AC/DC Album Sales Visualized

A presentation of the sales history of all AC/DC's Gold, Platinum, and Diamond certified releases.
Albums are certified Gold at 500,000 copies sold, Platinum at 1,000,000 copies sold, and Diamond at 10,000,000(!) copies sold. The data and dates used in this video are based on the RIAA's published records.
Sales numbers are included for the following releases from the AC/DC discography:
- Back in Black
- Highway to Hell
- Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap
- The Razors Edge
- Who Made Who
- For Those About to Rock
- AC/DC Live
- High Voltage
- Ballbreaker
- Black Ice
- Let There Be Rock
- 74 Jailbreak
- Blow Up Your Video
Due to space constraints within the chart, the following gold and platinum releases are not shown:
- Rock or Bust (500,000 copies sold)
- Iron Man 2 (500,000)
- Bonfire (box set) (1,000,000)
- Stiff Upper Lip (1,000,000)
- If You Want Blood You Got It (1,000,000)
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[@low_mans_lyric]

For some reason in 1995 Back in Black started selling like crazy again. For like a 10 year period after that.

[@NoneMoreMetal]

This chart is based on RIAA gold/platinum/diamond certification awards and their dates. Often these awards will lag actual record sales, sometimes by a decent amount.
Back in Black was certified 10x platinum in 1990, and then didn't get another certification until 1996. My theory is that two things happened in that 6 year window which both contribute to the drastic uptick in sales starting in '96:
1) The widespread adoption of CDs as the medium of choice. Lots of people who already owned Back in Black on vinyl and cassette bought it again on CD during this period.
2) Razors Edge was released in 1990. Thunderstuck (and to a lesser extent Moneytalks) exposed AC/DC to a whole new generation of rock fans, who then went out and bought their most well known album.

[@chris8534]

Where's the TNT album? According to wikipedia it went 9 times platinum in Australia (630k). What a travesty for Let there be rock to be so low.

[@NoneMoreMetal]

This chart is based only on U.S. sales.

[@lawsonfan5797]

What this tells me is not nearly enough people have heard Powerage.

[@NoneMoreMetal]

Agreed!

[@johngandolfo2073]

Yeah pretty sad isn't it?

[@mufflersponge8969]

Why did they Highway to hell album pop up before the 2 that came before it

[@NoneMoreMetal]

It received award certificate prior to those albums. The first appearance of an album on this video isn’t based on release date, it’s based on the date the first award was received.