Every Lady Gaga Album, Ranked
Dance-floor pop made Lady Gaga's name, and ever since she has tested how far she can stray from it; rank her albums and judge each swerve. Rankings from Nylon, Out, NME, Slant and American Songwriter only band the albums, none counting for a later album. Three or more first-three finishes, rejected releases struck, put an album in the upper band; other albums are lower band, you vote inside each, and entries state tallies. Studio albums billed to Lady Gaga alone get in, weak or not; deluxe, expanded and anniversary editions share their album's slot unless songs cut for one also had their own album or EP release, not a single, seating The Fame Monster. Joint billing sinks the Bennett records and A Star Is Born, a mostly-covers record like Harlequin (11 of 13 tracks) is out, and nothing else gets in. Every item links Spotify's oldest copy holding exactly the original's tracks under their titles, styling aside, else the oldest holding them all, whatever its printed date; entries on flawed copies say what they add, drop or censor.
Lady Gaga — The Fame Monster (2009) is #1 on “Every Lady Gaga Album, Ranked”.
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Lady Gaga — The Fame Monster (2009)
Interscope first wanted three songs for The Fame's reissue and got eight, cut in Los Angeles, London, Osaka and Amsterdam around fears Gaga cast as monsters, with Teeth closing in a gospel style. Nylon and American Songwriter call the record "technically an EP" and rank it anyway, and with Nylon and NME at first, Out and Slant second and American Songwriter third, it's top three on 5 of 5 and lands in the upper band.
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Lady Gaga — Artpop (2013)
Jeff Koons made the cover image, a nude sculpture of Gaga. Rankings split on the album, fifth at Nylon and sixth at Slant but third at Out and NME and second at American Songwriter, 3 of 5 top-three placings and exactly the upper-band line. Spotify's 15-track page, ending on Applause, is the album's clean edit, as its titles show: Do What U Want is marked Edited, Sexxx Dreams reads X Dreams, Jewels n' Drugs is starred out.
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Lady Gaga — Born This Way (2011)
Recorded during the Monster Ball tour, partly on the buses, it has Clarence Clemons's saxophone on The Edge Of Glory and Brian May on Yoü And I. Out, Slant and American Songwriter all crown the album, NME slots it second and Nylon third, a 5 of 5 sweep that makes it upper band. Week one in the US came to 1,108,000 copies, and Amazon, charging 99 cents, moved an estimated 440,000 in two days.
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Lady Gaga — Joanne (2016)
Named for her aunt Joanne Stefani Germanotta, who died of lupus complications at 19 in 1974, it had Gaga working six months with Mark Ronson at Shangri-La in Malibu, and Florence Welch sings on Hey Girl. Nylon has the album second and Slant third, 2 of 5 top-three placings when the upper band needs three, while Out prints it sixth, the bottom of its six.
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Lady Gaga — The Fame (2008)
Electropop with an ear on the 1980s, made with RedOne, Martin Kierszenbaum and Rob Fusari, it needed 62 weeks on the Billboard 200, from a debut at 17, to reach second in January 2010. Nylon, Out, NME and Slant park it at fourth and American Songwriter prints it seventh, a 0 of 5 return and a lower-band seat. Spotify's copy plays the original 14, Paparazzi third, then adds Disco Heaven, first a bonus on the US and international iTunes editions.
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Lady Gaga — Chromatica (2020)
COVID-19 pushed it from April 10 to May 29, 2020, and its early-1990s house is broken up by three orchestral interludes, composed by Morgan Kibby for a 26-person orchestra, with 911 following the second. Nylon, Out and NME all went to print before release, NME while it sat postponed, which leaves 2 eligible rankings, and Slant's fifth and American Songwriter's fourth put it at 0 of 2, outside the upper band.
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Lady Gaga — Mayhem (2025)
Andrew Watt, Cirkut, Gesaffelstein, D'Mile and Bruno Mars produced it with Gaga, and it closes on Die With A Smile, her duet with Mars that came out in August 2024; the 68th Grammys gave the album itself Best Pop Vocal Album. All 5 counted rankings went to print before its March 2025 release, so not one is eligible, the tally reads 0 of 0 and the lower band takes it by default.
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How this list was ranked
Readers rank this list by voting items up and down. Items are ordered by reader votes.
