How many records have ABBA sold?
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Points to Consider
1. There is no global organisation compiling record sales.
2. ABBA's record company, Universal, was not its record company during their original career. They had several record companies eg Epic (UK), Atlantic (USA), RCA (Australia) Polydor (Europe). Universal simply doesn't have sales figures for ABBA's period in 70s/early 80s. The 400 million sales figures often quoted has NEVER been broken down by country or record.
In 1982, at the end of ABBA's original career there was a claim of 128 million records - which was plausible.
But when Universal took over they claimed 250m in 1992 (ABBA did not sell more in the 10 years after they split up). Then this was increased to 350m in 1999. Again, ABBA did not sell 100m in those 7 years. GOLD was 15 million at that point and that was basically all that was selling for ABBA. And this claimed, upped to 400m in recent years has stayed.
IT HAS NEVER BEEN BROKEN DOWN BY EITHER COUNTRY OR RECORD.
3. Certifications. In ABBA's day many countries either didn't have them eg Sweden, or had no multiple platinum awards then eg the UK.
4. Charts. The UK Charts were sales based. US Billboard Top 100 had an airplay component and it's not clear how most were compiled.
5. ABBA's career was during the time of physical sales. After that we had downloads (which are sales but there was an explosion in "singles" sales due to cheapness and conveniance. Now we are in the Streaming era - and they are not sales even if many countries' chart compilers have different formulas to attribute x amount of streams as sales.
6. ABBA's back catalogue sales for their studio albums is quite small. For example, in the UK Arrival sold a little over 100k in the 20 year period from 19995-2015. Rumours by Fleetwood Mac sold 2 million in that period.
7. Although they had some success in the USA, they weren't as popular as in other countries or against other artists in the US.
8. Estimated Physical Sales
| Country | Albums | Singles |
| France | 3,500,000 | 5,500,000 |
| Germany | 12,000,000 | 8,000,000 |
| Japan | 3,500,000 | 1,500,000 |
| UK | 20,000,000 | 10,000,000 |
| US | 20,000,000 | 8,000,000 |
| Sub Total | 59,000,000 | 33,000,000 |
| GLOBAL TOTAL ESTIMATE | 130 - 140,000,000 | 50 - 55,000,000 |
About 180 to just under 200 million physical sales. Add downloads and around 215 million.
If we look at that 128 million figure from early 1980s that seems very realistic. Add 32 million sales for GOLD, other compilations such as More Gold, The Definitive Collection, local compilations and budget albums and you'll come to a figure of within that 180 - 200 million range.
It is very hard to compare artists' sales with different formats and over different decades. Streaming is more like airplay, albeit more personal but even then opened up to algorithm manipulation. Maybe there needs to be a "popularity" comparison rather than saying "sales" but that opens up exact same difficulties!
Certification databases
🇬🇧 BPI
🇺🇸 RIAA
🇩🇪 BVMI
🇨🇦 Music Canada