Burna Boy ranked Africa’s best-selling singer with 14.46m album sales

Global music data platform Chartmasters has ranked Grammy Award-winning Nigerian singer Burna Boy as Africa’s best-selling singer for recording a whopping 14.46 million Equivalent Album Units (EAS).

Nigerian music news platform, The Debut Hub, announced this in a post on its X account, citing data from Chartmasters.

It wrote: “Burna Boy returns as the #1 best-selling African artist of all time with 14.46 MILLION Equivalent Album Sales globally!

“It covers studio albums, other LPs (incl. compilations), physical singles, digital singles & streaming (album track equivalents).”

EAS is a standardised music industry metric used to equate singles, streams, and physical or digital purchases into one “album sale”.

It levels the playing field so traditional album purchases (1 unit) can be compared fairly to digital downloads and streaming activity across streaming platforms like Spotify or Apple Music.

Burna Boy, Shakira perform at Barclays Center show in New York

According to Chartmasters, Burna Boy’s 14.46 million equivalent album units are derived from a combination of album sales, physical and digital single sales, and streaming equivalents, rather than pure album purchases alone.

The ranking marks another milestone for the Port Harcourt-born singer, who has become one of Africa’s most commercially successful music exports since gaining global mainstream recognition.

Burna Boy has released several albums, including African Giant (2019) and Love Damini (2022), which ranked among the most-streamed African albums on Spotify.

Beyond recorded music, Burna Boy has earned global recognition for his touring success, staging sold-out concerts at major international venues and further expanding the global reach of African music.