Beyoncé has claimed the top spot on Billboard’s 2025 year-end touring report, with her Cowboy Carter tour finishing as the highest-grossing solo tour of the year. The run brought in $407.6 million from 32 shows and drew 1.6 million attendees across nine cities.
Billboard also confirmed that Cowboy Carter now holds the record as the highest-grossing country tour ever documented, marking another significant milestone in Beyoncé’s touring career. The achievement places her among a select group of artists who have launched multiple tours that cleared the $400 million mark. She’s the first American act to reach this benchmark twice.
A residency approach that paid off
Rather than following a traditional touring route with stops in dozens of cities, Beyoncé opted for a residency-style format that concentrated performances in strategic markets. This approach allowed for more elaborate production values and created exclusive events that fans traveled across regions to attend.
The structure proved highly effective from both artistic and business perspectives. By staying in fewer cities for extended runs, the tour minimized logistical complications while maximizing revenue potential. Each performance felt like a destination event rather than just another tour stop.
SoFi Stadium shattered expectations
The tour’s Los Angeles engagement at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, delivered particularly impressive results. Across five shows in late April and early May, the run generated over $50 million with 217,000 tickets sold. According to Rolling Stone, this stretch became the biggest reported single-venue engagement of the year.
The numbers behind each performance tell the story. Beyoncé performed on April 28, then returned for shows on May 1, 4, 7 and 9. Each night brought in an average of $11.1 million, with more than 43,000 fans filling the stadium for every performance.
This engagement also earned a place in Boxscore history as the fifth-highest grossing tour stop ever recorded. Only U2’s Sphere residency in Las Vegas across 2023 and 2024, Harry Styles’ 2022 run at Madison Square Garden, and Take That’s 2011 Wembley Stadium shows ranked higher. The SoFi Stadium residency also became the highest-grossing single-venue engagement by a female artist in history.
The bigger touring picture
While Cowboy Carter dominated the solo touring category, other major acts also posted strong results in 2025. Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres World Tour took the crown for the year’s highest-grossing tour overall, generating $464.9 million according to Billboard Boxscore. The Weeknd’s After Hours Til Dawn tour brought in $336.7 million.
What sets Beyoncé’s achievement apart is the efficiency of her approach. With significantly fewer shows than many of her peers, she still managed to gross more per performance. This residency model may influence how other major artists structure their touring strategies going forward.
Genre boundaries dissolved
The success of Cowboy Carter extends beyond impressive financial returns. The tour represented Beyoncé’s bold move into country music territory, a shift that sparked widespread conversation about artistic evolution and genre authenticity. Her ability to claim the record for highest-grossing country tour while maintaining her established fan base demonstrates her unique position in popular music.
Each performance balanced spectacle with substance, offering production values that justified premium ticket prices while creating memorable moments that resonated across social media platforms. This combination of commercial success and cultural impact has defined Beyoncé’s career and explains her sustained relevance in an industry where few artists maintain their momentum across multiple decades.
Looking ahead
The Cowboy Carter tour‘s record-breaking performance raises interesting questions about the future of live music. Will more artists embrace residency-style formats that prioritize fewer shows in key markets? The financial success of this approach suggests audiences respond enthusiastically to events that feel exclusive rather than widely accessible.
For Beyoncé, the achievement adds another chapter to an already historic career. From Crazy in Love to country music domination, she continues to redefine what’s possible for touring artists while setting benchmarks that will likely stand for years to come.
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