Billboard 200 Will Now Count Video Plays From YouTube & Streaming Services

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Billboard 200 Will Now Officially Count Video Plays From YouTube And Streaming Services

Music videos (and Youtube as a whole) are about to get a lot more recognition in the music industry.

According to reports from Billboard, video data will impact their genre-specific album consumption charts starting on January 3.

Video and audio data from YouTube, along with visual plays from several music streaming services, are gearing up to be factored into the Billboard 200 albums chart. As announced on Friday, in addition to YouTube, officially licensed video content plays from Apple, Spotify, Tidal, and Vevo will also be included in the calculations for album charts.

This new addition of video data into the Billboard 200 arrives just five years after audio streams were added, which marks the chart’s shift from a measure of pure sales to the new consumption model. This upcoming inclusion of video will also impact Billboard’s genre album consumption charts, like R&B/Hip-Hop, Latin and more.

Even though YouTube streams already factored into the Billboard Hot 100 and other song-specific charts since back in 2013, this new rule marks a first for the album charts. Unlike the rules for the song charts–which can be impacted by certain user-generated videos–only officially licensed video content uploaded by rights holders are going to be counted for the Billboard 200 and any other album charts.

This new change will take effect with the charts for the week of January 18, 2020, which is going to reflect sales and streams for the period of the 3-9.

Former Def Jam label head Lyor Cohen, who is now the global head of music at YouTube, called these new changes a “very important moment in making the chart a more accurate representation of what people are listening to.”

“Genres like Latin, hip-hop and electronic, which consistently dominate the YouTube charts, will now be properly recognized for their popularity,” he said. “This is another great step in bringing YouTube and the industry together and we’re so grateful to Billboard and the music business at large for making this addition.”

It’ll be interesting to see how this change impacts the album charts in 2020.