--- description: Adele's 25 sold 3.38 million copies in its first week title: Adele’s '25' Debuts at No. 1 With Record-Smashing Sales image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt173f5ee3c6a41ae8/69887302a988ca5ede6b57d0/gettyimages-498469942.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Entertainment](/section/entertainment/) ## Entertainment Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Adele’s _25_ Debuts at No. 1 With Record-Smashing Sales by [Jessica Goodman / Entertainment Weekly](/author/entertainment-weekly/) ## Jessica Goodman / Entertainment Weekly Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Nov 30, 2015 5:24 AM CUT  Adele performs on Saturday Night Live, episode 1689 s on Nov. 21, 2015. Adele performs on Saturday Night Live, episode 1689 s on Nov. 21, 2015.Dana Edelson—NBC/NBCU Photo Bank/Getty Images by [Jessica Goodman / Entertainment Weekly](/author/entertainment-weekly/) ## Jessica Goodman / Entertainment Weekly Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Nov 30, 2015 5:24 AM CUT Adele’s record-shattering first-week album sales for _25_ have earned her the No. 1 spot on Billboard 200 chart. According to [_Billboard,_](http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/chart-beat/6777926/adele-25-debuts-no-1-billboard-200-albums-chart "undefined") the set earned 3.48 million equivalent album units in its first week — 3.38 million of which were pure album sales. It’s Adele’s second No. 1 album, following her 2011 smash _21_, which also returned to the top 10 for the first time in nearly two and a half years. That album has now spent 82 nonconsecutive weeks in the chart’s top 10. The original story on Adele’s big week is below. Hello from the top of the world! It’s Adele, breaking all the records, selling all the albums, and crushing every artist’s sales in her path. The first-week sales are in for 25, the collection Adele released on Nov. 20, and they’re staggering. The album sold a record-setting 3.38 million copies in the U.S. in its first week, [_Billboard_ reports, ](http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/chart-beat/6777905/adele-25-sales-first-week-us "undefined")marking the largest sale week for an album since Nielsen SoundScan began tracking sales in 1991 and making 25 the first album to sell more than 3 million in a single week. As of Tuesday, Adele had already sold [2.433 million albums](http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/chart-beat/6777905/adele-25-sales-first-week-us "undefined") and broke the [single-week sales record](http://www.ew.com/article/2015/11/24/adele-breaks-nsync-single-week-sales-record "undefined"), which was previously held by \*NSYNC’s _No Strings Attached,_ released in 2000\. (They graciously [ceded her the honor](http://www.ew.com/article/2015/11/24/nsync-reacts-adele-broken-record "undefined").) That number rose to[ 3 million ](http://www.ew.com/article/2015/11/26/adele-25-sales-3-million "undefined")as of Thursday. Adele’s collection is far and away the top selling album of the year. The only album that’s come close so far is Justin Bieber’s _Purpose,_ which beat out One Direction’s _Made In The A.M._ for the [No. 1 spot in last week’s charts.](http://www.ew.com/article/2015/11/22/justin-bieber-purpose-no-1-billboard-chart "undefined") At that time, it had sold 649,000 units. And before Bieber, Taylor Swift’s _1989_ was the biggest selling-album in recent memory. Released last year, it sold[ 1.287 million albums](http://www.ew.com/article/2015/11/22/justin-bieber-purpose-no-1-billboard-chart "undefined") in its first week, and was the only album of 2014 to sell a million copies. At the time it was the 19th album to sell a million copies in a week, which makes 25 the 20th. 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