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List of best-selling singles by year in the United Kingdom

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This is a list of the best-selling singles on the UK singles chart for each year. Note that the Number sold section denotes the number sold within the year, not in total, as very often the single continues to sell more in later years (and sometimes other singles released within a particular year will go on to outsell the year-end winner – e.g., Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan's "Especially for You", from 1988, ultimately outsold "Mistletoe and Wine").

The best-selling UK single of all time is "Candle in the Wind 1997/Something About The Way You Look Tonight" by Elton John, which sold 4,770,000 copies.

Best-selling singles by year

Year	Single	Artist	Number
sold	Number
sold and
streamed	1952	1953	1954	1955	1956	1957	1958	1959	1960	1961	1962	1963	1964	1965	1966	1967	1968	1969	1970	1971	1972	1973	1974	1975	1976	1977	1978	1979	1980	1981	1982	1983	1984	1985	1986	1987	1988	1989	1990	1991	1992	1993	1994	1995	1996	1997	1998	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014	2015	2016	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025
"Here in My Heart"	Al Martino		N/A
"I Believe"	Frankie Laine		N/A
"Secret Love"	Doris Day		N/A
"Rose Marie"	Slim Whitman		N/A
"I'll Be Home"	Pat Boone		N/A
"Diana"	Paul Anka		N/A
"Jailhouse Rock"	Elvis Presley		N/A
"Living Doll"	Cliff Richard	800,000	N/A
"It's Now or Never"	Elvis Presley		N/A
"Wooden Heart"	Elvis Presley		N/A
"I Remember You"	Frank Ifield		N/A
"She Loves You"	The Beatles	1,300,000	N/A
"Can't Buy Me Love"	The Beatles		N/A
"Tears"	Ken Dodd	1,268,000	N/A
"Green, Green Grass of Home"	Tom Jones	850,000	N/A
"Release Me"	Engelbert Humperdinck		N/A
"Hey Jude"	The Beatles		N/A
"Sugar, Sugar"	The Archies		N/A
"In the Summertime"	Mungo Jerry		N/A
"My Sweet Lord"	George Harrison	700,000	N/A
"Amazing Grace"	The Royal Scots Dragoon Guards Band		N/A
"Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree"	Dawn featuring Tony Orlando		N/A
"Tiger Feet"	Mud	730,000	N/A
"Bye Bye Baby"	Bay City Rollers		N/A
"Save Your Kisses for Me"	Brotherhood of Man	1,006,000	N/A
"Mull of Kintyre" / "Girls' School"	Wings	2,000,000	N/A
"Rivers of Babylon" / "Brown Girl in the Ring"	Boney M.	1,995,000	N/A
"Bright Eyes"	Art Garfunkel	1,155,000	N/A
"Don't Stand So Close to Me"	The Police	808,000	N/A
"Don't You Want Me"	The Human League	1,150,000	N/A
"Come On Eileen"	Dexys Midnight Runners	1,200,000	N/A
"Karma Chameleon"	Culture Club	1,390,000	N/A
"Do They Know It's Christmas?"*	Band Aid	3,000,000	N/A
"The Power of Love"	Jennifer Rush	1,280,000	N/A
"Don't Leave Me This Way"	The Communards	745,000	N/A
"Never Gonna Give You Up"	Rick Astley	759,000	N/A
"Mistletoe and Wine"	Cliff Richard	750,000	N/A
"Ride On Time"	Black Box	960,000	N/A
"Unchained Melody"	The Righteous Brothers	840,000	N/A
"(Everything I Do) I Do It for You"	Bryan Adams	1,850,000
"I Will Always Love You"	Whitney Houston	1,500,000	N/A
"I'd Do Anything for Love (But I Won't Do That)"	Meat Loaf	720,000	N/A
"Love Is All Around"	Wet Wet Wet	1,783,000	N/A
"Unchained Melody"	Robson & Jerome	1,840,000	N/A
"Killing Me Softly"	Fugees	1,360,000	N/A
"Candle in the Wind 1997" / "Something About the Way You Look Tonight"*	Elton John	4,770,000	N/A
"Believe"	Cher	1,830,000	N/A
"...Baby One More Time"	Britney Spears	1,445,000	N/A
"Can We Fix It?"	Bob the Builder	853,000	N/A
"It Wasn't Me"	Shaggy featuring Rikrok	1,151,000	N/A
"Anything Is Possible" / "Evergreen"	Will Young	1,783,919	N/A
"Where Is the Love?"	The Black Eyed Peas	625,198	N/A
"Do They Know It's Christmas?"*	Band Aid 20	1,065,000	N/A
"Is This the Way to Amarillo"*	Tony Christie featuring Peter Kay	1,100,200	N/A
"Crazy"	Gnarls Barkley	820,053	N/A
"Bleeding Love"	Leona Lewis	788,000	N/A
"Hallelujah"	Alexandra Burke	888,000	N/A
"Poker Face"	Lady Gaga	882,059	N/A
"Love the Way You Lie"	Eminem featuring Rihanna		N/A
"Someone like You"	Adele	1,996,000	N/A
"Somebody That I Used to Know"	Gotye featuring Kimbra	1,318,000	N/A
"Blurred Lines"	featuring T.I. and Pharrell Williams	1,470,000	N/A
"Happy"	Pharrell Williams	1,500,000	1,620,000
"Uptown Funk"	featuring Bruno Mars		1,760,000
"One Dance"	Drake featuring Wizkid & Kyla	530,000	1,950,000
"Shape of You"	Ed Sheeran	787,000	3,200,000
"One Kiss"	Calvin Harris and Dua Lipa	244,000	1,570,000
"Someone You Loved"	Lewis Capaldi		2,300,000
"Blinding Lights"	The Weeknd		2,200,000
"Bad Habits"	Ed Sheeran	142,000	1,700,000
"As It Was"	Harry Styles	65,000	1,550,000
"Flowers"	Miley Cyrus	91,000{{cite web	url=https://www.officialcharts.com/chart-news/the-official-top-40-biggest-songs-of-2023/	website=www.officialcharts.com	date=29 December 2023	access-date=29 December 2023}}	1,700,000
"Stick Season"	Noah Kahan		1,990,000{{cite web	url=https://www.officialcharts.com/chart-news/the-official-top-40-biggest-songs-of-2024/	website=www.officialcharts.com	date=27 December 2024	access-date=29 December 2024}}
"Ordinary"	Alex Warren		2,200,000{{cite web	url=https://www.officialcharts.com/chart-news/the-official-biggest-songs-of-2025/	website=www.officialcharts.com	date=26 December 2025	access-date=2 January 2026}}

Best-selling singles by decade

Decade	Single	Artist	Number sold	1950s	1960s	1970s	1980s	1990s	2000s	2010s
"Rock Around the Clock"	Bill Haley & His Comets
"She Loves You"	The Beatles
"Mull of Kintyre" / "Girls' School"	Paul McCartney and Wings
"Do They Know It's Christmas?"	Band Aid
"Something About the Way You Look Tonight" / "Candle in the Wind 1997"	Elton John
"Anything Is Possible" / "Evergreen"	Will Young
"Shape of You"	Ed SheeranBased on combined sales, i.e. including streaming.

References

;General (list positions)

;Specific

Notes

References

[http://www.officialcharts.com/chart-news/kylie-and-jasons-especially-for-you-hits-one-million-uk-sales-kylie-im-thrilled-__7679/ Official Charts Company "Especially for You" hits 1 million sales]
''The Complete Book of British Charts'' by Warwick/Kutner/Brown (sales for earlier years)
''[[Hunter Davies]] Official Biography''
Billboard Magazine, 7 January 1967, Page 38
"The Official Top 50 best-selling songs of 1981".
(12 January 1985). "Band Aid sales top 3m – proceeds set to reach Ethiopia by summer". Morgan–Grampian Publications.
Myers, Justin. (February 12, 2018). "These are the UK's 20 biggest selling love ballads of all time". [[Official Charts Company]].
"Can We Fix It? by Bob the Builder Songfacts". songfacts.com.
(27 December 2001). "Shaggy's single is UK's best-seller". [[BBC News]].
(11 November 2009). "Biggest Selling Songs Of The Decade In The UK Charts". [[MUZU.TV]].
(31 December 2007). "Leona sells most singles in 2007". [[CBBC (TV channel).
"Alexandra Burke top selling single of 2008".
Levine, Nick. (3 January 2010). "GaGa's 'Poker Face' is top single of 2009". [[Hearst Magazines UK]].
The Official Charts Company. "The UK's Official Chart 'millionaires' revealed".
The Official Charts Company. "The Top 20 biggest selling singles of 2011 revealed!".
"The Official Top 40 Biggest Selling Singles of 2012 revealed!". [[Official Charts Company]].
"The Official Top 40 Biggest Selling Singles of 2013". [[Official Charts Company]].
Copsey, Rob. (1 January 2015). "The Official Top 40 Biggest Selling Singles of 2014". [[Official Charts Company]].
Copsey, Rob. (31 December 2014). "The Top 100 biggest songs of 2014 on the Official Chart". [[Official Charts Company]].
Copsey, Rob. (4 January 2016). "The Official Top 40 Biggest Songs of 2015 revealed". [[Official Charts Company]].
Myers, Justin. (30 December 2016). "The Top 40 biggest songs of 2016 on the Official Chart".
Myers, Justin. (30 December 2016). "The Top 40 biggest songs of 2016 on the Official Chart".
Copsey, Rob. (3 January 2018). "The Top 40 biggest singles of 2017 on the Official Chart".
Copsey, Rob. (3 January 2018). "The Top 40 biggest singles of 2017 on the Official Chart".
Copsey, Rob. (3 January 2019). "The Official Top 40 biggest songs of 2018 on the Official Chart".
Copsey, Rob. (3 January 2019). "The Official Top 40 biggest songs of 2018 on the Official Chart".
Copsey, Rob. (1 January 2020). "The Official Top 40 biggest songs of 2019".
(4 January 2021). "The Official Top 40 biggest songs of 2020".
(4 January 2022). "The Official Top 40 biggest songs of 2021".
(4 January 2022). "The Official Top 40 biggest songs of 2021".
(4 January 2023). "The Official Top 40 biggest songs of 2022".
(4 January 2023). "The Official Top 40 biggest songs of 2022".
(11 December 2019). "The UK's Official Top 100 biggest songs of the decade 2010 - 2019".

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