Billboard is updating its album charts to allow qualifying "Smart Media Albums" to count towards its sales and consumption rankings, using new data from tracking partner Luminate. The change reflects how fans increasingly discover, collect and engage with music through emerging physical-digital hybrid products, and marks another step in the charts' long history of adapting to new formats and technologies.

Smart Media Albums are physical items that unlock digital content, such as extra audio, video, photos or liner notes, via QR codes, NFC or similar technology, alongside physical extras like cards or posters. Eligibility begins with the tracking week of 2–8 October 2026, with each qualifying transaction initially counting as 0.5 units on the consumption chart and one full sale on the sales chart, limited to approved vendors including IYK, KiTbetter, Serenade, Totem, WeVerse, Yoto and ZATAP, and capped at two eligible versions per release. Billboard executives said the move aims to reflect evolving fan behaviour while maintaining chart integrity.