Top 500 Best-Selling Comics of 2015

Star Wars returned to Marvel Comics in a big way in 2015 as Jason Aaron and John Cassaday's Star Wars #1 was the best-selling comic book of the year, and one of Marvel's seven titles in the top ten for the year.

In addition to Star Wars #1, three more Star Wars titles were in the top ten, including Jason Aaron and Mike Deodato's Star Wars: Vader Down #1 at #6, Kieron Gillen and Salvador Larroca's Darth Vader #1 at #7, and Mark Waid and Terry Dodson's Princess Leia #1 at #10. Also in the top ten were Jonathan Hickman and Esad Ribic's Secret Wars #1 at #2, Jason Latour and Robbi Rodriguez's Spider-Gwen #1 at #8, and Brian Michael Bendis and David Marquez's Invincible Iron Man #1 at #9.

BOOM! Studios entered the annual top 10 best-selling comics for the first time as Bravest Warriors: Tales of Holo John #1 ranked #3 for the year and was the year's best-selling non-premier comic book.

Also among the annual top ten for the first time was IDW Publishing with Orphan Black #1, based on the acclaimed BBC America series, at #4.

Closing out the top ten, the long-awaited Dark Knight III: The Master Race #1 from Frank Miller, Brian Azzarello, John Romita, Jr., and Klaus Janson ranked #5 on the year.

Among the premier publishers, Brian K. Vaughan and Steve Skroce's We Stand on Guard #1, a sci-fi series about a future war between the United States and Canada, ranked #124 on the year. Dark Horse Comics' best-selling release was Chuck Palahniuk and Cameron Stewart's Fight Club 2 #1, a sequel to Palahniuk's cult classic novel, which ranked #129.

TOP 500 COMIC BOOKS
Based on Total Unit Sales of Products Invoiced in Calendar Year 2015

This information may not be reproduced in any format without the express permission of Diamond Comic Distributors.

How does Diamond calculate the charts? It all starts at the comic book shop.

Data for Diamond’s sales charts — which includes the monthly market shares and all top product charts — are compiled by Diamond Comic Distributors from sales made to thousands of comic book specialty shops located in North America and around the world.  Additional sales made to online merchants and other specialty stores may be included as well.

Unit and dollar market shares are calculated based upon orders for comic books, graphic novels, and magazines invoiced and shipped to Diamond customers during any given month, which comprises pre-orders, advance reorders, and reorders, minus any copies that are received back from a title marked as returnable. Please note that comics marked with an asterisk (*) have had their reported quantities reduced due to retailer returnability, and thus may rank lower on the charts than their actual sales would reflect.

About the Diamond Sales Index: The Sales Index of selected monthly Best Seller Charts is presented as a comparative tool for retailers and publishers. It presents Diamond’s monthly sales for individual titles in relation to Diamond’s total sales for the issue of DC Comics' monthly Batman comic book. (Batman is used as the control title – with a value of 100 – because sales of Batman usually remain relatively stable.) This allows for easy comparison to other titles and helps retailers gauge their orders for all other titles. This formula is only a guide, other factors may impact a titles’ ability to sell in certain locations and clientele.