Madonna has secured her 10th No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 with CONFESSIONS II, debuting at the top of the chart dated July 18. According to Billboard, she becomes only the 11th act, and third woman, to reach that milestone.
CONFESSIONS II is the sequel to her 2005 chart-topper Confessions on a Dance Floor. The new album was announced on April 15, released on July 3, and marks Madonna's first studio album since 2019's Madame X. It reunites her with DJ, writer, and producer Stuart Price, her main collaborator on the original Confessions project.
The debut also creates a rare chart moment. As CONFESSIONS II lands at No. 1, Michael Jackson's Thriller sits at No. 8, putting the two icons in the Billboard 200 top 10 at the same time for only the second time in history. The last time it happened was on the December 1, 2001-dated chart, when Jackson's Invincible fell from No. 3 to No. 4 and Madonna's compilation GHV2: Greatest Hits Volume 2 debuted at No. 7. Both albums dropped out of the top 10 the following week.
The two artists came close to a top 10 overlap in the 1980s, during a stretch when they combined for 57 weeks at No. 1, but they missed each other by a single week. On the September 19, 1987-dated chart, Madonna's Who's That Girl soundtrack spent its final week in the top 10 at No. 7. The following week it fell to No. 11, the same week Jackson's Bad debuted at No. 1. They never shared the top 10 that year, though both albums appeared in the top 15 together for four straight weeks.
Part of what kept them apart over the decades was the timing of their releases. Billboard notes there were only four instances when Madonna and Jackson released top 10-charting albums within six months of each other: in 1987 with Who's That Girl and Bad, in 1995 with Something to Remember and HIStory, in 2001 with GHV2 and Invincible, and in 2009 with Celebration and Jackson's posthumous releases.
Madonna first hit the top 10 on the October 6, 1984-dated chart with her self-titled debut, by which point Thriller had already left the top 10 after an extended run from January 1983 through June 1984. She has now logged 24 top 10 albums on the Billboard 200, compared to Jackson's 12.
With CONFESSIONS II at No. 1, Madonna also becomes the first act to have topped the Billboard 200 in four separate decades, spanning the 1980s through the 2020s. Her first No. 1 came in 1985 with Like a Virgin.
Among soloists on the all-time list, Taylor Swift leads with 15 No. 1 albums, followed by JAY-Z with 14. Eminem, Bruce Springsteen, Barbra Streisand, Ye, and Future all have 11. Madonna and Elvis Presley are tied at 10. Presley's first No. 1 came in 1956 with his self-titled album. His 10th came posthumously in 2002 with ELV1S: 30 #1 Hits, which spent three weeks at the top.
The full July 18-dated Billboard 200 chart is set to be posted on Billboard's website on July 14.
