Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres World Tour has become the biggest rock tour of all time according to Billboard’s touring archives.
The British band is currently touring in Europe – their third European leg no less – before heading over to Australia and New Zealand in October and November. The tour has also travelled to Asia, North America and South America since launching in March 2022.
According to figures reported to Billboard Boxscore, the Music of the Spheres World Tour has grossed $945.7m (£727m/€843m) and has sold more than 8.8 million tickets. These figures make the tour the highest-grossing and best-selling rock tour in the nearly 40 years that Boxscore has been tracking concert data.
Coldplay have overtaken Sir Elton John’s Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour, which grossed $939.1m during its run between 2018 and 2023. In November 2022, Sir Elton’s tour overtook U2’s U2 360 Tour, which earned $736.4m from 2009 and 2011. Making up the rest of the major rock tours over the year include The Rolling Stones and their A Bigger Bang Tour with $558m between 2005 and 2007, as well as AC/DC, Guns N’ Roses, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Roger Waters.
Based purely on ticket sales, Coldplay have held the all-time rock title since January this year. The band ended U2’s 13-year record of 7.3 million tickets sold. Before that, The Rolling Stones were top for 16 years with 6.4 million tickets during the Voodoo Lounge Tour in 1994-95.
Coldplay still have 19 dates of the tour left to play, meaning the band could reach an unprecedented 10 million ticket sales.
The band have been trying to tour more sustainably and reduce their footprint. In June, Coldplay published a sustainability report demonstrating a 59% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions in its first two years compared to their previous tour.
Earlier this month, Coldplay played to more than 178,000 people during their first visit to Helsinki, Finland.
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