Adele says 'Hello' to chart topping success with new single

Adele's new track Hello has become the first single to sell one million tracks in a week in the U.S.A. Photo / Getty

Adele's new single Hello is smashing records and dominating airwaves becoming the first tune ever to reach 1 million downloads in a week.

The British singer's piano ballad is the debut single from her first album in nearly five years, and opened at number one for the week on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart, which monitors sales, streaming and radio play.

For digital sales only it was downloaded 1.1 million times, far outpacing the previous record holder - rapper Flo Rida's Right Round which sold 636,000 copies in a week in early 2009, tracking service Nielsen Music added.

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Hello

was also ahead in the streaming stakes. The song was played 20.4 million times via on-demand subscription services, more than double the record set two months ago by Canadian Justin Bieber with

What Do You Mean.

Music industry watchers are expecting Adele's upcoming album 25, set to drop November 20, to be the year's biggest release and even rival Taylor Swift's blockbuster 1989 from 2014.

Adele's last album 21, featuring the heartbreaking song Someone Like You, was a top-seller in the United States for two years in a row and the biggest record by a comfortable margin in Britain for the 21st century.

The singer planned to promote 25 in the United States with a recorded-for-television concert at New York's Radio City Music Hall and an appearance on Saturday Night Live.

Hello amassed nearly 200 million views on YouTube, becoming the fastest video to hit the 100 million mark with the exception of Gentlemen by South Korean pop singer Psy, a follow-up to the most-viewed-ever YouTube clip Gangnam Style.

- AFP