International breakthrough

Enya achieved a breakthrough in her career in 1988 with the album Watermark, which featured the hit song Orinoco Flow (sometimes known as Sail Away). Orinoco Flow, reported to be named after Orinoco Studios (now Miloco Studios), where it was conceived, topped the charts in the United Kingdom, and the album sold eight million copies.

Three years later, she followed with another hit album, Shepherd Moons, which sold ten million copies and earned Enya her first Grammy Award. The songs On Your Shore and Exile (from Watermark) and Epona (from Enya) were featured in the 1991 film L.A. Story. Ebudae was also featured on the soundtrack to the Robin Williams film Toys, while the 1990 film Green Card had River, Watermark, and Storms In Africa. Book Of Days was featured prominently in the movie Far and Away.

In 1992, a re-mastered version of the Enya album was released as The Celts including a longer, modified version of Portrait (Out of the Blue). Four years after Shepherd Moons, she released the Grammy-winning The Memory of Trees (1995). Singles released from the album were Anywhere Is and On My Way Home.

In 1997, Enya released her greatest hits collection, Paint The Sky With Stars: The Best of Enya, which featured two new songs: Paint the Sky With Stars and Only If...; Only If... later became a single. (Only If You Want To, is an early version of Only If.... It appears on a promotional Japanese CD called, The Best of Enya, and does not include the French lyrics.) She was offered the chance to compose the score for James Cameron's 1997 film Titanic, but declined. The eventual choice of Norwegian vocalist Sissel Kyrkjeb?, whose style is similar to Enya's, resulted in work that some sources erroneously credited to Enya, although in interviews, the songs were officially credited as the sound of Clannad. A 1989 recording of Enya singing an Irish Language version of Silent Night (O?che Chi?in) has been reissued many times over the years, including The Christmas EP (which otherwise contained several non-holiday related previously issued recordings by Enya) and the 1997 edition of the charity album A Very Special Christmas.