List of UK Albums Chart Christmas number ones facts for kids

The UK Albums Chart is a weekly list that shows the most popular albums in the United Kingdom. These lists are based on how many albums are sold. When we talk about "Christmas number ones," we mean the albums that are at the very top of this chart on Christmas Day. Usually, the Christmas number one is the album that was announced as number one on the Sunday just before December 25th. If Christmas Day happens to be a Sunday, then the album announced on that day's chart is the official number one. As of 2023, 65 albums have reached this special Christmas number one spot.

The UK Albums Chart counts sales from Sunday to Saturday. It includes both physical albums (like CDs) and digital albums you can download. The chart is put together by the Official Charts Company (OCC), which works for the UK music industry. Every Sunday evening, the new number one album is announced on The Radio 1 Chart Show. The very first album chart was published in 1956 by a magazine called Record Mirror. The first ever UK Christmas number one album was the soundtrack to the 1956 movie The King and I. This soundtrack was so popular that it was also the Christmas number one in 1957! After that, in 1958, the soundtrack for South Pacific became the second Christmas number one. It stayed at the top of the album chart for an amazing 115 weeks, and was also number one for Christmas in 1959 and 1960. Other famous movie soundtracks like The Sound of Music and Grease also became Christmas number ones.

The Beatles have had seven Christmas number one albums, more than any other music act.

Music companies make a lot of their yearly sales during the Christmas season, sometimes as much as forty percent! A music seller named Geoff Bonouvrie said in 2009 that "The whole psychology of buying changes around Christmas. ... People's buying habits change. They are buying gifts for other people." Because of this, reaching number one on the album chart for Christmas is a really big deal in the music world. Christmas number one albums often sell huge numbers of copies. Between 1986 and 2012, 23 out of 27 Christmas number one albums were also among the top three best-selling albums of their entire year.

In the UK, betting shops sometimes let people bet on which albums will be the Christmas number one. For example, in 2010, two big betting companies, William Hill and Ladbrokes, offered very low odds for Take That to get the Christmas number one album. This meant they were almost certain Take That would win! In 2011, the album Christmas by Canadian singer Michael Bublé became the Christmas number one. Michael Bublé said he was "thrilled" to achieve this. The next year, Scottish singer-songwriter Emeli Sandé topped the chart. In 2014, Ed Sheeran had the Christmas number one with his album X, which had the biggest sales in one week for any artist album that year. The year after, in 2015, Adele's album 25 became the Christmas number one, selling 450,000 copies!

After the first Now That's What I Call Music album came out in December 1983, albums that collected songs from many different artists (called compilation albums) became super popular in the UK during the mid to late 1980s. This is why many Christmas number ones during that time were these types of albums. From 1983 to 1987, every Christmas number one album was a compilation album from either the Now That's What I Call Music or Hits series. Because of this, the UK Albums Chart rules were changed. From January 14, 1989, compilation albums with various artists were no longer allowed on the main album chart.

Christmas Chart Toppers: The Albums That Made History

Singer Marni Nixon sang on the soundtrack album to The King and I, which was the first album to ever be Christmas number one in the UK.

Elton John has had two Christmas number one albums, in two years in a row.

Queen has had two Christmas number one albums, in 1975 and 1991.

John Lennon had a solo Christmas number one in 1982 with The John Lennon Collection, after he had passed away.

Robbie Williams has topped the UK Albums Chart four times at Christmas.

As of December 2019, there have been 61 Christmas number one albums. The most successful music group is The Beatles, who have had seven different albums reach the Christmas number one spot. They were number one for Christmas almost every year from 1963 to 1969 (except 1966). They also topped the chart in 2000 with their collection of hit songs, 1. The only other artist to have more than three Christmas number one albums is British singer Robbie Williams, who has had four solo albums reach the top. Robbie Williams was also part of Take That when their album Progress was number one in 2010. Take That has had three Christmas number one albums in total.

The record label that has had the most Christmas number one albums is Virgin Records, with eight albums. Virgin did very well with sales of the Now That's What I Call Music! compilation series. They had four of the five Christmas number ones between 1983 and 1987. As mentioned earlier, from January 14, 1989, compilation albums featuring various artists were no longer included in the main UK Albums Chart.