After Bad Bunny and Harry Styles ruled the 2022 year-end global rankings, 2023 is all about the ladies: Taylor Swift finishes as the No. 1 Billboard Global 200 Artist and Billboard Global Excl. U.S. Artist, while Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers” is the No. 1 title on the year-end Billboard Global 200 and Billboard Global Excl. U.S. recaps.
While the 2023 year-end tracking period began with the Nov. 19, 2022-dated chart, Cyrus rang in the calendar year almost immediately, with the Jan. 12 release of “Flowers.” By the end of the month, it debuted atop both global charts, and made itself at home. The song reigned for 13 weeks on Global Excl. U.S. and for 12 on the Global 200, tying Harry Styles’ “As It Was” for the longest run at No. 1 on the former list (dating back to its Sept. 2020 launch).
Explore All of Billboard’s 2023 Year-End Charts
Throughout the year, “Flowers” appeared on 39 of Billboard’s Hits of the World charts and topped lists in 26 international territories, including those in Africa, Asia, Europe and Oceania. In North America, it crowned the U.S.-based Billboard Hot 100 for eight non-consecutive weeks, winding up No. 2 on its year-end tally.
Eight songs appear in the year-end top 10 of both global lists. In addition to “Flowers,” there’s Rema and Selena Gomez’s “Calm Down,” “SZA’s “Kill Bill,” Taylor Swift’s “Anti-Hero,” The Weeknd & Ariana Grande’s “Die For You,” Sam Smith & Kim Petras’ “Unholy,” David Guetta and Bebe Rexha’s “I’m Good (Blue),” and last year’s champion, Harry Styles’ “As It Was.”
The Global 200 top 10 is rounded out by Metro Boomin, The Weeknd & 21 Savage at No. 9 with “Creepin’” and Morgan Wallen at No. 10 with “Last Night.” On Global Excl. U.S., the two final missing pieces are Tom Odell’s “Another Love” at No. 9 and Jung Kook’s “Seven,” featuring Latto, at No. 10. Last year, both charts’ top 10s contained the same songs, albeit in slightly different order.
Both lists’ top 10s are performed entirely in English. In each of their three annual recaps so far, “Dakiti” by Bad Bunny and Jhay Cortez is the only non-English song to hit the top 10, at No. 6 for both in 2021. Still, six non-English songs topped the weekly Global Excl. U.S. survey during the 2023 tracking period, up from four in 2022 and three in 2021. This year’s haul includes the first Japanese-language song the reach the summit, via YOASOBI’s “Idol.”
Bolstered by the hangover success of last year’s Midnights, plus the July release of Speak Now (Taylor’s Version), Taylor Swift finishes as the No. 1 Billboard Global 200 Artist and Billboard Global Excl. U.S. Artist. In all, she landed 54 songs on the former survey and 46 on the latter. In addition to new hits like “Anti-Hero” and “Karma,” featuring Ice Spice, Swift’s year on the charts was bolstered by buzz surrounding The Eras Tour. Though the trek never went beyond North America in the tracking period (the tour continues throughout next year, traveling from continent to continent), global buzz via word-of-mouth and social media spring boarded various hits across Swift’s eras onto the charts.
As the tour continues, so likely will her global chart success. Already in the 2024 tracking period, she has hit No. 1 on the Global 200 twice – first, with 2019’s “Cruel Summer,” and then with “Is It Over Now? (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault),” one of 19 top-40 debuts from 1989 (Taylor’s Version).
Aside from Olivia Rodrigo as 2021’s No. 1 year-end Global 200 Artist, Cyrus and Swift are the first artists from the mainland U.S. to crown annual global recaps. BTS (South Korea) and Dua Lipa (U.K.) covered the other three in 2021, and Bad Bunny (Puerto Rico) and Harry Styles (U.K.) reigned over 2022.
Ed Sheeran and The Weeknd appear in the top 10 of both charts’ artist lists for the third year in a row. While global-chart-era hits like “Shivers” and “Save Your Tears” have been key to their sustained success, they’ve each maintained consistent weekly marks for older titles like “Perfect” and “Shape of You” for Sheeran and “The Hills” and “Starboy” for The Weeknd.
Just as Styles repeats in both top 10s with last year’s champ, “As It Was,” Bad Bunny is back on both artist tallies, at No. 2 on Global 200 Artists and No. 3 on Global Excl. U.S. Artists. Like Swift, he is setting himself for a successful 2024, as 19 songs from Nadie Sabe Lo Que Va A Pasar Manana debuted on each chart in the first week of the ’24 tracking period, including “Monaco” at No. 1 on both.
In year-end recaps for 2021 and 2022, Bad Bunny was the only Latin act to reach the top 10 of any of the four global charts. This year, he is joined in the top 10 by Peso Pluma (No. 6 – Global 200 Artists; No. 7 – Global Excl. U.S. Artists), plus Feid and Karol G, at Nos. 8-9, respectively, on Global Excl U.S. Artists.
NewJeans is the highest-ranking K-Pop act, at No. 9 on Global 200 Artists and No. 4 on Global Excl. U.S. Artists.
Billboard’s year-end music recaps represent aggregated metrics for each artist, title, label and music contributor on the weekly charts from Nov. 19, 2022, through Oct. 21, 2023. Rankings for Luminate-based recaps reflect equivalent album units, airplay, sales or streaming during the weeks that the titles appeared on a respective chart during the tracking year. Any activity registered before or after a title’s chart run isn’t considered in these rankings. That methodology detail, and the November-October time period, account for some of the difference between these lists and the calendar-year recaps that are independently compiled by Luminate.
