This is a list of the best-selling albums by year in the United States, published by American music magazine Billboard since 1956 as year-end rankings of album sales. Until 1991, the Billboard album chart was based on a survey of representative retail outlets that determined a ranking, not a tally of actual sales.

Their Greatest Hits (1971–1975) by the Eagles is the best-selling album of all time in the U.S. The following is a list of the best-selling albums in the United States based on RIAA certification and Nielsen SoundScan sales tracking.

Michael Jackson's Thriller, estimated to have sold 70 million copies worldwide, is the best-selling album ever. [4] [5] [6] Jackson also currently has the highest number of albums on the list with five, Celine Dion has four, while the Beatles, Madonna and Whitney Houston each have three.

Worldwide, Thriller is still the best-selling album of all time with a whopping 47 million certified copies sold, six million ahead of Their Greatest Hits. We’ve compiled the top 25...

This visualization shows the top-selling album of the year from 2001 to 2023 by number of units sold. Units sold include all physical formats (vinyl, cassette, CD) and paid full album downloads. The figures come from the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) and are updated as of August 2024.