Spotify Picked Its Songs Of The Summer, & We Have Notes

It’s nearly Labor Day, so we can definitively say what we’ve been thinking for months: 2025 will go down in infamy for having no song of the summer. We hedged our bets multiple times, hoping tales of f*ckboys and heart-wrenching subway breakups would eventually break through, but even acts like Lorde and BLACKPINK couldn’t top the charts for long. Needless to say, it was a bleak time to be a music writer.

Spotify seems to be of different mind, however — the streaming platform shared its 2025 song-of-the-summer picks on Aug. 27, with selections chosen based on streaming data, cultural impact, and editorial insight. And while we’re not entirely sold on all their picks, there are some strong cases to be made. The first case being: Ravyn Lenae’s “Love Me Not,” a track that’s been quietly climbing the charts since its release in 2024. According to Spotify, the nostalgic tune reached its highest streaming day of all time on July 18, which just so happened to coincide with Lenae’s first entry into the Top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100. Since then, the song has gone on to peak at No. 5 and has spent a collective 20 weeks on the charts.

Another solid song of the summer contender is Sabrina Carpenter’s “Manchild,” which spent 25 consecutive days at No. 1 on Spotify’s U.S. Daily Top Songs following its June 5 release. Not to mention, the track also debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. Sure, it may not have the same staying power as “Espresso,” but hey — 306 million Spotify streams is nothing to sneeze at. Then there’s “Shake It To The Max (FLY) — Remix” by MOLIY, Silent Addy, Skillibeng, and Shenseea, an infectious dancehall anthem that started out as a mainstay on the TikTok FYP and went on to chart on Spotify's Top 50 Chart in more 45 countries.

“Back To Friends” by Sombr also got a shout-out from the Spotify team, and here’s where we start to push back. There’s no denying the track single-handedly propelled the 20-year-old artist to pop superstardom, but it’s a little too moody to be crowned the song of the summer by NYLON standards. Rounding out the list is Alex Warren’s “Ordinary,” and though the stats are undeniable — not only has it spent 10 weeks at the top of the Hot 100, it was also the most streamed song of the summer on Spotify — pseudo-Christian power ballads don’t really give “we’re outside having fun all day and night” as a proper SOTS should. No wonder this year was the “least danceable and lowest-energy summer for music” in a decade, according to Spotify.

When we predicted in June that no one would agree on a song of the summer, we had no idea just how dire things would get. Let’s just hope the main pop girls will be back on top in 2026.