RIO DE JANEIRO — Move over, Madonna, Lady Gaga has not just broken your crowd-size record. She shattered it.

The “Abracadabra” singer manifested a crowd of 2.5 million concert goers for her free show Saturday night on Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro, Variety reported.

Madonna held the previous record for the highest-attended concert by a female artist with 1.6 million. She also performed on Copacabana Beach in May 2024, according to People magazine.

Lady Gaga gave her fans, many of whom camped outside the hotel where she was staying, a preview during her rehearsal Friday, telling them, “I’ve missed you so much. I know that this is not the first show here, I know this is just a rehearsal, it feels like it’s the real show.”

She was last in Brazil 12 years ago.

The concert this weekend almost didn’t happen. Police said they had prevented a bomb attack. The BBC reported that the suspects had recruited people to use improvised explosives to attack the venue, all in the name of social media notoriety, the Civil Police of Rio de Janeiro and the justice ministry said.

During raids on the homes of 15 people, police did not say if any weapons or explosives in connection with the concert, were discovered, The Associated Press reported

The group’s attack "aimed at gaining notoriety in order to attract more viewers, more participants — most of them teenagers, many of them children,” Rio Police chief Luiz Lima said, according to the AP.

Two people were arrested - the person who was allegedly responsible and a teenager.

Police said that the group behind the attack was spreading hate speech against mostly children, teens and members of the LGBTQ+ community, the BBC reported.

“They were clearly saying that they were planning an attack at Lady Gaga’s concert motivated by sexual orientation,” Rio police secretary Felipe Cury said, the AP reported.

The one person arrested was accused of illegal possession of a firearm in Rio Grande do Sul. The teen was in custody for storing child pornography in Rio de Janeiro.

The entertainer‘s team was not told about the planned attack. They found out about it from media reports on Sunday.

Security was high at the concert, with attendees going through metal detectors and 5,000 police officers and members of the military were on duty. Drones and facial recognition devices were also deployed, the BBC reported.

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