Yarp! When I'm thinking about it, when counting worldwide sales, both B'z and Ayu should be one list higher! (until 100 million).

Oh well, we should at least be happy she's getting SOME credit ; )

I saw it long time ago, I'm pretty much sure it's around 60 millions now.
Anyway I'm so proud of Ayu. ;)

i think shes still in the 50million counting only japan sales, which is what you see on this list. but like i said b4, if you check her page in wikipedia, ull see shes at around 100million with japan + asia sales, but that is if the numbers listed in wikipedia are true.

and here we have some award show where the girl says she has sold over 5million in asia.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Avq5CaDpwK4

so who knows how she has really sold outside japan, but my guess would be around 100million

wow! im so proud of Ayu :yes shes one of the artist that represent Asia among those western artists. go Ayu!

yes,really hope they would count the sale outside japan too,if that happen we'll see her album sale increasing(imo) as shes more popular outside japan now~

It's impossible that she sold almost 40 million outside of japan. :P I would guess she's closer to 60 than 50 now, but not 100.

as of 2005 for japan (from music station)

From Music Station 2005.04.01

Rank Artist Sale

1 B'z 75,614,000
2 Mr. Children 50,635,000
3 Southern All Stars 47,083,000
4 Hamasaki Ayumi 45,528,000
5 DREAMS COME TRUE 40,893,000
6 Matsutoya Yumi 37,790,000
7 GLAY 35,800,000
8 ZARD 35,450,000
9 Utada Hikaru 32,160,000
10 CHAGE & ASKA 31,220,000


Actually I¨m not sure if she passed SAS yet, but it's possible which would make her the third most selling japanese artist domestically of all time. THese are oricon's numbers.

this is really awesome.

^
Probably. But I don't really think that her total sales counting all asian countries are that much higer because sales in these countries are really really low. Other worldwide artists sold/sell a lot in the biggest music markets which includes mostly western europe, north america, japan and to a certain extent south america.

She's been on there quite a while. :) Hikki too! They rock! :heart

Utada was 40 million worldwide when EXODUS came out, so she definitely has to be past that now with the sales of HEART STATION & ULTRA BLUE, as well as This Is The One. :yes

According to the discography thing on Wikipedia, Utada has around 37 million CD sales (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hikaru_...8Japan_Only.29). I'm really skeptical about that 50 million...:S

^50 million is the number her record label released...

i believe wiki said 37 million for japan. but since hikki technically is a more international artists with her us releases her total would be around 50 million like adrenekoi said.

ayu on the other hand would just be domestic sales, yes?

or we could go by the sales Avex reports, instead of oricon. the numbers would be a lot different.

one thing for sure is that i think oricon has reported she has pass the 50million. and seeing in the clip that i posted where the asian chick said she had sold over 5million that year, i wouldnt be surprise if the sales would be just about what she has sold in japan, most likely less but not that far apart.

OMG~ ayu awesomeee~~

Yes, the official avex sales is what I was going by when I said to tack on a significant amount more.
Also, according to all the sources I've ever seen about Asia sales, the totals of all other countries usually equal the amount of just Japan, so yeah.... In other words, Ayu has sold over twice as much as what ORICON says, lol. In physical sales alone.

Yaaay go Ayu!!! :yatta :heart

this list is odd. where is Britney and Madana???

wiki says that ayu sold 75 million in asia n japan in total,,,,

I was about to say where's Britney, Madge, and Micheal? But this is 50-74 sold, they're way past that, lol. :P

Good for Ayu and Hikki too... though I'd be a little more excited if that list was actually up to date. :innocent

wow!! Congrats to Ayu and Andrea Bocelli!!

It's really strange tehre isn't Laura Pausini, she's so famous worldwide

Such a shame people in Japan adore Oricon XD. I'm not saying it's not handy, but they tend to consider it to be the conclusive factor in an album's succes.
Although I DO believe avex, and all record companies, exaggerate numbers for promotion, I do think that they're somewhere in between.

Plus people shouldn't underestimate the strength of the Asian market. Korea and Singapore, I think, are one of the few countries that publish actual numbers, and those aren't very high, but there are a lot of other countries and even though individual numbers may be low, combined they can match the Japan numbers.

Take Lady Gaga. She recently said she has sold over 5 million in Asia. Probably a bit exaggerated, but when you considered probably only one of those millions is from Japan ...