Welp, it’s Joever for those artists and their chart manipulation tactics. Billboard and Luminate are finally cracking down on album variants for the Billboard 200 album chart.
Here is a rundown of the upcoming changes, courtesy of Chart Data.
[Billboard rule change, effective immediately]
• Any D2C store with three submissions of illegitimate data within a 12-month period may receive a minimum 90-day reporting suspension.
• Physical D2C shipments which fall outside of “established sales trends” will require the reporting store to provide enhanced tracking status along with other info such as geo-location data and if a VPN was used to make the purchase.
[Billboard rule change, effective February 28]
• Digital albums sold via an artist, label, or other official web store must now be redeemed in order to be chart eligible. In addition, verification using hCaptcha is now required to prevent bots.
[Billboard rule change, effective April 4:]
• Only four (4) “digital exclusive versions” will be allowed for the life of an album. Includes deluxe versions.
• “Digital D2C exclusive versions” cannot be put up for sale during the middle of the first week. Either need to be available for pre-order or held for a later week of release.
• Minimum price for all exclusive digital albums has been raised to $7.99.
• Minimum price of albums increasing at all retailers:
$7.99 – CD
$7.99 – Cassette
$15.99 – Vinyl
Billboard and Luminate rule changes to albums charts have begun to roll out.
Initial changes were quietly introduced with releases beginning February 28. More changes expected April.
— chart data (@chartdata) March 17, 2025
