‘Summer’ Love: Taylor Swift Breaks Record for Most No. 1s Among Soloists on Adult Pop Airplay Chart

18 August, 2023

Taylor Swift passes P!nk for the most No. 1s among soloists in the history of Billboard’s Adult Pop Airplay chart as “Cruel Summer” climbs to the top of the tally dated Aug. 26. The song becomes Swift’s 11th leader. Among all acts, she trails only Maroon 5, with an overall record 15 No. 1s.

The Adult Pop Airplay chart, which began in Billboard’s pages in March 1996, measures songs’ weekly plays, as tabulated by Mediabase and provided to Billboard by Luminate, on around 80 U.S. adult top 40 radio stations.

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Here’s a recap of Swift’s 11 No. 1s on Adult Pop Airplay.

Title, Weeks at No. 1, Year(s):

  • “Cruel Summer,” one (to date), 2023
  • “Karma,” two, 2023
  • “Anti-Hero,” nine, 2022-23
  • “Willow,” three, 2021
  • “Delicate,” four, 2018
  • “Wildest Dreams,” four, 2015
  • “Bad Blood,” three, 2015
  • “Style,” two, 2015
  • “Blank Space,” six, 2015
  • “Shake It Off,” eight, 2014
  • “I Knew You Were Trouble,” one, 2013

Originally released on Swift’s 2019 album Lover and now being promoted by Republic Records as a single, the song has been gaining momentum in recent months, as Swift has been performing it on her The Eras Tour. It’s the first tour in which she’s been able to spotlight songs from Lover, which was released shortly before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The song becomes the first Adult Pop Airplay No. 1 from Lover, following four top 10s: “Me!,” featuring Brendon Urie (No. 5 peak, June 2019); “You Need to Calm Down” (No. 3, November 2019); the title track (No. 6, February 2020); and “The Man” (No. 9, April 2020).

“Cruel Summer” concurrently spends a fourth week atop the Pop Airplay chart, where it became Swift’s 12th No. 1, the most among all artists. Swift scores her longest reign on the survey since 2015, when “Bad Blood” dominated for five frames.

On the most recently published, Aug. 19-dated all-genre, multimetric Billboard Hot 100, “Cruel Summer” rose to a new No. 3 best.

All charts dated Aug. 26 will update on Billboard.com Tuesday, Aug. 22.

Gary Trust

Billboard