For the third straight week, Adele’s blockbuster “25” ranks as America’s best-selling album.
Per Hits Daily Double, the album shifted approximately 88,082 copies during the February 19-25 tracking week. Nearly double that of the nearest competitor, the count enables “25” to easily retain its #1 position.
In recent months, the discrepancy between the preliminary Hits Daily Double data and the final, more authoritative Billboard/Nielsen data has become more significant. One should, consequently, expect the Billboard sales figure to differ from the 88,082 reported by Hits.
One should not, however, expect a difference in the overall outcome: “25” will be #1 on the Top Album Sales chart.
With Track Equivalent Albums (track sales/10) and Streaming Equivalent Albums (track streams/1500) added to its pure sales total, “25” will have generated enough total consumption units to spend a second week at #1 on the revamped Billboard 200. The consumption figure is due Sunday.
In terms of pure sales, here are this week’s other top performers: Yo Gotti’s “The Art Of Hustle” (~44,576), Chris Stapleton’s “Traveller” (~42,112), Rihanna’s “ANTI” (~33,499), and Joey + Rory’s “Hymns” (~31,391).