Presales Of BTS’s New Album Have Now Reportedly Passed 4 Million

[infj23.livejournal.com]

BTS’s new album Map of the Soul: 7 isn’t slated to be released until February 21, but fans the world over haven’t wasted any time when it comes to ensuring they’ll get their hands on a copy as soon as possible. The band’s dedicated base of listeners, known as ARMYs, have been pre-ordering the as-yet-unreleased set non-stop since it was first made available in early January, and now the total sum has reached heights only the biggest in the business can dream about.

According to a new piece published by the Washington Post, Map of the Soul: 7 has already racked up an incredible four million pre-orders worldwide. That figure is incredible any way one looks at it.

These days, people don’t buy albums, they largely stream them when they’re out, so while history is constantly being made by acts who see the tunes featured on their new sets earn higher-than-average play counts, sales are, for the most part, a thing of the past. It’s extremely uncommon for any musician, even the most successful in the industry at the moment, to sell four million copies at all, let alone before a title has even dropped.

That four million number is up noticeably from just a short time before, which shows that while millions may have rushed to place their order, there are still plenty of people interested in doing so. Big Hit Entertainment, BTS’s record label, revealed that between January 9 (when pre-orders opened) and January 15, the K-pop superstars’ new set was purchased 3.42 million times. That’s an eye-popping sum, and it has grown by at least 600,000 copies by now, perhaps even more.

With almost three weeks to go before Map of the Soul: 7 arrives, there is no telling how many more people will pre-order the latest set from BTS. It could reasonably climb to four and a half million, or maybe even higher. Even if it doesn’t sell one more copy, the title is already on track to be one of the bestselling releases in the world in 2020, and it is sure to end up on a number of year-end rankings. While these massive figures aren’t broken down from country to country, it looks like the new studio effort from the most successful Korean act is headed straight to the top of albums charts all around the globe when it’s finally unleashed.

Source:  Forbes

I haven't pre-ordered yet (like many).  Still waiting on the concept photos.  Someone on Reddit is speculating that the pre-orders as of today's date may be closer to 5 million based on historical and current sales data from KTown4U.  The Forbes article references data from a Washington Post article posted last week (hence why I think the Forbes notes "With almost three weeks to go before Map of the Soul: 7 arrives...." instead of 2 weeks).

Comments

[modestgoddess79.livejournal.com]

Wow

[camouflagecat.livejournal.com]

Wow, even if it's several individual fans buying multiple copies, it's still a lot.

[violoncelliste.livejournal.com]

holy shit lmao that's.. a lot

[fadeintoyou.livejournal.com]

Wow that’s crazy. Congrats to them

[garnetstar38.livejournal.com]

I can’t believe they are still refusing to do merch, ticket bundles or iTunes pre-saves. That’s crazy. Can you imagine what these numbers would look like if they did?

And it’s always funny that in the west when people talk about western artists sales after the fact they never mention Merch or Ticket bundles but they never miss an opportunity to say “actually” BTS had 4 versions of their albums.

[kary1591.livejournal.com]

Lol mte. Taylor Swift also had 4 versions of her last album and her breaking a million sales had no one batting an eyelash.

[katheli.livejournal.com]

right? bundles are wayyyy bigger on album sales than having four versions you can basically inflate your sales from like 50k to 300k with the right amount of merch and tour bundles. I feel like BTS could easily pull 500k first week with some merch and their stadium tour. But sure, four versions is inflating numbers? also nowadays Western artists with big fanbases literally do that as well...on top of bundles!

[pinklunacy.livejournal.com]

Damn. These are impressive numbers. Congratulations kings!

And like you OP, I have yet to pre-order my copies. I too always wait for the concept photos before ordering, which is all sorts of stupid in my case because I constantly end up buying all 4 versions anyway! I'm weak.

[infj23.livejournal.com]

lol I've been good and restrained myself to one version but buying two copies of it (one for keepsake and one for regular use).

[reader17.livejournal.com]

I have not pre-ordered for two reasons, the first reason I don't have the money for it right now, and the second reasion I want to make sure I like over half the songs. If I only like one or two songs then I will buy the songs, but if I like over half of the songs then I will buy the album.

[mun-chairudo.livejournal.com]

thumbs up! you are doing it the sensible way.

well, i haven't pre-ordered mine either for 3 reasons.
1) i want to wait until i see more of their concept because i only want to buy 1 version and i want to pick the one that speaks to me the most.
2) i'm seriously considering just buying it from a local store instead of ordering it online; like yay, i can do that now! walk into a store and buy a bts album. yay, yay!
3) in case the concept doesn't convince me, i'd buy the digital album and be done with it \o/

i'm not worried about the songs, i'm 99,999% positive i'll like most of the songs on the album since
1) i love shadow, black swan and ego
2) their music has never disappointed me before

[infj23.livejournal.com]

It’s for this reason that I have not looked into buying concert tickets yet. I don’t want to attend a concert where I dislike the album being promoted.

[gigabytexx.livejournal.com]

For me I dont care about the songs since I can stream them on Spotify, but since it's physical album we're gonna buy and hold, it's important to choose concept photos! Ha!