In the week ending August 15, Tortured Poets experienced a decline in sales but managed to maintain its position at the top of the Billboard 200 chart, earning 85,000 equivalent album units in the United States. The album, by the popular artist Swift, has spent a remarkable 84 weeks at number one on the Billboard 200, solidifying her position as the solo artist with the most weeks at the top. Elvis Presley follows closely behind with 67 weeks.

Meanwhile, Chappell Roan's album, The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess, continues its upward trajectory for the third consecutive week, reaching a new peak at number 2. The album saw a 13% increase in units, earning an impressive 72,000 equivalent album units. This marks the highest weekly performance for the set. Over the past ten weeks, The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess has steadily climbed the chart, cementing its popularity among listeners.

The Billboard 200 chart ranks albums based on multi-metric consumption, including album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA), and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). For the Tortured Poets album, streaming equivalent albums contributed 57,000 units, album sales accounted for 28,000 units (a 67% decrease), and TEA units made up a negligible portion.

The tracking week of August 9-15 was eventful for Swift as news emerged regarding a foiled terror attack on her cancelled Eras Tour dates in Vienna. Despite the setback, the tour continued on to London's Wembley Stadium for its final shows in Europe. Swift also introduced new digital album variants of Tortured Poets on her official webstore, featuring exclusive bonus tracks recorded during The Eras Tour.

Despite strong competition from Chappell Roan, Tortured Poets remained firmly at number one on the Top Album Sales chart. The album sold nearly 10,000 digital album downloads across all variants, reaffirming its dominance. Even without any digital album sales, Tortured Poets would still have secured the number one spot on the Billboard 200, with a 13,000-unit lead over The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess.

Other notable entries on the chart include Morgan Wallen's One Thing at a Time, which slipped from number one to number three, and Billie Eilish's Hit Me Hard and Soft, which climbed to number four. Zach Bryan's The Great American Bar Scene also made strides, moving up to number five.

Luminate, the independent data provider for Billboard charts, thoroughly reviews and authenticates all data submissions used for compiling the weekly chart rankings. Suspicious or unverifiable data is promptly removed using established criteria before the final chart calculations are made and published.

The new chart, dated August 24, 2024, will be available in full on Billboard's website on August 20. To stay updated with the latest chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on social media platforms.