Highest attendance for a music tour

Ed Sheeran’s (UK) ÷ [Divide] Tour – the highest-grossing music tour in history ($776.2 million; £631.3 million) – generated a total attendance of 8,882,182 at the 255 shows staged across six continents between 16 March 2017 and 26 August 2019, according to Billboard Boxscore. The record was set in France on 24 May 2019, when a performance at the Groupama Stadium in Lyon, watched by 7,315,970 fans, took the ÷ Tour’s overall attendance figures past those of U2’s 360° Tour – previously the highest-grossing music tour – which attracted 7,272,046 people to 110 shows between June 2009 and July 2011.

In Europe alone, the ÷ Tour attracted more than 4.84 million people and grossed $419.7 million (£341.4 million) from 112 shows. The spectacle was watched by almost 2 million fans in North America (88 shows), just over 1 million in Australia (18 shows), 454,000 in Asia (19 shows), more than 357,300 in South America (14 shows) and 225,900 people in Africa (four shows).

Sheeran set the single-tour record despite the average attendance per show (34,832) being almost half that of U2’s average of 66,110, due to the Halifax-born singer-songwriter playing smaller venues than the Irish rock giants. The ÷ Tour’s average ticket price of $86.75 (£71.49) compares favourably with the $101.15 (£83.36; then £61.81) average paid by fans on U2’s 360° Tour.

Sheeran took to Instagram (@teddysphotos) to celebrate the success of the tour, writing: “9 million people, 893 days, 46 countries, 175 cities, 260 [sic] shows, 268 touring crew, 193265 miles travelled, 2 broken arms, 3 marriages, 4 babies. What a wild ride this Divide tour has been… The Divide tour - 2017-2019. Officially the biggest tour of all time, so weird to say that, and we survived it!”

The tour’s set list included ÷ favourites “Castle on the Hill”, “Perfect” and “Shape of You”, plus a selection of tracks from previous albums such as “Sing”, “The A Team” and “Thinking Out Loud”.