It is that exciting time of year that people have been eagerly waiting for, no we are not talking about christmas.
Spotify Wrapped is officially out!
At the end of each year, Spotify collects data of every single user’s listening activity to compile into a finalised analysis of their top genres, artists, songs, albums, and podcasts. You are bound to flick through countless instagram stories as the site is already overflowing with screenshots of peoples results.
Spotify holds hosts to an eye watering 700 million users worldwide all of whom use the application as their primary streaming platform. Spotify themselves round up a summary of the worlds decided top artists. 2025’s top artist is Bad Bunny, the artist dominated the leaderboard rounding up 19.8 billion streams this year. Following him in the leaderboard is Taylor Swift in second place, then The Weeknd in third, Drake in fourth and Billie Eilish taking the fifth spot.
The top 5 songs globally are revealed to be-
1. ‘Die With A Smile’, by Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars
2. ‘BIRDS OF A FEATHER’, by Billie Eilish
3. ‘APT’, by ROSE and Bruno Mars
4. ‘Ordinary,’ by Alex Warren
5. ‘DtMF’, by Bad Bunny
Spotify wrapped landed into users devices at 13:00 GMT on Wednesday. The collection of data is presented in a fun and playful formation, often presented in personality-driven ways urging people to share their top track results on social media,
Spotify first introduced the simple wrapped phenomenon in 2015, and it has only blossomed from there on. It is an incredible marketing tactic pushing people to use the apps streaming services more to differ their results. This leads to those that do not use the app to develop FOMO and feel inclined to get involved. The data is typically harvested right up until October allowing people enough time to get their minutes listened up to however impressive they may deem. It seems silly that people use this as a means to show off but it sure as hell works in Spotify’s favour.
Wrapped typically comes out between the last week of November each year or leans into the first week of December. Spotify Wrapped typically includes the five musicians, songs, and musical genres that a user has listened to the most throughout the previous year. Artists themselves also have access to the response of their craft with their own version of wrapped displaying which of their tracks that fans favoured.
Following in Spotify’s footsteps several other competing streaming services have introduced their own version of the data compiling. Apple Music released its ‘Replay’ feature in 2019, Tidal launched its ‘My Rewind’ feature in 2020, Youtube Music has introduced ‘Your Music Journey’ and Deezer has their own variant known as ‘MyDeezerYear’. All great attempts however none are yet to recreate the cultural impact of Spotify Wrapped.
A strategic marketing tactic that provides users with a little digital christmas present in the run up to the festive season. Spotify Wrapped offers an internal moment of self reflection in the form of listening activity and may (or may not) bring people closer together via music preferences
