Country’s Back (Again!) With 2025 Boxoffice Bonanza

A diverse group of high-profile country music artists are making waves on the road in 2025, grabbing headlines and taking their careers to new levels of success. And none more so than alt-country phenom Zach Bryan who recently made history selling the largest number of tickets ever for a single performance by a solo headliner at a U.S. venue.

In under three hours, he sold more than 112,000 tickets for his upcoming Michigan Stadium performance planned for Sep. 27 at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. His attendance there will surpass the current record of 110,905 tickets sold for “King of Country” George Strait who performed on June 15, 2024, at Kyle Field in College Station, Texas.

Prior to the Michigan show, Bryan will also appear this summer at San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park; MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey; Marshall University’s Joan C. Edwards Stadium in West Virginia and Notre Dame Stadium in Indiana. And in Europe, he will perform three concerts in Dublin and play two days at BST Hyde Park in London as only the third country artist ever to headline the festival. He follows Morgan Wallen and Shania Twain who both topped one of the daily lineups during last year’s nine-day event.

Bryan made a significant impact on the Pollstar charts in 2024 with boxoffice success at arena and stadium performances on his “Quittin’ Time Tour.” According to reported ticket sales figures, he averaged 17,325 tickets sold per show at arenas and 49,156 at stadiums, while grosses averaged $3.22 million per concert at arenas and $9.68 million at stadiums.

The biggest impact on the charts this year comes from country superstar Luke Combs with his run of stadium concerts in Australia and New Zealand during January and February. He is not only 2025’s highest-grossing country artist so far, but the third highest of any genre this year. Only Coldplay and Trans-Siberian Orchestra had higher collective grosses in our first-quarter recap.

Combs’ chart success is based on ticket revenue from two-show engagements in three Australian cities. Together, all six concerts brought in $48.9 million from 349,075 sold tickets with fans in Sydney buying 40 percent of them. The city’s Accor Stadium had a total of 138,146 sold tickets (for shows Jan. 31 and Feb. 1) while Melbourne’s Marvel Stadium sold 116,468 (Feb. 7-8) and Brisbane’s Suncorp Stadium, 94,461 (Jan. 24-25).

Strait also scored highly in the first quarterly ranking of top touring artists. The country legend racked up a whopping $23.3 million from one concert at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas last December. In his first headlining performance ever at the venue, his sold-out show moved a total of 47,554 tickets.

Kacey Musgraves also shined at Q1 with a total gross of $15.2 million from 105,770 sold tickets during the final weeks of her “Deeper Well World Tour.” As one of country’s 21st century personalities, she has often pushed the boundaries of the genre, as have Bryan and contemporary artists like Shaboozey, Jelly Roll and others who are defining country music on their own terms.

Which brings us to Beyoncé, the reigning “Best Country Album” Grammy winner who is about to launch her “Cowboy Carter Tour.” The 13-week trek is booked in stadiums and will include multiple shows in each venue. Along with the seven U.S. markets on the schedule, she will also appear in London and Paris. She will launch the tour with a five-night stint at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California from April 28 through May 9. London’s Tottenham Hotspur Stadium will host the most performances with six planned between June 5 and 16.

Finally, Chappell Roan, whose breakout year was one of the biggest success stories of 2024, has made her own foray into the country universe with the release of her country single “The Giver.” Her confirmed performances this year are centered on the festival stage with headlining sets planned for multiple-day events in Europe during the summer.