Studio Albums in the U.S.
2.8 million, Good Girl Gone Bad / 1.8 million, Loud / 1.4 million, A Girl Like Me / 1.2 million, Unapologetic / 1.15 million, Talk That Talk / 1.13 million, Rated R / 623,000, Music of the Sun
Since then, 3.5 years have elapsed. Anti was released and sold just above 400K in the US plus 1 million copies given away for free in the US by Samsung who sponsored the Anti era.
Let's generously add 1 million catalog album sales for these last 3.5 years in the US.
This will bring her US album sales to around 12.5 million as of date (including the 1 million copies given way freely).
Today Billboard reported that Rihanna has sold 60 million albums worldwide, which means just over 47 million copies of her last 8 studio albums outside the US, which is insane!
Congrats to Rihanna and Billboard.
It seems that certifications bodies and IFPI have lost their credibility!