Drake earned ten new plaques from the RIAA ( Record Industry Association of America), totaling 184 million singles sold. This new record propelled Drake past Eminem, who held the record since March when he hit 166 million units across his singles catalog. Drake became only the third act in history to have at least five diamond singles; Bruno Mars has six, and Post Malone has five.
The RIAA began its certifications in 1958. Its process is as follows: one unit equals 150 on-demand streams. Regarding plaques, Gold means an artist has hit 500,000 units, Platinum is 1 million units, multi-Platinum is 2 million units, and Diamond is 10 million units. While digital and physical albums count as one “unit” per sale, the RIAA requires ten permanent track downloads and 1,500 on-demand video or audio streams for the same amount. In other words, 1,000 downloads and 150,000 streams equal the 100 units you’d earn by selling just 100 physical or digital albums.
Drake has been on a record-breaking streak. Presently he is close to breaking the record for the highest certified RIAA song, which Post Malone and Swae Lee currently hold for Sunflower and Lil Nas X for Old Town Road. Both pieces are presently 17x platinum. Last month, the Toronto rapper tied Jay-Z’s record for the most No. 1s on the Billboard Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums with 14. His latest album, Her Loss, dropped on November 4, 2022.
Drake has solidified himself quite nicely in the music industry. With 170 million records sold worldwide, he is among the best-selling music artists in history. Drake has achieved eleven number-one albums on the Billboard 200 and twelve hits on the Billboard Hot 100.
