The 1989 World Tour

Background and development

The tour was announced via Swift's Twitter on November 3, 2014 in which Swift said: "#The1989WorldTour is happening!" before giving a link to her website where fans could find out the list of dates. It was also revealed that Vance Joy would be joining Swift on tour, and that tickets would go sale on for North American fans on November 14.

In an interview with Time Magazine, Swift said that "the setlist will predominantly songs from 1989. [...] I have so many things I've been dreaming up for this. If you look at the makeup of my previous music, as far as production elements go, there are a lot of live drums, acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and live bass. And if you look at the landscape of 1989, it's mostly synths and automated drums and these kind of big epic synth pad sounds, and key bass, and layered vocals. I have a very big band, there are, what, 14 of us, so what you’re going to end up with is more of a live feel in that it's going to be filled in and more dramatic with more layers to it, but never to the point where it's going to feel noisy or overcrowded."

Swift also acknowledged the challenge of playing to stadiums, stating that "the challenge with a stadium show is making those people in the very top row feel like they got an intimate, personal experience." The following month in an interview with KIIS-FM, she revealed that she knew what the stage would look like, as well as knowing that "all the fans seem to be saying that they really don't want any song [from 1989] left off the setlist".

The tour took seven months to plan before three months of music rehearsals, four weeks of stage rehearsals and ten days of two-a-days dress rehearsals. It travels with 26 semi-trailer trucks and 11 buses carrying 146 people from city to city. Additionally, about 125–150 people are hired in each city to help with the load in and stage setup. The entire load in and stage setup process takes between 6 and 8 hours for arenas, with stadiums requiring an additional day. Many of the traveling crew members have worked on Swift's tours since the Fearless era. Swift chose two designs for the trucks' vinyl wrap; 13 carry one design and 13 have the other.

The tour's corporate sponsors are American Express, Comcast Cable under its Xfinity name, and Keds. Toyota presented the Chinese leg of the tour for its hybrid cars. Cornetto presented the shows in Singapore.

The only Asian shows in this tour, other than the two in Tokyo, were announced in June 2015. The shows were in Singapore and Shanghai.

Filming

Signs were displayed at the sold out Sydney concert on November 28, 2015 at ANZ Stadium which said "Today's events are being recorded and filmed for global streaming, and may also form part of a television program... for commercial and promotional purposes." Although there was no further information about what the filming was for at the time, there was speculation that it will form a DVD of the 1989 World Tour to be released once the tour concludes its run in Melbourne in late 2015. Later speculation involved an Apple Music Video launch, which was proved to be correct. Coincidentally, "All You Had To Do Was Stay" and "This Love" were added back into the show after having been left off the set list for several months. This makes the Sydney setlist identical to that of Tokyo when the tour premiered.

On December 13, 2015 (Swift's 26th birthday), she announced she had partnered with Apple Music to release a concert film entitled The 1989 World Tour Live on December 20. Filmed in front of 75,980 fans during her stop at ANZ Stadium in Sydney on November 28, it shows the entire performance and never-before seen footage from backstage and from rehearsals with some of the musical and surprise guests from previous shows.

Ticket sales

Pre-sales for European shows started on November 4, public on-sale for this leg started on November 7, tickets for London was sold later on November 10. First round of pre-sales on select North American shows start on November 7 and general sales for fans in North America started from November 14, 2014; Australia started from December 12, 2014; Japan started from December 13, 2014; Singapore and Shanghai started from June 30, 2015.

In January 2015, Forbes reported that The 1989 World Tour was one of the most expensive concert tours of 2015, just behind Fleetwood Mac's On with the Show and Maroon 5's V Tour. Swift was the sixth most-searched artist on Ticketmaster in 2014.

Sellout status occurred in many cities when general sales for the tour started. Swift announced 9 extra dates as well as the new show in Houston for North American leg. Los Angeles had the most extra dates with 3 shows at Staples Center, cities which had one extra date were East Rutherford, Chicago, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, St. Paul, Santa Clara. In St. Louis, Swift was originally performing on October 13 and 14, 2015, but after to adding Houston to the schedule, St. Louis shows downsize from two to one and she would play in this city only on September 28, 2015 and tickets go on sale at 10 am on January 30, 2015. However, tickets for St. Louis show was sold out within minutes, this resulted in a second date being added there on September 29 at the same venue. In the US the average ticket price was $380, and the cheapest date was the show at the Fargodome on October 12, where the average ticket price was $182.95 with a get-in of $79.

Swift also added more dates to European leg due to vast popularity, one for Cologne and one for Dublin. In Dublin, tickets for both concert sold out within 55 minutes although the second show was just added after 6 minutes when the first show was sold out. The show on June 29, 2015 in Dublin was also the most expensive European date, where the average ticket price was $285, with a get-in price of $198.

In Australia, over 30,000 tickets for the first show (December 11, 2015) in Melbourne was sold out less than an hour. Soon after, Swift announced 2 extra dates for this leg, one for Melbourne and one for Adelaide. Due to popular demand, in July 2015, Swift added the third show for Melbourne after 2 first shows were sold out and became the first female artist to play 3 shows at AAMI Park. The Sydney show has the cheapest get-in price for Taylor Swift tickets in Australia at $130 Australian ($100 USD). The most expensive show is the final concert in Melbourne – Saturday, December 12, 2015 – with a get-in price of $249 Australian ($193 USD).

In total, The Red Tour tickets averaged $176 across all tour stops, whereas the 1989 World Tour averaged at about $392 per concert, a 123% increase. Tickets for the 1989 World Tour were the most expensive ever for Taylor Swift.

Boxscore

Swift's five shows from the North American run (May 20 – June 6, 2015, not including Baton Rouge) generated a total of US$16.8 million from 149,708 ticket sales. It topped the Billboard Hot Tours chart for the second week, earning $15.2 million with a total of 129,962 tickets sold from three shows in Charlotte and Philadelphia. As of August 1, 2015, the tour had grossed US$86.2 million, at 20 performances in the U.S. and Canada with 771,460 tickets sold at seven arenas and nine stadiums. On September 9, the magazine reported that the tour has grossed over US$130 million, with 1.1 million tickets sold, and stated it could become Swift's highest-grossing tour. The 1989 World Tour officially surpassed The Red Tour in October, 2015 when Billboard reported that the tour grossed over US$173 million, the tour also returned to No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Tours recap, Swift's sixth turn in 2015 atop the weekly tally of highest-grossing touring artists thank to ticket sales totaling $13.6 million from the shows in Toronto, St. Louis and Des Moines.

According to Billboard, after finishing the North American leg in Tampa, the tour gross more than US$217 million with 71 shows, surpassing One Direction's On the Road Again Tour and became the highest-grossing Pop tour in 2015. Swift's 2 shows at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey ranked at number 8 on the list "Top 25 Boxscores", the tour also had 6 another position on this list, including the shows in Santa Clara, Foxborough, Philadelphia, Chicago, Tokyo and Washington, D.C.

After concluding in Melbourne, the tour grossed over US$250 million and became the highest-grossing tour in 2015, was top on "2015 Year-End Top 20 Worldwide Tours", "2015 Year-End Top 100 Worldwide Tours", "2015 Year-End Top 200 North American Tours" of Pollstar. Specially, The 1989 World Tour grossed over US$199.4 in North America alone, breaking the previous all-time high of $162 million set by The Rolling Stones in 2005, Swift became the first female artist in music history to do so. Swift's record-setting year also gives her three notches in the list of the 25 highest-grossing North American tours, the most ever for a woman but third all time.

Two shows in Tokyo's Tokyo Dome ranked at number 9 on the list "2015 Year-End Top 100 International Boxoffice" of Pollstar, appearing on this list along with 2 shows in Tokyo were the shows in Melbourne, Sydney, Shanghai and Brisbane. The 1989 World Tour also had 24 position on another list of Pollstar – "2015 Year-End Top 200 Concert Grossed [in North America]" – with the highest position of the tour which ranked at number 5 was 2 shows at MetLife Stadium, East Rutherford and the lowest position was 2 shows at Pepsi Center in Denver which ranked at number 160.

Set list

This set list is representative of the show on May 5, 2015 in Tokyo, Japan. It is not representative of all concerts for the duration of the tour.