Topline
All but one of Apple Music’s Top 10 most-streamed songs of 2025 weren’t even released this year—a trend that will continue when bigger services Spotify and Billboard release their year-end lists—a phenomenon caused by a streaming service’s own playlists and conservative radio that some in the industry are trying to change.
“APT.” by Rosé and Bruno Mars was the biggest song of 2025 on Apple Music and Deezer, despite being released in 2024. (Photo by Manny Carabel/Getty Images for MTV)
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Key Facts
A trio of duets—”APT.” by Rosé and Bruno Mars, “Die With A Smile” by Lady Gaga and Mars and “Luther” by Kendrick Lamar and SZA—were the top three most-streamed songs on Apple Music this year, even though all were released in the fall of 2024, and much of the rest of the top 10 were released last year, like Lamar’s “Not Like Us” and Billie Eilish’s “Birds of a Feather.”
Alex Warren’s “Ordinary,” which placed seventh, is the only song in Apple Music’s top 10 released this year.
Streaming service Deezer released its top 10 most-streamed songs of the year Monday, and all but two, “Ordinary” and Doechii’s “Anxiety,” were released in 2024, although “Anxiety” isn’t really new—Doechii released an early version of the song on YouTube in 2019.
The lists match an unusual, ongoing trend—fueled by streaming habits and radio—where older songs rule the charts for a long amount of time, resulting in little turnover and prompting Billboard to change rules to finally kick some older music off the charts.
Why Are Older Songs Dominating Charts?
Two primary reasons: Streaming and conservative radio strategies. For much of the year, the top songs on the Spotify and Billboard charts looked the same as last year as “Die With A Smile,” “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” “Beautiful Things” and more reigned. Billboard said in October charts have moved more slowly than ever in recent months because radio stations have kept the same songs in heavy airplay rotation. Radio programmer and consultant Guy Zapoleon told Billboard the fragmentation of audiences across streaming and other platforms has paradoxically made songs stay hits for longer periods of time, stating because there are “so many different sources to go to, it’s difficult for songs outside the very biggest songs to become hits.” Gary Trust, Billboard managing director of charts and operations, told the New York Post radio stations feel pressure to play songs they know are big hits because they face competition from audiences who can just put on their own Spotify playlists or listen to podcasts in their car.
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Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/conormurray/2025/12/02/old-music-will-dominate-2025s-top-song-lists-like-apples-heres-why-and-whats-needed-to-change-it/
