Before 1969 there was no official singles chart. Before February 1969 - when the British Market Research Bureau (BMRB) chart was established - there was no official chart or universally accepted source. The company regards a choose period of the new Musical Express chart (only from 1952 to 1960) and Slots the Record Retailer chart from 1960 to 1969 as predecessors for the period as much as eleven February 1969, Casino slots where multiples of competing charts (none official) coexisted aspect by side.

The primary number one on the UK singles chart was "Here in My Heart" by Al Martino for the week ending 14 November 1952. As of the week ending 18 December 2025, the UK singles chart has had 1,445 completely different number one hits. The UK singles chart started to be compiled in 1952. Based on the Official Charts Company's statistics, online slots game (https://www.slotsfreegame.com) as of 1 July 2012, 1,200 singles had topped the Official Singles Chart.

The Official Chart, broadcast on BBC Radio 1 and previously MTV (Official UK Top 40), is the UK music business's recognised official measure of singles and free online slots albums reputation as a result of it's probably the most comprehensive analysis panel of its type, Free slots in the present day surveying over 15,000 retailers and digital providers daily, capturing 99.9% of all singles consumed in Britain throughout the week, and Free slots over 98% of albums.

Record Mirror began operating a Top 5 album chart in July 1956; from November 1958 onward Melody Maker printed the highest 10 albums.

7 inch EP and all singles needing to be under 20 minutes in size, as releases longer than 20 minutes would be classed as an album (with most longer EPs falling into the finances albums class). EPs taken out the listings between March 1960 - December 1967 (the information for the now 'Official' 1960s EP chart might be discovered in the Virgin Book of British Hit Singles).