He only had One Dance, but it was a pretty popular one: Drake has been named the best-selling artist of 2016.
The Canadian star achieved millions of sales and billions of streams with his fourth album, Views, which topped the charts around the world.
He managed to beat Adele and Coldplay, who also achieved big sales last year.
The news comes from music industry bigwigs the IFPI, who’ve given Drake their Global Recording Artist of the Year Award.
“Drake’s phenomenal success reflects how deeply his unique sound appeals to an enormous global audience,” said chief executive Frances Moore.
In the UK, Drake’s single One Dance topped the charts for 15 weeks, nearly beating the all-time record, held by Bryan Adams’ (Everything I Do) I Do It For You.
However, Views only ended the year as the country’s eighth best-selling album, behind Little Mix’s Glory Days and Adele’s 25 – which took the top spot for the second year in a row.
In Germany, the world’s third-biggest music market, the album was only the year’s 100th best-seller.
The IFPI declined to release figures for Drake’s overall sales, or a country-by-country breakdown, so it is hard to decode how he made up the difference – but the star’s phenomenal success on streaming services is likely to be key.
Views became the first album to reach one billion streams on Apple Music (where it was initially available as an exclusive); while One Dance was the first song to be played one billion times on Spotify.
The album also topped the year-end charts in the US, still the biggest music market in the world, with sales of 4.1 million.
The IFPI Global Recording Artist Award was established in 2013, and previous recipients have been One Direction (2013), Taylor Swift (2014) and Adele (2015).
Top 10 Global Recording Artists of 2016
- Drake
- David Bowie
- Coldplay
- Adele
- Justin Bieber
- Twenty One Pilots
- Beyoncé
- Rihanna
- Prince
- The Weeknd
