Adele 21's outsells Michael Jackson's Thriller and Bad

According to the latest Official Charts Company sales data, Adele’s 21 has now outsold Michael Jackson’s Thriller and, in doing so, has become the UK’s fifth biggest selling album of all-time.
adele_1_2011.jpg

According to the latest Official Charts Company sales data, Adele’s 21 has now outsold Michael Jackson’s Thriller and, in doing so, has become the UK’s fifth biggest selling album of all-time.

As of this morning, the London-born singer’s 2011 second album has now sold 4,274,300 copies in the UK, 500 more than Thriller. And with 21 selling an average of 20,000 copies per week over the last four weeks, that lead will significantly increase when this week's final Official Albums Chart sales datais published on Sunday.

“To add to her many landmark records, Adele's achievement in overtaking Thriller in the all-time sales list is truly remarkable,” comments the Official Charts Company’s Managing Director Martin Talbot. “Thriller has long been recognised as one of the most iconic albums of all time - there is now no doubt that 21 can be spoken of in the same breath.” 

It’s been an amazing year-and-a-quarter for Adele; in the fifteen months since 21 was released, it has spent 66 weeks on the Official Albums Chart, 23 of those at Number 1, and has outsold Amy Winehouse’s Back To Black to become the biggest selling album of the 21st Century, and has also overtaken the sales of such seminal albums as Michael Jackson’s Bad, Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side Of The Moon and Dire StraitsBrothers In Arms in the UK. To put that in perspective, one in six British households owns 21. She has also won six Grammy Awards, and two BRIT Awards.

The UK’s Top 10 biggest selling albums of all-time are now as follows:

01 GREATEST HITS (1981) - QUEEN
02 SGT PEPPER’S LONELY HEART’S CLUB BAND (1967) - THE BEATLES
03 GOLD - GREATEST HITS (1992) - ABBA
04 WHAT’S THE STORY MORNING GLORY (1995) - OASIS
05 21 (2011) – ADELE
06 THRILLER (1982) - MICHAEL JACKSON
07 BROTHERS IN ARMS (1985) - DIRE STRAITS
08 THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON (1973) - PINK FLOYD
09 BAD (1987) - MICHAEL JACKSON
10 GREATEST HITS II (1991) - QUEEN

© 2012 the Official Charts Company. All rights reserved.

Click here to see the previously published biggest selling albums of all-time Top 40 which was published in April of this year.

For the latest Official Charts news, be sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter.


Adele - Someone Like You [Live] on MUZU.TV.

Related artists

Join the conversation by joining the Official Charts community and dropping comment.

Already registered?

Log in

No account?

Register