Beyoncé scores biggest first-week sales since November with ‘Cowboy Carter’

Did anyone think that Beyoncé‘s Cowboy Carter wouldn’t lasso a huge #1 debut on the Billboard chart?

Bey’s acclaimed new album debuts with sales of 407,000 units, giving her the biggest first-week sales of 2024 and the biggest first-week sales since Taylor Swift‘s 1989 (Taylor’s Version) sold 1.65 million units in November. Cowboy Carter is Bey’s biggest week since Lemonade debuted with 653,000 units in 2016.

Cowboy Carter also debuts at #1 on Billboard’s Top Country Albums, American/Folk Albums and Top Album Sales charts. Beyoncé is now the first Black woman to top the Top Country Albums chart, which was established in 1964.

In addition, Cowboy Carter scores the biggest first-week sales for a country album since July when — who else? — Taylor Swift crashed in with 716,000 units of Speak Now (Taylor’s Version).

Overall, Cowboy Carter is Beyoncé’s eighth #1 on the Billboard album chart, following Renaissance, Lemonade, her self-titled album, 4, I Am … Sasha Fierce, B’Day and Dangerously In Love. Now only Taylor, Barbra Streisand and Madonna have had more chart-topping albums than she has.