Polish Society of the Phonographic Industry

ZPAV certifies sales of albums, singles and videos, for media sold from 1993.[2] It awards Gold, Platinum and Diamond certifications, and as of 1 August 2021, the number of units required for certification is as follows:[6]

Sales may include both physical units and digital sales. For albums sales made before March 2017, 10 digital downloads (including ringtones) or 2,500 streams of any track of the album count as one album sale. For albums sales starting March 2017, revenue of 20 zł count as an album unit. For singles, only singles released from 2015 are eligible for including digital sales. For single sales before March 2017, one digital download (including ringtones) or 250 streams or any revenue of 2 zł count as a single. For single sales starting March 2017, only the revenue criterion hold.[6] Boxed sets count as a single unit and ZPAV also awards multiple Platinum awards, up to the amount which rewards a Diamond award.[6] An archive of all the certifications awarded by ZPAV is available at the website.[7]

The first gold and platinum awards were granted by ZPAV in February 1995, became gold to Marysia Biesiadna by Maryla Rodowicz and platinum to Three Tenors Live by The Three Tenors. The diamond award was first presented in July 2000 to Kayah i Bregović by Serbian musician Goran Bregović and Polish singer Kayah.[2]

Prior to April 1997, the threshold for pop album was 100,000 units for gold, 200,000 for platinum and 1,000,000 for diamond award, with reduced thresholds (50,000/100,000/500,000) for international repertoire.[8] In April 1997,[8] the thresholds for domestic repertoire were reduced to the ones for international records, and the thresholds were set as follows:[9]

Certifications was done by categories. It included a separate category for singles, up to 30 minutes (reduced to 20 minutes in 2014)[10] and no more than four songs, and maxi-singles, more than 30 minutes in length and between three and five songs.[9] Separate categories existed for multi-disc box sets and multi-disc video boxes. Originally, each media piece was counted separately,[11] but this practice was cancelled in February 2013.[12] It also included a separate video single category, for media with playing time of up to 15 minutes, which was genre-independent, with thresholds of 5,000/10,000/50,000.[9]

The first change in the certifications occurred in June 2002.[8] Pop album thresholds were reduced to 35,000/70,000/350,000, and Class/Jazz to 5,000/10,000/50,000. A "Soundtrack" category was introduced, with thresholds of 10,000/20,000/100,000 and a separate genre-independent DVD category was added, with thresholds of 5,000 for Gold, 10,000 for Platinum and no Diamond award.[13] Reduced thresholds for foreign repertoire were introduced in June 2004.[8] The thresholds for foreign repertoire were set at 20,000/40,000/200,000 for Gold/Platinum/Diamond. At the same time, a classical-popular album category was introduced, with thresholds of 10,000/20,000/100,000.[14]

In June 2006,[8] the thresholds for pop albums were reduced again, for the final time, as of 2021. Domestic repertoire requirements were set to 15,000/30,000/150,000 and foreign repertoire were set to 10,000/20,000/100,000. However, this change was applied only for albums released from July 2005 onwards.[15][16]

Following these change, the thresholds remained the same for a longer period, with changes only in the rules and categories of certifications. The DVD category was merged with the video category in January 2008.[17][18] Following this, digital sales for albums, including ringtones and mastertones, was recognized in September 2010,[11] with streaming included in April 2014.[10]

In June 2015, the certification rules were greatly simplified. The separate thresholds for albums released before July 2005 were canceled, the video single category was removed and the multi-disc categories were merge into the single-disc categories.[19] Digital sales for singles were introduced in August 2015, including streaming.[20] Revenue thresholds were introduced in March 2017, and the categories for single and maxi-single were merged.[21] The final change, as of August 2021 was increasing the thresholds for singles in August 2021.[6] Prior to the change, the thresholds were 10,000/20,000 zł for Gold, 20,000/40,000 zł for Platinum and 100,000/200,000 zł for Diamond, and the change doubled these requirements.[22]

The Fryderyk is the annual award in Polish music. Its status in the Polish public can be compared to the US Grammy and the British BRIT Award. The Fryderyk was established by ZPAV in 1994 and presented for the first time in 1995.[2] Since 1999, nominees and winners have been selected by the Phonographic Academy (Polish: Akademia Fonograficzna) which was founded by the General Assembly of ZPAV in 1998 and now consists of nearly 1000 artists, creators, journalists.[23] Since 2007 it is organized by STX Records.[2]

Since 2010, ZPAV also awards a "Digital Song of the Year" award, which is awarded to the best selling digital song in two categories, Polish songs and foreign songs. The 2010 winners (for sales in 2009) were the Polish "Nie mogę Cię zapomnieć" by Agnieszka Chylińska and the foreign "Womanizer" by Britney Spears. The 2011 winners (for sales in 2010) were the Polish "Nie pytaj mnie" by Ala Boratyn and the foreign "Waka waka" by Shakira.[24]