It does not appear that Ariana Grande’s “thank u, next” ranked as the leader in pure US sales for the February 15-21 tracking period.
The album did, however, resoundingly rank as the week’s top album for overall consumption.
According to Hits Daily Double and BuzzAngle, “thank u, next” shifted about 155K units during its second week of release. Pure sales accounted for about 24K of the units, with the remainder coming from track sales and streams.
Due Sunday, Billboard’s more authoritative data may differ slightly from that reported by Hits. The discrepancy will not, however, jeopardize the album’s claim to #1. “thank u, next” will dominantly top a second consecutive Billboard 200 (total consumption) chart.
The “Bohemian Rhapsody” soundtrack, which Hits lists as the week’s #2 album, shifted just under 60K total units in the tracking period. It did, however, outperform “thank u, next” in pure sales (~34.5K).
“thank u, next” will become Grande’s first multi-week #1 on the Billboard 200. Her previous chart-toppers “Yours Truly,” “My Everything,” and “sweetener” each ruled for a single week.
“thank u, next” topped last week’s chart with nearly 360K in first-week US units.
