• News & Politics
  • Culture
  • Food
  • Science & Health
  • Money
  • Life Stories
  • Video
  • Reviews
    • Lifestyle
      • The New Sober Boom
      • Getting Hooked on Quitting
    • Education
      • Liberal Arts Cuts Are Dangerous
      • Is College Necessary?
    • Finance
      • Dying Parents Costing Millennials Dear
      • Gen Z Investing In Le Creuset
    • Crypto
      • Investing
        • SEC vs Celebrity Crypto Promoters
        • 'Dark' Personalities Drawn to BTC
Profile Log In/Sign Up Saved Articles Go Ad-Free Logout
subscribe
Help keep Salon independent
Newsletter
Profile Login/Sign Up
Saved Articles Go Ad-Free Logout
  • News & Politics
  • Culture
  • Food
salon logo
  • Science & Health
  • Money
  • Video

The 10 most popular artists on vinyl, according to Discogs

Digital may have supplanted physical media, but plenty of people are expanding their well-curated vinyl collections

By Ellen Gutoskey

Published May 15, 2022 9:00PM (EDT)

Abbey Road (Apple Records)
Abbey Road (Apple Records)
--

Shares

Facebook
Twitter
Reddit
Email

This story originally appeared on Mental Floss.

mental floss logo; logo

Though music streaming platforms may have supplanted physical media as the go-to way to play your favorite songs, plenty of people are still actively expanding their well-curated vinyl record collections. In fact, vinyl actually outsold CDs for the first time in decades back in late 2019.

In short, vinyl records are still surprisingly popular—and according to a new study from UK financial comparison service Money.co.uk, no one is more popular on vinyl than The Beatles. To come to that conclusion, the researchers crunched numbers from Discogs, an online music database and retailer where millions of users catalog and add to their own music collections across many formats. Each album's page includes statistics showing how many Discogs users own it. So Money.co.uk took a look at that data for 1.3 million vinyl records and then ranked artists based on their aggregate totals.

The Beatles totaled more than 3.3 million, outpacing runner-up Pink Floyd by more than half a million. As for which Beatles album reigns supreme, the title goes to "Abbey Road"—not exactly surprising, as that album was also named the best-selling vinyl record of the past decade in 2020. The rest of the top 10 is pretty predictable, too. David Bowie, Led Zeppelin, and Queen rounded out the top five, and The Rolling Stones edged out Nirvana for the sixth spot. Elvis Presley came in tenth with more than 934,000 records on Discog users's shelves.

While the study is far from a comprehensive look at all vinyl record sales throughout history, it's a good indicator of which artists do really well on vinyl. You can see the full list below; and if it prompts you to thumb through your old boxes of records, that's not a bad idea—some of them could be worth a fortune.

  1. The Beatles // 3,369,578
  2. Pink Floyd // 2,815,586
  3. David Bowie // 2,178,928
  4. Led Zeppelin // 1,879,600
  5. Queen // 1,311,065
  6. The Rolling Stones // 1,097,877
  7. Nirvana // 1,075,811
  8. The Smiths // 998,687
  9. AC/DC // 957,002
  10. Elvis Presley // 934,547

By Ellen Gutoskey

MORE FROM Ellen Gutoskey


Related Topics ------------------------------------------

Beatles List Mental Floss Music Vinyl

Related Articles


Advertisement:
  • Home
  • About
  • Staff
  • Contact
  • Privacy
  • Terms of Service
  • Archive
  • Go Ad Free

Copyright © 2025 Salon.com, LLC. Reproduction of material from any Salon pages without written permission is strictly prohibited. SALON ® is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office as a trademark of Salon.com, LLC. Associated Press articles: Copyright © 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


DMCA Policy