Taylor Swift’s ‘1989 (Taylor’s Version)’ Back at No. 1 on Billboard 200
Written by Keith Caulfield on December 25, 2023
Taylor Swift’s 1989 (Taylor’s Version) rises 2-1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart (dated Dec. 30), marking the fourth nonconsecutive week atop the list for the set. It earned 136,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. in the week ending Dec. 21 (up 25%) according to Luminate. The set, along with many of Swift’s titles, continues to benefit from vinyl sales encouraged by holiday shopping and promotions.
1989 (Taylor’s Version) spent its first two weeks at No. 1 (Nov. 11-18), had another week in the lead on the Dec. 9 chart, and then bounces back to the top on the new chart.
Swift has a total of three albums in the top 10 on the new chart, as 1989 (Taylor’s Version) is joined by former No. 1s Midnights (7-3 with 75,000 – up 31%) and Lover (9-7; 60,000 – up 22%).
The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week in the U.S. based on multi-metric consumption as measured in equivalent album units, compiled by Luminate. Units comprise album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). Each unit equals one album sale, or 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album. The new Dec. 30, 2023-dated chart will be posted in full on Billboard‘s website on Dec. 27, one day later than normal due to the Christmas Day holiday on Dec. 25. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both X, formerly known as Twitter, and Instagram.
Nicki Minaj’s Pink Friday 2 falls to No. 2 with 100,000 equivalent album units (down 56%) after debuting atop the list a week ago. Michael Bublé’s former No. 1 Christmas climbs 5-4 (70,000; up 10%), Morgan Wallen’s chart-topping One Thing at a Time bumps 6-5 (just over 64,000; up 2%), and Drake’s former leader For All the Dogs dips 3-6 (64,000; down 6%).
Nat King Cole’s The Christmas Song ascends 11-8 (56,000 equivalent album units; up 17%), SZA’s former leader SOS falls 8-9 (54,000; up 2%), and Mariah Carey’s Merry Christmas returns to the top 10 for the first time this season, rising 12-10 (52,000; up 14%). Merry peaked at No. 3 in its initial chart run, on the Dec. 17, 1994-dated chart. This is the sixth consecutive season the album has revisited the top 10.
Luminate, the independent data provider to the Billboard charts, completes a thorough review of all data submissions used in compiling the weekly chart rankings. Luminate reviews and authenticates data. In partnership with Billboard, data deemed suspicious or unverifiable is removed, using established criteria, before final chart calculations are made and published.
