NEW YORK (AP) — Much has been done about the global tourism economy over the past few years. Take, for example, the fact that tours grossing over a billion dollars are a new phenomenon in the 2020s—a benchmark first surpassed by Taylor Swift in 2023 with her landmark Eras Tour, and a feat recently achieved by The Weeknd. But who are the most popular touring artists of the last two decades based on ticket sales? The results may surprise you.
On Monday, ahead of Pollstar's 2025 release, the concert publication ranked the top 25 touring artists of the millennium based on ticket sales from Jan. 1, 2001 through the end of 2025. Top of the list? Coldplay: 24.8 million tickets sold. U2 are next with 20.2 million tickets sold and Ed Sheeran with 19.6 million.
Rounding out the top five were Dave Matthews Band with nearly 19.6 million tickets sold and Swift with approximately 18.9 million. Let us remember that her debut album was released in 2006.
Pollstar chart data comes from reported and estimated box office data for events that occurred between 2001 and 2025.
Swift is the only woman to make the top 10. She is followed by Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Kenny Chesney, Metallica, Bon Jovi and Elton John.
In fact, there are only four women in the top 25: Pink is in 11th place with almost 13 million tickets. Beyoncé is in 13th place with 11.8 million tickets sold; Madonna is in 15th place with almost 11 million tickets.
Tickets sold differ from money collected
Don't get this wrong, it should be noted that the number of tickets sold is a different metric than the money raised.
As mentioned earlier, in 2023, Swift's Eras Tour became the first tour to cross the billion dollar mark, according to Pollstar's year-end 2023 charts. She then broke her own record: in December 2024, Pollstar announced that the Eras Tour had brought in $2.2 billion over nearly two years, solidifying its lead as the highest-grossing tour of all time.
Swift earned more than $3.1 billion in the new millennium, according to a new chart released Monday. Compare that to Coldplay, which leads in ticket sales and follows with a gross of almost 2.5 billion.
In September, Pollstar reported that total earnings from Coldplay's Music of the Spheres tour had reached $1.39 billion. It also launched in 2022 and will run until 2025.
And last month, The Weeknd's After Hours 'Til Dawn Tour officially crossed the $1 billion mark, according to Live Nation.
