The Most Expensive Rare Vinyl Records Ever Sold

Some people who own vinyl records keep them around for more than listening. Such record collectors often invest in rare vinyl; for them, buying valuable records may signify owning a piece of history, and they may feel a sense of pride in this ownership. Their purchases account for some of the most expensive records ever sold, including one record that’s never been publicly heard. 

Below is a list of the 10 most expensive rare vinyl records sold to date. These sales primarily occurred at auction, though in some cases, rare record dealers directly facilitated the sales. Additionally, some of these records have previously sold for lower — but still high — prices at prior auctions. 

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What makes a vinyl record rare and expensive?

Record collectors may view a vinyl record as rare under the following circumstances, all of which increase its potential sale value.

• There are very few copies of the record in existence. When supply is low, sellers can charge — and expect people to pay — higher prices. Additionally, a record’s rarity introduces prestige that increases competition among collectors. This high demand further drives the record’s value.
  • • • The record is a test pressing. By their very nature, test pressings aren’t supposed to reach the public for sale or purchase. This makes these original pressings inherently rare and highly valuable.
• The record is signed. A record sleeve bearing the musician’s autograph takes on more value as a piece of music memorabilia. Additionally, very few signed copies of records are for sale. These two factors make signed vinyl records rare and expensive.
• The record includes different artwork from a limited run. A record is more than the music therein — it’s also the album cover design. In some cases, the record’s packaging and design will differ for limited manufacturing runs of an album. This may be intentional, or it may be due to poor public reaction requiring a change in the artwork. In either case, records bearing the less common artwork are rare and valuable.
• A notable person previously owned the record. Some rare records are highly specific copies of albums that generally abound in record stores’ “used” sections. The only difference with these special copies is that someone of note previously owned them — in many cases, the artist themself. This ownership history can especially strongly increase the LP’s price — the artist is unlikely to have owned more than one copy of their own work.

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Rare vinyl records: the 10 most expensive sales

The below 10 rare vinyl records’ sale prices are currently the highest on record. These prices reflect confirmed purchases, rather than asking prices for sales that have yet to occur.

10. Aphex Twin: ‘Caustic Window’ test pressing

In the 1990s, Richard D. James, best known as the electronic music innovator Aphex Twin, recorded a self-titled album under the alias Caustic Window. Although he planned to release the album in 1996, this never happened. Ultimately, only a very limited number of test pressings were manufactured, with no copies produced for retail. 

One of these very rare test pressings appeared for sale on the online vinyl record marketplace Discogs in 2014 for $13,500. However, in June of that year, the record ultimately sold at auction on eBay for $46,300. Markus “Notch” Persson, who developed the popular game ‘Minecraft,’ was the buyer.

9. The Beatles: “Till There Was You” 10” two-sided demo

In March 2016, an undisclosed buyer purchased this 1963 Beatles demo via the U.K.-based auction house Omega Auctions. The sale price was £77,500, then equivalent to approximately $108,500.

The record is rare and valuable for two primary reasons. The first is that the handwriting of Brian Epstein, the Beatles’ manager, is on the white label in the center of the record. The second is that The Beatles used this two-sided demo — A-side “Till There Was You,” B-side “Hello Little Girl” — to get signed to Parlophone Records. This label would go on to release the seminal rock band’s first eight studio albums.

8. The Beatles: ‘Yesterday and Today’

Released in June 1966, this Beatles album only saw the light of day in the U.S. and Japan — never Europe or the U.K. On top of that, the original album artwork proved controversial, resulting in future copies including a different cover image. In the original image, the band members have, at first glance, murdered several babies (though the photograph, in reality, only contains meat and doll parts). In May 2019, Julien’s Auctions sold a copy with this image — and John Lennon’s signature — on the cover for £180,000 ($234,400).

7. Rammellzee and K-Rob: “Beat Bop” single

Released in 1983, this single appeared on the 2017 ‘Rolling Stone’ list of the all-time greatest hip-hop songs. Although the two rappers to whom the song is credited are little-known figures, the track’s producer is the famed American Neo-expressionist Jean-Michel Basquiat. This unusual Basquiat credit, the rarity of the single’s original pressings, and Basquiat’s art for the album cover make it a rare vinyl record. In 2020, a copy sold at a Sotheby’s auction for $126,000.

6. Frank Wilson: “Do I Love You (Indeed I Do)” single

Only five copies remain of this 1965 Motown single, on which production was limited in the first place — a meager 250 copies were ever manufactured. Upon the single’s release, Frank Wilson had already become well-known as a Motown producer, and this was his attempt at being a public-facing artist too. 

Wilson ultimately decided to stay in his production lane instead, though some allege that Motown boss Berry Gordy coerced him into doing so. Either way, Gordy destroyed all but the five copies still in existence today. In August 2020, the rare soul record dealer John Manship sold a copy for £100,000, or roughly $130,485 at the time.

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5. John Lennon and Yoko Ono: ‘Double Fantasy’

John Lennon’s murder in December 1980 made headlines around the world and shocked just about everyone who heard the news. Several hours before his death, he signed a copy of ‘Double Fantasy’ (1980), his fifth album with his wife, the musician Yoko Ono. According to some sources, the copy he signed belonged to Mark David Chapman, his murderer. 

Lennon’s signature and its circumstances have made this copy of the LP a highly valuable, if macabre, rare vinyl record. In fact, many say this LP is the last he ever signed in his lifetime. After police returned the LP to someone who filed it as evidence in Lennon’s murder investigation, it sold for $150,000 in 1999. Several sales have occurred since then, and in November 2020, Goldin Auctions posted the LP for sale, with a final price of $900,000.

4. The Beatles: ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’

Often considered The Beatles’ best record, ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ (1967) is a valuable record in any condition. Copies of the LP’s mono version with a black Parlophone label are known to sell for especially high prices. One particularly rare copy of the LP includes all four Beatles’ signatures. The Dallas-based auction house Heritage Auctions sold this copy for $290,500 in March 2013.

3. Elvis Presley: “My Happiness” demo

In 1953, long before he was famous, the King of Rock and Roll recorded a cover of the pop music standard “My Happiness.” This demo was never publicly released in Elvis’ lifetime, making its test pressing a highly sought-after rarity among record collectors. 

In January 2015, the musician Jack White — also well-known to be an avid record collector — purchased this test pressing at auction for $300,000. This sale occurred through an auction that Graceland, Presley’s estate, directly facilitated. Through White’s record label Third Man Records, he later issued copies of the demo, marking its first-ever official public release. 

2. The Beatles: ‘The Beatles’ (a.k.a. ‘The White Album’)

‘The White Album’ ranks among many music critics’ and fans’ favorite Beatles albums, and Beatles drummer Ringo Starr previously owned the LP’s first copy. In December 2015, nearly 50 years after the album’s 1968 release, Starr sold his copy at a Julien’s auction for $790,000. This extraordinarily high sales price comes from both this copy being the first ever manufactured and Starr himself owning it for close to five decades.

1. Wu-Tang Clan: ‘Once Upon a Time in Shaolin’

From 2007 to 2013, the massively influential hip-hop group Wu-Tang Clan secretly recorded their seventh studio album. This album, ‘Once Upon a Time in Shaolin,’ has never been publicly released, though the group played it for a small audience in March 2015. In fact, only one copy of the LP has ever been manufactured. 

Given the group’s prestige and the extreme scarcity of the record, the LP is tremendously valuable. In November 2015, controversial Turing Pharmaceuticals founder Martin Shkreli — who recently spent four years in federal prison — bought the album. The now-defunct New York-based auction house Paddle8 facilitated the $2 million sale. This makes ‘Once Upon a Time in Shaolin’ the most expensive vinyl record ever sold by an order of magnitude.

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Buying your own rare vinyl records 

Anybody can buy vinyl records at auction, including rare ones. Other records — those that aren’t quite scarce but aren’t common either — could become truly rare sometime after purchase. In this regard, buying vinyl records at auction can be seen as an investment. These collectibles can bring joy and wonder to music enthusiasts — and fortune to the lucky person who sells a rare copy.