The BLACKPINK album “THE ALBUM” has debuted at No. 2 on the US Billboard 200 with 110,000 units earned, of which 81,000 are pure album sales.

Not only has the BLACKPINK album become the highest-charting K-pop girl group album in the history of the Billboard 200, but also BLACKPINK had the highest-charting album by an all-female group since Danity Kane in 2008.

Breaking records

Billboard noted that “THE ALBUM” actually set two milestones for all-female groups on the Billboard 200.

The Album marks the highest-charting album by an all-female group since Danity Kane’s second album Welcome to the Dollhouse debuted at No. 1 on the chart dated April 5, 2008. The Album additionally is the highest-charting debut full-length album by an all-female group since Danity Kane’s self-titled effort opened at No. 1 on Sept. 9, 2006.

Prior to “THE ALBUM”, BLACKPINK charted on the Billboard 200 with two extended plays: their debut EP “Square Up”, which reached No. 40 in 2018, and “Kill This Love”, which placed No. 24 last year.

21 Savage and Metro Boomin’s “Savage Mode II”, debuted at No. 1 this week on the Billboard 200, with 171,000 equivalent album units. While “Savage Mode II” only had 22,000 pure album sales compared to BLACKPINK’s 81,000 copies, it earned 148,000 SEA (streaming equivalent albums) units (from 200.1M on-demand streams of the album’s songs) and 1,000 TEA (track equivalent albums) units (where 1 unit is equal to 10 song downloads from the same album).

Over the weekend, the BLACKPINK album also made history in the UK, the world’s third-biggest music market, where it debuted at No. 2 in the Official Albums Chart Top 100. The K-pop queens nearly defeated the legendary British rock band Queen plus Adam Lambert with their last-minute challenge.

BLACKPINK also made history in Germany, the world’s fourth-biggest music market. “THE ALBUM” debuted at No. 7 in Germany, making BLACKPINK the first Korean female act to pull off this feat.

In their home country, BLACKPINK has also been breaking records. On Oct. 6, the physical edition of “THE ALBUM” was launched in South Korea. The BLACKPINK album sold 589,310 copies on its first day. This not only broke the highest first-day sales record for girl group albums on Hanteo, but also the highest first-week sales record.

The BLACKPINK album is the first girl group album to sell 500,000 copies on Hanteo. On Day 1, it has already become the best-selling girl group album not only on Hanteo, but also Gaon Album Chart. Gaon Album Chart tracks the physical sales of domestic albums shipped to other countries.