The highest attended concert tour of all time
When The Beatles decided to quit touring in 1966, it was the logical decision because of the lack of infrastructure in the live entertainment industry. From a financial perspective, their time was better spent making a new album in the studio rather than on the road, but the music business has completely transformed since the Fab Four called it a day.
The economics of the music industry is incomparable to even the 1990s. Back then, acts would tour to promote their new album, where they made the bulk of their money. However, today, even bands who score number-one records are not necessarily making a profit on their albums once expenses are considered and the label takes its cut.
Therefore, touring has become crucial to survival, and every act needs to get on the road to earn money. When live shows were taken away during the Covid-19 pandemic, many bands were worried about how they could pay their rent without gigs and, as a result, took second jobs out of sheer desperation. While streaming platforms have their advantages and allow musicians to discover a large audience, the pay isn’t enough for most artists to get by.
The musicians with the highest monthly listeners on Spotify also correlate with the attendance of live shows. Concert tours are becoming bigger as the infrastructure and stadia are now in place to allow bands to play huge venues around the globe. U2 were pioneers of these such tours, and for many years, they held the record for having the most people attending a tour.
The Irish rock band began their innovative 360° Tour in 2009, and for two years, they were largely on the road. The average attendance for their run of dates was 66,110, beginning with two dates at Camp Nou in Barcelona, with their European tour making up the first leg. While on the continent, U2 played at legendary stadiums, including London’s Wembley and the San Siro in Milan.
In total, U2 played seven legs which saw the group play to huge crowds in South Africa, Australia, South America and a lengthy tour of the United States. The 360° Tour was finally concluded at the Magnet Hill Concert Site in Moncton, Canada, on July 30th, 2011 – over two years after they began in Barcelona.
Their tour was attended by 7,272,046 across the 110 shows, and for a while, it seemed as though this record would never be beaten, but English singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran achieved the impossible when he stepped on the road to promote his 2017 album ÷.
While Sheeran began the tour by playing much smaller venues than U2 and bringing his music to indoor arenas across Europe, over two years later, the record belonged to him. On May 24th, 2019, Sheeran’s collective attendance surpassed U2 and reached 7,315,970 following a performance at the Groupama Stadium in Lyon.
Although the average attendance per show was only 34,832, considerably less than U2, Sheeran played 260 shows in total. When the tour finally ended, Sheeran had remarkably performed in front of 9,078,636 people across the tour, which concluded with four hometown shows at Chantry Park in Ipswich.
After the tour concluded, he wrote on Instagram: “9 million people, 893 days, 46 countries, 175 cities, 260 [sic] shows, 268 touring crew, 193265 miles travelled, 2 broken arms, 3 marriages, 4 babies. What a wild ride this Divide tour has been… The Divide tour – 2017-2019. Officially the biggest tour of all time, so weird to say that, and we survived it!”
Watch Sheeran perform live below.
