Kanye West’s “DONDA” earned him another Billboard 200 number 1.
The first week numbers for Kanye West’s new album “DONDA” are here. The project debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200 with moving over 309k equivalent units in the first week. It is the biggest debut of the year, after surpassing J. Cole’s first-week number for “The Off Season” which sold 282k copies in the first week. But it doesn’t look like the album will hold the record for long, as Drake’s new album “Certified Lover Boy” is expected to earn the biggest debut this year. Halsey’s new album “If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power” debuted at #2 on the Billboard 200 with 100k sold in the first week.
After five days of charting, Donda debuted at the top of the US Billboard 200 with 309,000 album-equivalent units, which included 272,000 streaming-equivalent album units, 37,000 pure album sales, and fewer than 1,000 track-equivalent units. The RIAA awarded Donda platinum certification on March 9, 2022, for selling 1,000,000 certified units in the US.
Donda surpasses Olivia Rodrigo’s Sour, which sold 295,000 copies in June, to become the year’s greatest week for any album. Because the 27-track album was published on a Sunday, the first chart week had only five days of activity instead of the normal seven.
Billboard 200: #1(new) @kanyewest, DONDA 309,000 [357.39 million on-demand streams | 37,000 pure sales].
— chart data (@chartdata) September 5, 2021
Billboard 200: #2(new) @halsey, If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power 98,000 [34.76 million on-demand streams | 70,500 pure sales].
— chart data (@chartdata) September 5, 2021
.@kanyewest‘s ‘DONDA’ earns the biggest first week sales for an album by any artist on the Billboard 200 this year.
— chart data (@chartdata) September 5, 2021
DONDA is now Kanye West’s 10th consecutive number 1 album. He now equals Eminem’s chart record, whose last year’s “Music To Be Murdered By” earned the 10th consecutive Number 1. Kanye West also break the record for the most consecutive #1 albums on the Billboard 200 among artists debuting on the chart this century, as Eminem’s “The Slim Shady LP” dropped in 1999.
With Donda, West joins a select group of only seven musicians to achieve ten #1 albums in the Billboard 200’s history. He joins the Beatles (19), Jay-Z (14), Bruce Springsteen (11), Barbra Streisand (11), Eminem (10), and Elvis Presley (10) as the most successful musicians of all time (10). (Drake has nine #1 albums, including his own Certified Lover Boy, which will be eligible for next week’s ranking.) Donda is West’s tenth consecutive number one.
.@kanyewest becomes the first artist debuting this century to earn a milestone ten #1 albums on the Billboard 200.
— chart data (@chartdata) September 5, 2021
.@kanyewest ties @Eminem as the artist with the most consecutive #1 albums in Billboard 200 history (10 each).
— chart data (@chartdata) September 5, 2021
Kanye West’s new album featured guest appearances from Jay-Z, Kid Cudi, Lil Baby, The Weeknd, Travis Scott, the late Pop Smoke, Jay Electronica, The Lox, Young Thug, Roddy Ricch, Lil Durk, Pusha T, Playboi Carti, Ty Dolla Sign, Baby Keem, Chris Brown and more.
