This is a list of the world's best-selling albums of all time. The criteria are that the figure must have been published by a reliable source and the album must have sold at least over 20 million copies worldwide. There are some music industry based organizations that are responsible for defining official "achievement levels" (like Gold and Platinum sales for example).
Rock musicians who are typically viewed as solo acts are not included in this list. No players of blues, rhythm & blues, funk, soul, folk, hip-hop much less jazz or other dissimilar genres, even compilation album type. This also includes a calculation, that is estimate of the most probable level of worldwide sales. Here they are :
#10 Bon Jovi - Slippery When Wet Album (1986)
| US (RIAA) |
UK (BPI)
|
Germany (BVMI)
|
Min. Copies
|
Range
|
| 12 Platinum |
3 Platinum
|
1 Platinum
|
22. 5 Million
|
20 - 26 Million
|
Combined with Radicci’s incredible likeness to a young Richie Sambora, whose blazing guitar solos nail every note as if you were listening to the original recordings, you get a front line rivaled only by Jon and Richie themselves.
The album peaked at #1 on the Billboard 200, becoming Bon Jovi's first number-one album in United States. The album also had impressive staying power, with 38 weeks inside the Top 5 of Billboard 200, including 8 weeks at #1.
#9 Linkin Park - Hybrid Theory Album (2000)
| US (RIAA) |
UK (BPI)
|
Germany (BVMI)
|
Min. Copies
|
Range
|
| 10 Platinum |
4 Platinum
|
5 Gold
|
23. 8 Million
|
20 - 28 Million
|
Hybrid Theory takes its title from the previous name of the band. The music that would ultimately become the Hybrid Theory album was first produced by Linkin Park in 1999 as a nine-track demo tape.
The band sent this tape to various recording companies and played forty-two different showcases for recording industry representatives, including performances for Los Angeles promoter and impresario, Mike Galaxy's showcase at The Gig on melrose.
#8 Boston - Boston Album (1976)
Boston became the most successful debut ever by an artist and
remained so for over a decade, selling million albums in less than
three months and nine times that figure over its first decade. The band
would put out a similarly-styled follow-up with Don’t Look Back two years later, but Sholz felt that effort was “rushed” and it did not fare nearly as well critically nor commercially.
In reality, Boston would be that unique super nova by the band which could never be replicated. It was also the rare piece that was extremely excellent, extremely popular, and has held up over the decades, and that is what makes it Classic Rock Review‘s album of the year for 1976.
Legacy Records released a remastered version for compact disc on June 13, 2006. The original master tapes were digitally remastered by the band's leader, Tom Scholz, after he heard that the remastering project was to be handled by Sony. This was unacceptable to him, and he took it on himself after negotiations with Legacy. "I've always wanted to make those albums sound good on CD, and the chance arrived," he said.
#7 Metallica - Metallica Album (1991)
| US (RIAA) |
UK (BPI)
|
Canada (MC)
|
Min. Copies
|
Range
|
| 17 Platinum |
1 Gold
|
1 Diamond
|
25. 3 Million
|
23 - 29 Million
|
In reality, Boston would be that unique super nova by the band which could never be replicated. It was also the rare piece that was extremely excellent, extremely popular, and has held up over the decades, and that is what makes it Classic Rock Review‘s album of the year for 1976.
Legacy Records released a remastered version for compact disc on June 13, 2006. The original master tapes were digitally remastered by the band's leader, Tom Scholz, after he heard that the remastering project was to be handled by Sony. This was unacceptable to him, and he took it on himself after negotiations with Legacy. "I've always wanted to make those albums sound good on CD, and the chance arrived," he said.
#7 Metallica - Metallica Album (1991)
US (RIAA)
|
UK
|
Germany (BVMI)
|
Min. Copies
|
Range
|
16 Platinum
|
1 Platinum
| 12 Platinum |
25. 5 Million
|
23 - 30 Million
|
Additionally,
Vintage Vinyl News reports that two Metallica ringtones earned
Mastertone Gold certification from the RIAA for 500,000 downloads.
Metallica‘s
self-titled 1991 record, aka ‘The Black Album,’ is already the
best-selling album of the SoundScan era, and now they’re pulling away
from the pack. Commercially, the album was a colossus, selling a
staggering over 22 million
copies and firmly establishing Metallica as worldwide superstars and an
essential part of the cultural landscape.
#6 Nirvana - Nevermind Album (1991)
| US (RIAA) |
UK (SNEP)
|
France (BVMI)
|
Min. Copies
|
Range
|
| 10 Platinum |
2 Platinum
|
1 Diamond
|
26. 1 Million
|
24 - 31 Million
|
The album reached #1 on Billboard Music Chart's Top 200 albums and the
Heatseekers chart. It was voted as the best album of the year in The
Village Voice Pazz & Jop critics poll.
This is the second studio album by the American rock band Nirvana, Produced by Butch Vig.
#5 Guns N Roses - Appetite for Destruction Album (1987)
The original artwork for ‘Appetite For Destruction’ was a
stomach-turningly gruesome affair: an image based on the Robert Williams
painting of the same title, that depicts a girl with her pants round
her ankles, a robot rapist, and a metal avenging angel about to take
revenge.
Appetite for Destruction, the ultimate Guns N’ Roses experience, have been performing the music of Guns N’ Roses for fifteen years, selling out venues throughout the northeast.
They have twice performed on the same bill as ex-G N’ R guitarist Gilby Clarke, with current G N’ R keyboardist Dizzy Reed, and headlined at BB King’s for five consecutive years.
Most of the songs on the album reflect the band's personal experiences and daily life, such as "Welcome to the Jungle", some of the lyrics of which Rose wrote after he encountered a man near the highways of Manhattan in 1980 shortly after arriving there from Indiana, and "Mr. Brownstone", which is about the band's problems with heroin.
#5 Guns N Roses - Appetite for Destruction Album (1987)
| US (RIAA) |
UK (BPI)
|
Germany (BVMI)
|
Min. Copies
|
Range
|
| 18 Platinum |
2 Platinum
|
1 Platinum
|
30. 5 Million
|
27 - 35 Million
|
They have twice performed on the same bill as ex-G N’ R guitarist Gilby Clarke, with current G N’ R keyboardist Dizzy Reed, and headlined at BB King’s for five consecutive years.
Most of the songs on the album reflect the band's personal experiences and daily life, such as "Welcome to the Jungle", some of the lyrics of which Rose wrote after he encountered a man near the highways of Manhattan in 1980 shortly after arriving there from Indiana, and "Mr. Brownstone", which is about the band's problems with heroin.
#4 Eagles - Hotel California Album (1976)
| US (RIAA) |
UK (BPI)
|
France (SNEP)
|
Min. Copies
|
Range
|
| 16 Platinum |
6 Platinum
|
1 Diamond
|
31. 5 Million
|
28 - 36 Million
|
Hotel California was the Eagles' fifth album of original material and became a critical success and a major commercial hit; since its release in late 1976, it has sold over 16 million copies in the U.S. alone.
The album was at number 1 for eight weeks in early 1977 (non-consecutively), and included two tracks which became number 1 hits as singles on the Billboard Hot 100: "New Kid in Town", on February 26, 1977, and "Hotel California" on May 7, 1977.
#3 AC/DC - Back in Black Album (1980)
| US (RIAA) |
Germany (BVMI)
|
France (SNEP)
|
Min. Copies
|
Range
|
| 22 Platinum |
2 Platinum
|
2 Platinum
|
39. 1 Million
|
34 - 45 Million
|
Back in Black might be the purest distillation of hard rock ever: The title track, "Hells Bells" and the primo dance-metal banger "You Shook Me All Night Long" have all become enduring anthems of strutting blues-based guitar heat.
The album was a rebirth for the band only months after previous lead singer Bon Scott passed away February 19, 1980.
#2 Pink Floyd - The Wall Album (1979)
| US (RIAA) |
Germany (BVMI)
|
UK (BPI)
|
Min. Copies
|
Range
|
| 23 Platinum |
4 Platinum
|
1 Platinum
|
41. 9 Million
|
36 - 48 Million
|
Pink Floyd's most elaborately theatrical album was inspired by their own success: the alienating enormity of their tours after The Dark Side of the Moon. As the band played arenas in 1977, bassistlyricist Roger Waters first hit upon the wall as a metaphor for isolation and rebellion.
Roger Waters has never done anything small when it comes to “The Wall,” the 1979 album and rock show about his own psychic struggle that many music critics say signified the end of Pink Floyd’s most fertile period.
Roger Waters constructed The Wall, a narcissistic, double-album rock opera about an emotionally crippled rock star who spits on an audience member daring to cheer during an acoustic song.
#1 Led Zeppelin - Four Symbols/Led Zeppelin IV Album (1971)
| US (RIAA) |
UK (BPI)
|
France (SNEP)
|
Min. Copies
|
Range
|
| 23 Platinum |
6 Platinum
|
2 Platinum
|
44. 6 Million
|
38 - 51 Million
|
Of all of Zeppelin's songs, "Stairway to Heaven" is the most famous, and not unjustly. Led Zeppelin IV was the band's most musically diverse effort to date,
featuring everything from the crunching rock of "Black Dog" to the folk
of "The Battle of Evermore," as well as "Stairway to Heaven," which
found the bridge between the two genres.
In 1998, Q magazine readers voted Led Zeppelin IV the 26th greatest album of all time; in 2000 Q placed it at No. 26 in its list of the 100 Greatest British Albums Ever. In 2003, the album was ranked number 66 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of "500 Greatest Albums of All Time. It is ranked at No. 7 on Pitchfork Media's Top 100 Albums of the 1970s.
In 2006, the album was rated No. 1 on Classic Rock magazine's 100 Greatest British Albums poll; that same year it was voted No. 1 in Guitar World 100 Greatest Albums readers' poll and was ranked No. 7 in ABC media's top ten albums.
