LONDON and NASHVILLE, Tenn., March 31, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Taylor Swift has surpassed the 20 MILLION milestone for album sales, it was announced last night just prior to her wrapping the overseas portion of her SPEAK NOW WORLD TOUR 2011 with a sold-out show at London's O2 Arena. Taylor has sold 10 million albums in the last 18 months – she reached the 10 Million albums sold mark in September of 2009. Big Machine Records and Universal Music International executives presented Taylor with a plaque commemorating the achievement at a special backstage event at the O2.

The 20 million number represents actual full albums sold – in addition, Taylor has sold over 33 million paid song downloads, making her the top-selling digital artist in music history.

20 Million + is the worldwide combined sales total for her three Big Machine Records studio albums: Taylor Swift (released in 2006), Fearless (2008), and Speak Now (October, 2010), plus The Taylor Swift Holiday Collection and Beautiful Eyes (a Walmart-only release).Taylor has earned Gold, Platinum and Multi-Platinum album sales certifications in 18 countries spanning 5 continents.

21-year old Taylor, who writes all of her own material, sold more albums than any other artist in any genre of music in both 2010 and 2008, and her Fearless album was 2009's top-selling CD. At the age of 20, Taylor won 4 GRAMMY Awards, making history as the youngest-ever winner of Album of the Year. She was Billboard's Most-Played Artist in both 2009 and 2010, and with the release of Speak Now, Taylor made history on the Billboard Hot 100, charting a record-breaking 11 songs from one album in a single week. Taylor, who just celebrated her 7th #1 record, currently holds the Billboard all-genre records for the longest charting album of this century, for most Top 20 debuts in a calendar year, and for the largest overall airplay audience for a country-based act.

Taylor's sales success is matched by her critical acclaim, as she receives rave reviews for both her albums and live shows from top critics around the world. Her last two albums each earned 4-star reviews in Rolling Stone, and Entertainment Weekly named Taylor 2010's Entertainer of the Year.

Last night's London O2 show marked the conclusion of the overseas leg of the SPEAK NOW 2011 WORLD TOUR, which launched February 9th in Singapore. Taylor just added 16 new dates to the North American portion of the tour, which kicks off May 27th with two sold-out shows at Omaha's Qwest Center, and now wraps with two shows at Madison Square Garden just before Thanksgiving. In total, Taylor will have headlined 97 stadium and arena shows around the world this year.

Taylor is currently nominated for four Academy of Country Music Awards, including the evening's biggest honor, the fan-voted Entertainer of the Year Award. Earlier this week, the Academy of Country Music announced that Taylor will be awarded their Jim Reeves International Award for her "outstanding contributions to the acceptance of country music throughout the world." Past recipients of this prestigious award include Garth Brooks, Dick Clark, Merv Griffin, Buck Owens and Dolly Parton.

This week, Taylor's Twitter feed, @taylorswift13, was selected by the editors of Time magazine as one of their 140 Best Twitter feeds. The influential tweeters were selected because their feeds are "shaping the conversation" online. In addition to her more than 5.7 million Twitter followers, Taylor has over 19 million Facebook friends.

A complete listing of all of the dates of the TAYLOR SWIFT SPEAK NOW WORLD TOUR 2011 is available at www.taylorswift.com.

SOURCE Big Machine Records