While Taylor Swift’s album Evermore was released in late 2020, it has had a huge 2021: The album has broken vinyl sales records this year on its way to becoming the year’s best-selling vinyl album. For a while, it seemed like Evermore would easily end 2021 as the year’s top vinyl LP, but then Adele’s 30 happened. Adele took vinyl seriously with her new album, turning in the project months early to make sure there were plenty of LPs available, which sparked (debunked) rumors that the album was responsible for industry-wide vinyl manufacturing delays. As far as which album can be crowned the year’s best-selling vinyl, it turns out the race was extremely close.
Billboard reports that on the new Vinyl Albums chart dated December 25 (the final chart of 2021), 30 is on top for a fourth week thanks to 41,000 copies sold during the week ending December 16. That brings the album’s total vinyl sales up to 234,000 copies. Meanwhile, the vinyl sales total for Evermore now stands, as of the latest charting week, at 232,000. This means that 30 ends the year as the best-selling vinyl thanks to just 2,000 more copies sold, which amount to a difference in sales figures of less than one percent.
This feat is even more impressive when you consider that while Evermore has been out for over a year, 30 was only just released a month ago, on November 19.
