Taylor Swift has been named IFPI’s Global Recording Artist of the Year 2024, marking her third consecutive year at the top and setting a new record as the first artist to win the award five times.
The pop superstar’s latest win, announced Tuesday (February 18), follows her previous IFPI Global Artist victories in 2014, 2019, 2022, and 2023. For Swift, 2024 was a banner year that saw her album THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT dominate multiple IFPI global charts.
IFPI’s Global Recording Artist of the Year Award is calculated based on an artist’s worldwide performance across streaming, downloads, and physical music formats throughout the calendar year.
THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT, released in April 2024, swept all major IFPI global album categories, including the Global Album Chart, Global Vinyl Album Chart, Global Streaming Album Chart, and Global Album Sales Chart. Less than 12 hours after its release, it became the most-streamed album in a single day in 2024.
The album sold 5.6 million copies worldwide in 2024, with its success amplified by Swift’s record-breaking The Eras Tour, which drove significant engagement with her entire music catalog across streaming platforms globally.
TikTok even had an in-app experience built for the album, with its launch coinciding with the return of Swift’s music to the platform.
Pollstar’s 2024 Year End Analysis also shows Swift’s The Eras Tour becoming the highest-grossing tour of all time, with $2.2 billion in revenue.
“We are immensely proud to award the IFPI Global Recording Artist of the Year Award to Taylor Swift for the fifth time, as she continues to redefine the limits of global success,” IFPI CEO Victoria Oakley said.
“This has been a huge year for Taylor, and it has been incredible to see the extent to which fans all over the world are connecting with her superb catalog of music.”
The 2024 Global Recording Artist Chart also highlighted several notable industry trends. Drake secured the second position (up from No. 4 in 2023), while K-pop group SEVENTEEN landed in third (down from second spot in 2023). In 2023, SEVENTEEN’s FML was the biggest-selling album globally. Last year, two of the group’s albums — SPILL THE FEELS and 17 IS RIGHT HERE — placed sixth and eighth in the Top 20 IFPI Global Album Chart.
The year saw breakthrough appearances from artists like Zach Bryan and Sabrina Carpenter, who both reached the top 10 for the first time. Billie Eilish and Kendrick Lamar also re-entered the Top 10 Global Recording Artist Chart in 2024.
The global charts revealed shifting industry patterns, particularly in the vinyl market, which showed a growing trend toward new releases and female artists. This was exemplified by strong performances from Chappell Roan‘s The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess, and Billie Eilish‘s HIT ME HARD AND SOFT. Eilish was Apple Music‘s Artist of the Year for 2024, the first artist to receive this honor twice following her initial win in 2019.
Swift’s catalog also placed in the Top 20 of IFPI’s Global Vinyl Album Chart: 1989 (Taylor’s Version) (2023), Midnights (2022), folklore (2020), evermore (2020), and Lover (2019).
On the Global Album Sales Chart, K-pop maintained its dominant position, with groups like ENHYPEN and SEVENTEEN dominating much of the chart. It also reflected strong performances from other Asian markets, with Chinese artist Zhou Shen and Japanese group Snow Man making appearances in the top 20.
In addition to the IFPI recognition, Swift also claimed the title of Spotify’s most-streamed artist for the second year in a row in 2024, achieving more than 26.6 billion streams for the whole year.
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