Taylor Swift brought her record-breaking Eras Tour to a close in Vancouver on Sunday. In total, more than 10 billion fans watched the sequin-clad songstress rip through her three-hour set throughout the tour, which lasted the best part of two years - 149 sellout shows across five continents.
Swift kicked off the Eras Tour at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona on 17 March 2023 - the first of 66 shows last year. The tour resumed in 2024 with four dates in Tokyo in February and concluded last weekend with the last of 83 shows performed this year.
Record concert ticket sales
- Taylor Swift: Eras Tour (2023-2024): 10,168,008
- Coldplay: Music of the Spheres World Tour (2022-2024): 8.82 million.
- U2: U2 360 Tour (2009-2011): 7.27 million.
- The Rolling Stones: Voodoo Lounge Tour (1994-1995): 6.44 million.
- Elton John: Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour (2018-2023): 6.03 million.
- Coldplay: A Head Full of Dreams Tour (2016-2017): 5.39 million.
- Guns N’ Roses: Not in This Lifetime... Tour (2016-2019): 5.37 million.
- U2: Vertigo Tour (2005-2006): 4.62 million.
- The Rolling Stones: Bridges to Babylon Tour (1997-1998): 4.52 million.
- Roger Waters: The Wall Live (2010-2013): 4.13 million.
- U2: PopMart Tour (1997-1998): 3.98 million.
Eras Tour smashes several concert records
The Eras Tour broke all kinds of records - setting new, single-day attendance records at several venues such as Pittsburgh’s Acrisure Stadium, Allianz Parque in São Paulo, Anfield, Lumen Field, and Murrayfield to name just a few.
It was also the highest-grossing concert tour by a solo artist, as well as the highest-grossing concert tour of all time.
Highest-grossing tours in history
- Taylor Swift: Eras Tour (2023-2024): $2 billion
- Coldplay: Music of the Spheres World Tour (2022-2024): 944.7 million.
- Elton John: Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour (2018-2023): 939.1 million.
- U2: U2 360 Tour (2009-2011): 736.4 million.
- Guns N’ Roses: Not in This Lifetime... Tour (2016-2019): 584.2 million.
- The Rolling Stones: A Bigger Bang Tour (2005-2007): 558 million.
- The Rolling Stones: No Filter Tour (2017-2021): 546.5 million.
- Coldplay: A Head Full of Dreams Tour (2016-2017): 523.3 million.
- Roger Waters: The Wall Live (2010-2013): 459.2 million.
- AC/DC: Black Ice World Tour (2008-2010): 441.6 million.
- Red Hot Chili Peppers: Unlimited Love Tour (2022-2024): 390.8 million.
With the tour now over, we can get some idea of the sheer magnitude of it and the impressive figures it has generated. Swift has sold an average of 72,500 tickets per show, with each ticket costing approximately $238.95 on average.
On Monday, it was reported that from start to finish, the Eras Tour grossed a total of $2,077,618,725. Then there are the other money-spinners from merchandising and related spin-off media.
The movie documenting the tour was also a huge financial success. Swift released the self-produced concert film on 13 October 2023 and since then it has taken in $261.7 million at the box office.
Book, movie, and merch
The 256-page coffee-table Eras Tour book which hit Target stores on Black Friday (November 28), retailing at $39.99, sold 814,000 copies in its first two days.
Add in another $500 million or so in merchandise sales and you have a very lucrative year by anyone’s standards.
And let’s not forget Taylor’s album The Tortured Poets Department, released in April. It shot straight to number one in 28 countries worldwide and went 6x platinum in the United States, 3x platinum in New Zealand, and 2x platinum in the United Kingdom.
Between downloads, streams and physical vinyl LPs, the album sold 2.474 million units and returned to the No.1 spot in Billboard’s album chart again this week thanks to the release of a new, deluxe Anthology box set, which has already shifted 405,000 album units in North America.
The Tortured Poets Department - The Anthology which was the most streamed album of 2024 on Spotify. With 26.6 billion global streams during 2024, that’s another $84.5 million for Taylor’s bank balance.
While it’s not possible to give an accurate total, that’s about as close as we can get to finding out how much Taylor Swift earned over the last 12 months - without any doubt one of the most successful years of her career.
Taylor Swift’s record-breaking Eras Tour officially came to a close on Sunday night with the singer’s final performance in Vancouver, Canada.
In the aftermath of the nearly two-year stretch of concerts, news outlets have highlighted some impressive stats from the Eras era: Swift performed 149 shows in 54 cities across 21 countries and five of seven continents. More than 10 million people attended her shows, with the highest attendance for a single night at 96,006 in Melbourne, Australia.
The Eras tour sold more than $2 billion in tickets ― double the sales of previous record holders. And that doesn’t even account for the broader economic impact of hotel bookings, flights, themed food and beverage events, elaborate outfits, friendship bracelet supplies, and more. Other points of interest include Swift’s donations to local food banks along the tour route and large bonus payments to the Eras crew and performers.
But amid the positive press, fans are also bemoaning the way certain outlets have decided to frame this moment in the singer’s career: by turning the focus to Swift’s romantic life.
“She’s Turning 35!” reads an Us Weekly magazine cover, which features an image of Swift and one of her boyfriend, Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. “Taylor at a Crossroads: An Engagement to Travis Kelce? Baby plans? New music? Another tour?”
The order of priorities in that list was striking to many Swifties, who slammed the headline as “so misogynistic” and “gross.”
Others pointed to Swift’s song “The Man,” which featured prominently at the beginning of her Eras tour setlist and tackles the issue of double standards for men and women in the spotlight.
Apt lyrics include: “They’d say I played the field before I found someone to commit to / And that would be okay / For me to do” and “I’m so sick of them coming at me again / ’Cause if I was a man / Then I’d be the man.”
Many fans also took issue with a tweet from Vulture which stated, “Taylor Swift finally concluded the Eras Tour Sunday night in Vancouver. So long, two-year, two boyfriend-spanning, two billion-earning tour.”
“I think it’s minimizing the success of one of the most powerful women in business right now,” Jessi Gold, author of “How Do You Feel?” and chief wellness officer at the University of Tennessee System, told HuffPost.
“It’s a dismissive way to talk about her success and all she’s been able to do ― which is something people care a lot about, so that’s hurtful to them. People are coming off two years of an enthusiastic fandom adrenaline rush and probably weren’t expecting that.”
Gold noted that the parasocial relationship many fans have with the singer can make this dismissive media framing feel more personal as if it’s happening to a friend rather than a celebrity. She also emphasized that media outlets taking this approach are typically acting intentionally ― rage bait drives clicks and engagement after all.
“As a fan, it can be frustrating because this has been the narrative around her since forever, but at this point, it just feels like, ‘Well, here they go again,’” she said.
There has been some backlash to the backlash, however. A few X users pointed out that Swift’s romantic life has been a point of intrigue for fans, with some even wearing Kelce jerseys to her concerts.
Relationships and dating are of course major themes in Swift’s music, which was the central focus of the Eras Tour. Kelce also made an appearance onstage during one of her London stops, and she even changed one of her song lyrics to include a nod to his NFL team.
But do these connections justify framing Swift’s career success around men she dates and fixating on the next steps in her private life at this moment? After all, the spectacle of each three-plus-hour-long Eras Tour show revolved around the live performance of the music ― the staging, the dancing, the costumes, the surprises, and more.
“I have always found it frustrating how much of the media narrative surrounding Taylor centers her romantic life,” Brit Barkholtz, a Minnesota-based clinical therapist, told HuffPost. “People tend to justify it by saying that she’s the one who writes diaristic music about her romantic life, which is true, but a lot of artists write about romance ― from love songs to breakup songs. And I don’t see nearly the same level of focus on it for them when discussing their professional achievements and accolades, particularly never for men.”
She expressed her disappointment that a professional feat and cultural touchstone as massive as the Eras Tour can’t be celebrated on its own without comments about Swift’s dating life tossed into the headline.
“On an individual level, it reinforces reductive stereotypes about Taylor that her career and success can be boiled down to her romantic life,” Barkholtz said. “On a more macro level, it reinforces the messaging to girls and women everywhere that anything we do, even professionally, will include scrutiny and critique via the lens of romantic relationships, or comes secondary to our relationship status. It reinforces the cultural idea that our primary worth is in who we’re connected to rather than who we are as people, what we’re passionate about, or what we achieve.”
Indeed, although public sympathy for a billionaire pop star with a private jet is understandably limited, the negative reaction to this kind of narrative speaks more to everyday people’s frustrations.
“It’s such a common experience for people in the workplace, specifically women in the workplace, to try so hard and find success, but still get feedback that feels unfair,” Gold said. “It’s challenging, and I think people who’ve had similar struggles are more likely to get upset when they see these kinds of headlines about Taylor Swift. You might even think, ‘Well I’m never going to achieve her level of success, and they’re still treating her like that. So I won’t be treated any better.’”
For many women, this kind of invasive questioning around whether or not she’ll get married or have children also feels familiar.
“Settling down with someone can feel like the only version of success we have modeled for us,” Gold noted. “Other people’s values get projected onto us, but they don’t have to be your values, and shouldn’t minimize your sense of success in your job and life. It’s hard to please everybody, especially when people’s expectations of success are different generationally, culturally, gender-wise.”
If you have a strong reaction to headlines about Taylor Swift, consider why you’re feeling so negatively, and how it might be related to your personal or professional life.
“Try to understand how you view your own self-worth and talk to someone about why this is pushing a particular button with you,” Gold advised. “These can be therapeutic conversations. And remember that ultimately you can’t control what other people say, but you can work through how it’s making you feel.”
Taylor Swift’s longtime bass player is reflecting on “the ride of a lifetime” as he says goodbye to the Eras Tour.
Amos Heller, who has played with Swift for more than 15 years, shared on Instagram a lengthy ode to his time on the road with the pop superstar, which ended in Vancouver on Sunday, Dec. 8 after five continents, dozens of cities, and 152 shows.
Heller, 47, offered a rare insight into what life was like behind the scenes of the highest-grossing concert tour of all time in his message. He also shared several photos of him playing onstage, including one of Swift, 34, leaning back on his shoulder during the Fearless section of the show.
“It’s done. No more early lobby calls. No more airports. No more lugging a suitcase and Mono bag up an escalator, through a line, out of baggage claim. No more warming up, no more cooling down,” he wrote. “No more looking at my watch 20 times to make sure I don’t miss a call. No more saying goodbye to my family, no more ‘How many sleeps now?’ No more jet lag. It’s done.”
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Gareth Cattermole/TAS24/Getty
The bassist continued by shouting out specific memories from various cities, including visiting bass shops in Australia, getting tattoos in Ireland, and visiting a watch factory in Switzerland.
"No more slipping into new languages, cultures, cuisines, accented pleasantries," he wrote. "No more snow in Tokyo, watch factories in Switzerland, museums in Sweden, bass shops in Australia, steaks in Rio, tattoos in Ireland, runs in Germany, flowers in Amsterdam."
He wrote that walking into the “ringing stadium” each night made him feel “like a gladiator,” and that he enjoyed “screaming lyrics with a perfect stranger who’s now your best friend.”
“This is the best I can do now. It’s a completed work. We watched it go from What If to How Will It Be to Here We Are to Almost Done to Done,” he wrote. “The record books are closed with fresh ink on a lot of pages. I’ve emerged changed. As a player, performer, person, partner. Backstage after the final curtain, I let myself sink to my knees for a bit, before laying on the floor gently reminiscing with [dancer Tori Evans]. Spent. We lived a lifetime. If you think it felt like graduation, it did.”
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John Shearer/Getty
Heller wrote that he feels “so much love and gratitude” to be a part of the Swiftie community, and shared a special message for the star of the show herself.
“You command so much respect and admiration from everyone fortunate enough to add their effort to yours,” he wrote to Swift. “Your blend of focus, heart, stamina, and joy calls forth the best of everyone around you. Thank you for trusting me with my part of your vision. It was the ride of a lifetime. I love you.”
He concluded his message with the words “Long Live,” a nod to Swift’s fan-favorite song of the same name, which is featured on her 2010 album Speak Now.
Among the many commenters on Heller’s post was Kam Saunders, an Eras Tour dancer whose brother Khalen famously played on the Kansas City Chiefs with Swift’s boyfriend Travis Kelce.
“You absolute GEM of a human! I will miss you making that guitar sing as I exit from YNTCD!” Saunders wrote. “I had the time of my life with you on this! Your humor. Your cleverness. Your kindness to my mom!!!! Thank you for ALL of it.”
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Xavi Torrent/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management
PEOPLE exclusively reported that Swift gave out $197 million in bonuses to everyone working on her tour during her nearly two years on the road, including truck drivers, caterers, instrument techs, merch team, lighting, sound, production staff, and assistants, carpenters, dancers, band, security, choreographers, pyrotechnics, riggers, hair, make-up, wardrobe, physical therapists and video team.
The Eras Tour sold more than $2 billion in tickets, which according to The New York Times is “double the gross ticket sales of any other concert tour in history.” The tour also inspired Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour Book, which sold a reported 814,000 copies in its first two days, making it the most successful publishing launch of the year.
Next up, Swift — who a source recently told PEOPLE is “exhausted, but obviously so, so grateful” for the successful tour — will vie for six Grammy Awards, including Album of the Year.
Taylor Swift finally wrapped her Eras Tour, but not without some incentive for the team that went above and beyond to make it a success. PEOPLE reported that the pop star gave the entire Eras Tour team $197 million in bonuses, marking a generous but deserving reward for the crew. Swift completed her hugely successful tour on December 8 at BC Place Stadium in Vancouver, Canada. Given that the Eras Tour made billions in sales, this bonus doesn’t come as a huge surprise.
Taylor Swift reportedly gave $197M in bonuses to Eras Tour team members
PEOPLE exclusively reported that Taylor Swift rewarded her Eras Tour team with $197 million in bonuses for their hard work. This includes the team behind lighting, sound, merch, production staff and assistants, instrument techs, dancers, and the band. Swift also rewarded truck drivers, caterers, carpenters, the security team, choreographers, the glam team, and more members of her crew.
The Eras Tour marked a significant milestone in Swift’s career. It kicked off in March 2023 at Glendale, Arizona, and came to an emotional close in Vancouver, Canada, in December. By the time the singer wrapped her North American leg of the tour, PEOPLE reported that she had dispensed over $55 million in bonuses. Moreover, the singer called her “beloved” Eras Tour “most thrilling chapter of my entire life to date” before taking a final bow to the Vancouver crowd.
The news of Taylor Swift’s bonuses comes after The New York Times revealed that the Eras Tour had garnered over $2 billion in sales. The singer’s production company, Taylor Swift Touring, handed over the exact figures to the publication for the first time. The concert tour sold a total of whopping $2,077,618,725 in tickets, with “double the gross ticket sales of any other concert tour in history.” Furthermore, 10,168,008 fans attended the concert.
Meanwhile, The New York Times also stated that the over $2 billion in sales are only part of the total earnings from the tour. This doesn’t take into account the massive merchandise sales, the secondary market consisting of online resellers, and more. In October, Forbes revealed that the Eras Tour also aided in Taylor Swift’s billionaire status. The publication estimated the singer’s net worth at $1.6 billion, making her the richest female musician.