Drake's Views named most popular release of 2016

Rapper Drake's album Views has been named the country's most popular release of 2016.

The Hotline Bling hitmaker recently celebrated as the project notched up quadruple platinum status as it was nominated for eight Grammy Awards, and now Views has landed Drake another title, thanks to officials at data tracking firm Nielsen Music.

The album, which shot to number one on the Billboard Hot 100 countdown in April (16), and became the biggest-selling disc of the year, has now been crowned the most popular of the past 12 months, scoring 4.14 million in equivalent album units, with 1.61 million of that figure from physical sales.

The Nielsen poll, which tracked all releases from 1 January (16) to 29 December (16), noted Views garnered 2.02 million in streaming hits, reports Billboard.com.

Adele's 25, which was the top album of 2015, actually sold more physical copies than Views, but only totalled 2.37 million equivalent album units, placing her a distant second on the countdown.

Meanwhile, Beyonce's Lemonade is at three, and Rihanna's Anti and Twenty One Pilots' Blurryface round out the annual top five.