It took Beyoncé just three days to become the fastest worldwide selling album ever on iTunes, according to Apple. According to information the company released on Monday, the new album sold 828,773 in its first three days.

The album also broke US album sales with 617,213 sold in those three days. In addition to the record sales, Beyoncé’s album hit No. 1 in 104 countries around the world.

If you remember, Beyoncé decided to release her album exclusively on iTunes—she didn’t even send the songs to be manufactured until after the album hit on iTunes. What this gave Beyoncé is a level of secrecy that few artists have enjoyed in many years.

Typically the press, and public, know about album releases far in advance of their release, effectively ruining any surprise. Sometimes this is done by the artist, but more often, the news comes from a leak.

Apple has proven with the Beyoncé release that an iTunes exclusive release is the way to go. I said last week and I’ll say it again—you are going to see a lot more releases done with Apple this way in the coming months and years.

Update: Apple and Columbia confirmed that Beyonce passed 1 million albums sold worldwide today.