The Top 10 highest grossing tours of all time

23 August 2024, 14:00

When the rock legends tour, much money changes hands. Radio X looks at the tours that made the most money and how much, exactly.

By Radio X

@RadioX

The industry titles Billboard and Pollstar are a goldmine of information for tour grosses and totals, but to make things simpler and more relatable, these figures have been converted into British pounds based on the current exchange rate (August 2024).

1. Taylor Swift - The Eras Tour, 2023/2024: £791 million

   Opening in Arizona on 17th March 2023 and currently making its way around Europe, Swift's Eras Tour is a show-business phenomenon and has knocked all other contenders off the top spot by breaking the $1 billion mark. It's due to wind up in Vancouver in December 2024.

   

2. Coldplay - Music Of The Spheres tour, 2022-2024: £720 million

   After the COVID pandemic put a stop to live performance, Coldplay came back with a vengeance on 18th March 2022 with a tour that spans the release of two albums: 2021's Music Of The Spheres and the forthcoming Moon Music. The show will go on until November in New Zealand - and Coldplay even managed to find time to headline Glastonbury for a record fifth time! According to Billboard, Coldplay have now earned the title of the Biggest Earning Rock Tour Of All Time by amassing over $945 million.

3. Elton John: Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour: £715 million

   When SIr Elt said that he was calling time on his touring career, his farewell shows quickly became THE hot ticket and his swansong has shot all the way to No 2 in this chart. It began in Pennsylvania on 8th September 2018 and ended in Stockholm on 8th July 2023, just after Elton headlined Glastonbury - a total of 330 shows. In dollars, that's over $939 million.

   

4. Ed Sheeran ÷ Tour: £591 million

   One of Britains' biggest exports of the past decade, this was amazingly, only Sheeran's third trek around the world, in support of his third album ÷. It began in Turin, Italy on 16th March 2017 and the final curtain came down on home turf at Ipswich's Chantry Park on 26th August 2019. The tour earned $776 million.

   

5. U2 360° Tour: £561 million

   Bono, The Edge, Larry Mullen and Adam Clayton packed their bags and headed to the Camp Npu stadium in Barcelona to kick off their latest tour on 30th June 2009. The 360° Tour was in support of their album No Line On The Horizon and immediately trumped all previous tours by the band, in that they took the biggest stage set ever constructed across the world with them, allowing the group to be seen "in the round". By the time the tour wound up on 30 July 2011 in Moncton, Canada, they'd performed to 7.2 million people and made $736 million dollars. Add a decade's worth of inflation on top and it would be $997 million in today's money.

   

6. Harry Styles - Love On Tour, 2021/2023: £470 million

   The erstwhile One Direction performer took his Fine Line and Harry's House albums out to the masses, starting at Las Vegas on 4th September 2021 and ending at Reggio Emilia in Italy on 22nd July 2023. In US dollars, the tour earned over $617 million.

7. Ed Sheeran +–=÷× Tour: £445 million

   Sheeran's jaunt in support of his albums = and - began in Dublin's Croke Park on 23rd April 2022 and is set to head back to Europe in May 2025. In US dollars, it's earned over $584 million.

   

8. Guns N'Roses Not In This Lifetime... Tour: £445 million

   The long-awaited reunion of the classic GN'R lineup of Axl Rose, Slash and Duff McKagan took place at their old haunt The Troubadour in Hollywood on 1st April 2016. The tour officially ended on 2nd November 2019 at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, by which point the band had made over $584 million. Along the way, Axl even found time to stand in for the retiring Brian Johnson as singer of AC/DC.

   

9. Beyoncé Renaissance World Tour: £441 million

   The R&B superstar's tour in support of her 2022 Renaissance album started off in Stockholm on 10th May 2023 and closed in Kansas City on 1st October of that year. In US dollars, it earned over $579 million.

   

10. The Rolling Stones Bigger Bang Tour: £425 million

    Mick Jagger and the boys hit the road on 10th August 2005 with a surprise club show in Toronto, before business got underway in earnest at Boston MAs Fenway Park on 21st August. The veteran rockers were still at it two years later when the final show took place at London's O2 on 26th August 2007. In today's money, the tour made over $820 million.

    

11. The Rolling Stones - No Filter Tour: £416 million

    Despite the COVID pandemic interrupting it for two years and the death of longtime member Charlie Watts in August 2021, the Stones' latest tour has shot into the Top 10, proving that the veteran rockers can still pull in an audience, earning over $546 million. The No Filter Tour kicked off in Hamburg on 9th September 2017, paused in August 2019 and resumed, with Steve Jordan in the drum stool on 20th September 2021. The remaining Stones - Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood - show no signs of slowing down and they have only just finished their SIXTIETH anniversary tour.