In 1991, X-Men #1 sold an estimated 8,186,500 copies, making it a likely contender for the best-selling single-issue comic book in history. And yes, that wiggle room matters. When it comes to determining the exact rundown of the best-selling comics of all time, the data is murky.
There are decades of comics history where industry number-crunchers only counted how many issues of Superman and Captain America newsstands ordered, leaving historians with only hard sales numbers from 1997 onward. And that’s without considering the apples to oranges comparison of America’s single issues method of distribution to, say, Japan’s doorstop-like weekly anthology magazines.
With that in mind, here are the 10 best-selling American single-issue comic books, according to the most concrete numbers in the industry’s spotty history.
- Action Comics #1000 (2018)
Copies sold: 504,200
The first on our list are the two youngest comics on it, this one commemorating the 80th anniversary of the first superhero and the second oldest continually running superhero comic still on stands today: Superman, and Action Comics. Action Comics #1000 is the first example of a trend we’ll see in the rest of the list, that is, the big anniversary blowout issue.
DC Comics printed the 80-page giant with 11 different covers, which is par for the course with a book of its magnitude and era. Aside from the milestone in comics history it represented, and the wealth of creators DC was able to attract to fill its anthology, Action Comics #1000 had a few other perks to attract the interested collector.
Superman returned to his classic costume in the issue — with his underwear on the outside — for the first time in seven years, and the issue also contained the first few pages of Brian Bendis’ run on Superman, a big turnaround for the legendary Marvel Comics creator.
- Detective Comics #1000 (2019)
Copies sold: 526,941
A year later (thanks to only a little bit of editorial shuffling of issue numbers) Batman got his own 80th birthday present, with Detective Comics #1000, for the first four-digit issue of the actual oldest still-running comic series.
Second verse, same as the first: The issue was an 80-page giant packed with a who’s who list of Batman writers and artists. But it couldn’t claim the clout of a long-time Marvel Comics writer’s first DC Comics work in years, or a costume change, to sweeten the deal.
How to account for the book selling 22 thousand more issues than Action Comics #1000? Likely, Batman is just more popular.
- Amazing Spiderman #583 (2009)
Copies sold: 530,500
Have you already figured out why an otherwise unremarkable issue of Mark Waid and Barry Kitson’s Amazing Spider-Man made it on this list? I’ll give you a hint: it was published on January 15, 2009.
But you’ve probably already guessed. It was all about the issue’s presidential tie-in story and variant cover, released to coincide with the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th president of the United States. The issue itself contained the backup story “Spidey Meets the President,” in which the Chameleon uses his skills at mimicry to try and take then-Senator Obama’s place and be sworn in as President.
Peter Parker is on hand covering the inauguration as a Daily Bugle photographer, and, as Spider-Man, he ferrets out the real Obama from the Chameleon by asking him a question only the real Barack Obama could answer: what was his nickname in his high school varsity basketball team? Over 530 thousand issues later, Amazing Spider-Man #853 made this list.