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Drake Crowned King of Shazam

Last Updated: October 25, 2022
Users have requested Drizzy’s songs for recognition on Shazam more than 300 million times, while Tones And I hold the record for most-Shazamed song.

As if he needed any more feathers in his cap to solidify his stake in the game, Drake is officially the most-Shazamed artist of all time. The Apple-owned platform notes that Drizzy’s songs, either as the main artist or via feature, have received over 350 million total Shazam requests.

According to a report released today to commemorate Shazam’s 20th anniversary — they’ve surpassed 70 billion total song recognitions to date — Drake is the most popular artist on Shazam, with his 2016 Views track “One Dance” featuring Kyla Reid and Wizkid receiving 17 million Shazams alone.

The news comes just days after Drake gained another once-in-a-generation-artist-type-accolade by surpassing The Beatles for most top-five hits among all artists in Hot 100 history, a feat the Fab Four held for 55 years. It was his most recent DJ Khaled collab “Staying Alive,” also featuring Lil Baby, that pushed things over the top.

It’s just a fact now. Drizzy does indeed have “more slaps than The Beatles.”

It all comes on the heels, of course, of the surprise June release of his seventh studio album, Honestly, Nevermind. The project would become his first under his massive new deal with UMG.

Shazam launched in the UK in August of 2002. Its original format allowed users to identify songs by entering a four-digit code on their phone and holding it up as the song played, producing an SMS message in return revealing the song title and artist name. It’s since evolved into an ever-popular mobile app — and over the course of its first two decades, some of the world’s biggest artists have reached several notable milestones.

The Apple-owned company revealed a couple of interesting tidbits in their data dump, including that the first song ever Shazamed was the 1971 track “Jeepster” by glam rockers T. Rex, while “Dance Monkey” by Tones And I holds the record for most-Shazamed song ever at 41 million.

Other notable stats from Shazam’s 20-year report include:

  • At just nine days, “Butter” by K-pop stars BTS is fastest track to reach one million Shazams.
  • Eminem’s “Cleanin’ Out My Closet” was the first song to reach 1,000 Shazams all the way back in September of 2002.
  • Kesha’s “Tik Tok” was the first track to top one million Shazams, doing so in February of 2010.
  • In February of 2019, Lil Wayne became the first artist to hit one million total Shazams. He also became the first to 10 million in June 2011.
  • In May of 2015, David Guetta became the first artist to reach 100 million total Shazams.
  • The fastest track to reach 10 million Shazams is “Shape of You” by Ed Sheeran, doing so in 87 days.
  • “Crazy” by Gnarls Barkley is the most-Shazamed song through the platform’s “2580” SMS text service.

On Instagram, the Toronto native played it cool though, posting a simple shrug emoji under a photo of an empty plate that read “Just another celebration.”

Mr. Graham acts like he’s been there before. And that’s because he has.

In 2021, he became the first artist to simultaneously hit the Billboard 200 and Billboard Hot 100 at the same time with the release ofCertified Lover Boy and its lead single “Way 2 Sexy.”

He then made history this past June when his dance-inspired record Honestly, Nevermind project and 21 Savage-assisted “Jimmy Cooks” track both debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and Billboard Hot 100 at the same time.

Safe to say, The Boy is not new to this. He’s true to this.

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Nate Louis

Nate Louis is a former music and culture writer at Boardroom.