Frank Sinatra extends his record as the artist with the longest span of top 10 albums in the history of the Billboard 200. The legendary singer, who first made the top 10 on Billboard’s flagship album chart on the chart dated April 7, 1956 with Songs for Swingin’ Lovers, returns to the top 10 on the chart dated Jan. 3, 2026 with Ultimate Christmas – giving him a nearly 70-year span of top 10 albums.
Ultimate Christmas was released in 2017 and first cracked the top 10 one year ago. Songs for Swingin’ Lovers made the top 10 in just the third week that the Billboard 200 appeared in Billboard as a consistent, weekly feature.
Two other legendary singers – Nat King Cole and Bing Crosby – also extend their spans of top 10 albums on the Billboard 200. Cole, who first cracked the top 10 on the chart dated April 20, 1957 with Love Is the Thing, inches up from No. 5 to No. 4 with The Christmas Song. Crosby, who first cracked the top 10 on the chart dated Dec. 9, 1957 with White Christmas, jumps from No. 6 to No. 2 with his holiday collection, also titled Ultimate Christmas. Cole and Crosby are runners-up to Sinatra for longest spans of top 10 albums on the Billboard 200.
Notably, all three singers had top 10 albums on album charts that preceded the introduction of the Billboard 200. (Because those charts didn’t appear every week, they are not considered as definitive as the Billboard 200.) On those pre-Billboard 200 charts, which date to 1945, Crosby first made the top 10 in 1945; Sinatra first hit the top 10 in 1946; and Cole first hit the region in 1945 as the leader of The King Cole Trio and first made it as a solo artist in 1952.
Crosby’s original 1942 recording of “White Christmas” (featuring The Ken Darby Singers and John Scott Trotter and His Orchestra) and The King Cole Trio’s 1946 recording of “The Christmas Song” were two of the first five recordings inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1974. Crosby’s original recording of “White Christmas” was also in the inaugural class inducted into the National Recording Registry in 2002. A 1961 solo recording by Cole of “The Christmas Song” was inducted into the National Recording Registry in 2022.
In 1963, Crosby became the first recipient of a lifetime achievement award from the Recording Academy. (In fact, the award was called the Bing Crosby Award through 1972.) In 1965, Sinatra became the second recipient. Cole received the honor posthumously in 1990.
Cole died of cancer in 1965 at just 45. Crosby died in 1977 at age 74. Of the three legends, Sinatra lived the longest. He died in 1998 at age 82.
