Beyonce has the number one album in the U.S.
According to Billboard, the "Drunk In Love" and "Flawless" singer's fifth studio album debuts atop the Billboard 200 albums chart today, Wednesday, December 18, with 617,000 copies sold.
Major — Sales of "Beyonce," the self titled visual album, are all digital thanks to an exclusive release through iTunes.
"Beyonce's" launch is the second-largest digital sales week overall — counting all digital retailers. It's second behind the debut frame of Lady Gaga's "Born This Way," which sold 662,000 downloads in its first week. (That number was enhanced by Amazon MP3's decision to sell the set for 99-cents for two days during its first week. Billboard has estimated that Amazon MP3's 99-cent version resulted in 440,000 copies sold.)," reports Billboard. "Beyonce" is only the second digital-only album to hit No. 1 on the Billboard 200, following the 2010 all-star live charity album "Hope For Haiti Now."
Featuring songs like "Partition," "Heaven" and "Jealous," "Beyonce" breaks multiple records, including Beyonce's first week sales record.
According to Billboard, the album's 617,000 copies sold within three days marks Beyonce best first week. Her best week prior to "Beyonce" was with "B'Day," which opened with 541,000 copies and spawned singles like "Deja Vu," "Get Me Bodied" and "Irreplaceable."
"Beyonce" has also earned the best sales figures for a female artist (first week) in 2013.
"Beyonce" also notches the largest sales week for a woman in 2013, and the year's fourth-biggest sales week overall," reports Billboard. "It follows the No. 1 debuts of Justin Timberlake's "The 20/20 Experience" (968,000), Eminem's "The Marshall Mathers LP 2" (792,000) and Drake's "Nothing Was the Same" (658,000). (The last larger week for a woman was when Taylor Swift's "Red" debuted with 1.2 million at No. 1 upon its release in October 2012.)"
"Beyonce" is also the recording artist's fifth studio album to debut atop the Billboard 200.
Physical copies of "Beyonce" are to be released later this week.
