It seems silly to raise the question of what was the biggest hit of summer 2019, given the chart dominance of ‘Old Town Road’ in various parts of the world in recent months. Yet here’s the thing: it wasn’t the most-streamed song of the summer on Spotify or on YouTube. Both services have put out their global charts for summer smashes, and both lists are headed by the same track: ‘Señorita’ by Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello.
‘Old Town Road’ did make it to number two on YouTube’s chart, but only number four on Spotify’s – behind Ed Sheeran and Justin Bieber’s ‘I Don’t Care’ and Billie Eilish’s Bieber-featuring remix of ‘Bad Guy’ in that case.
The charts are a reminder that while ‘Old Town Road’ *was* a global hit, assumptions of its overwhelming chart dominance stem mainly from its performance in the US. The streaming stats support that: YouTube said that Lil Nas X’s track was the top song of the summer in the US by its metrics “earning over 3x more views than its closest competition and topping the US Top Songs chart every week this summer”. US-focused streaming service Pandora has also put out its song-of-the-summer chart, which is topped by ‘Old Town Road’.
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