes 12 tracks and six previously released voice memos, as well as one new voice memo.
Meanwhile, in the UK, the album reached 423,000 combined chart units in its opening week, marking the strongest debut of Swift’s career in that market.
That’s according to data from the Official Charts on Friday (October 10), which reported that the album’s first-week performance marks the biggest opening for any release in the UK since Ed Sheeran’s Divide in 2017.
It also marks the strongest debut for an international album in the UK this century and the first Swift record to become BRIT-Certified Platinum within its first week of sale.
With this achievement, Swift surpassed Elvis Presley’s 13 UK No. 1 albums and matches The Rolling Stones with 14 chart-toppers. Only The Beatles and Robbie Williams, both with 15 No.1 albums, have achieved more in UK chart history.
She reached this milestone in just under 13 years after landing her first UK chart-topper with Red in October 2012. This translates to an average of more than one chart-topping album per year since then. The Life of a Showgirl is her third album to reach No.1 in 2025, following Lover (Live From Paris) in February and The Tortured Poets Department in April.
The album also set multiple UK chart records across different formats. Vinyl sales reached 126,000 copies, making it the fastest-selling vinyl album this century and the highest single-week vinyl total since modern chart records began in 1994.
Streaming contributed 84,000 equivalent sales units, surpassing both Sheeran’s Divide and Swift’s previous album, Tortured Poets Department, which each generated 79,000 stream-equivalent units. The album also recorded the year’s highest first-week download figures.
The album’s release triggered renewed interest in Swift’s catalog, with her 2020 release folklore returning to the Top 40 at No. 37.
MBW recently reported that Showgirl set new records across the major streaming platforms. Amazon Music reported that the album accumulated more streams in its opening day than any other release in 2025, while Spotify said the record has become its most-streamed album in a single day in 2025 so far, reaching that feat in under 11 hours.
Prior to release, the album broke Spotify’s pre-save record with more than 6 million users adding it to their libraries. This surpassed Swift’s previous record set by her own album, The Tortured Poets Department, from last year.
Beyond streaming dominance, a limited release party film for the album also broke records, becoming the biggest album debut event in cinema history with an estimated $33 million in box office sales, according to CNBC. The 89-minute release party film screened exclusively during the October 3-5 weekend at AMC theaters across the US.
The album is also dominating Spotify’s charts in the US and globally.
As of October 11, The Life of A Showgirl’s 12 songs are currently occupying positions No.1 through No.12 on the platform’s Global Weekly Top Songs chart Weekly Top Songs chart for the US.
The album is also No. 1 on Spotify’s Weekly US and Global Albums Charts.
The Fate of Ophelia marked Swift’s largest first-week streaming total for any single release. It also claimed the top spot on Apple Music for the first-day song streams globally, and the most-streamed song in a single day in Spotify history.
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