Spotify, the largest music streaming platform with a global market share of over 30%, always makes its year-end Wrapped an event to look forward to, and for good reasons. Time and time again, this marketing tactic has proved useful. To the point that 80% of the Spotify users actively wait for Wrapped stats to drop by ending November each year middle of the week, instead of weekends.
This time, however, Spotify wanted things to be different. Spotify had the largest Wrapped feedback in 2024, with some voices having strong opinions, and the team behind Wrapped wanted to make it different in terms of scale, statistics and tools.
In keeping with tradition, Spotify reached out to TechJuice for tight-lipped press briefing about the Spotify Wrapped this year, and gave an exclusive early access to the new features
Held on December 2, Dustee Jenkins, Chief Public Affairs Officer, began the briefing with a clear message:
2025 Wrapped is bigger and larger than ever!
She went on to say how 1 in every 4 Spotify users use the app just to get their Wrapped. Which is why the Spotify team was going personal this year, more individualistic than before.
Upon asking how Spotify aims to be individualistic, Spotify’s Global Brand Director, Payman Kassaie, told TechJuice about how Wrapped will feel like “flipping through a magazine” instead of a boring, plain list.
“Wrapped this year is not going to be a giant, cold wall… Every visual this year is made to feel handmade,” Kassaie said.
Kassaie also explained how the company has come up with Spotify logos inspired by different artists and their artistic style.
Angela Leffell, Global Brand Lead at Spotify, highlighted the efforts being done to promote Wrapped at 30 different locations. She said people who listened to their top artists the most throughout the year, will get a special message with their Wrapped this time. For Wrapped for Creators, she explained how artists can also see their songs getting total streams, who listened from where, fan leader boards, etc. The team also announced that they were bringing audiobooks to Wrapped this year, good news for bibliophiles.
Jacob Masga, the Principal Product Manager and Program Lead Manager of Wrapped 2025 took over the presentation, and took the audience to the details of this year’s top stats. Masga said Wrapped 2025 brings a dozen new features, controls, layered features such as Listening Age, Wrapped Clubs, Listening Archives and much more.
Listening Age is a feature that uses an estimated average age of the listeners of your top artists and genres. It is calculated by analyzing your listening habits and comparing them to the typical demographic data of artists you streamed most frequently. The result was presented as an “age” of your musical taste, which could potentially confirm or challenge your perceptions of your own music style.
Wrapped Clubs is also a new feature Spotify is bringing out, grouping people together in metaphorical clubs such as “Full Charge Crew” and “Club Serotonin.” People assorted to Clubs also get assigned Roles such as you can be a Scout if you are always on the hunt for Fresh Music in a particular genre.
Top Albums is another feature that highlights songs and artists, 2025 is the first year Spotify spotlights the albums listeners returned to most. With the resurgence of album-focused listening in recent years, this addition gives users a clearer sense of the bodies of work that defined their year.
Concluding his presentation, Masga unveiled the following global lists:
Here are the top 5 artists that brought out the colors of expression in the people, globally:
“The Joe Rogan Experience” took the first spot, like last year, as the most listened to podcast on Spotify.
“Fourth Wing” by Rebecca Yarros became the first ever audiobook to reach Wrapped. It is also important to note that Yarros also got her second book in the Empyrean Saga (Iron Dome) on the top 5 list.
Bad Bunny’s DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS topped the list of Top Albums 2025, coinciding with the Top Artist of 2025 list. Spotify team also explained that although Taylor Swift was the number 1 in the USA, she could not reach the Global level because Bad Bunny had released the album all the way back in January 2025, while Taylor Swift released her album in October, making her lose the race.
The Song of the Year slot went to Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars’ social media sensation: Die With A Smile.
While everything seems neat and organized this time, Spotify Wrapped 2024 was not a profound time, as the company had to beat allegations of botching user personal song statistics using AI. People expressed it in various ways, but the following interaction perfectly showcases how people reacted to their Wrappeds last year.
Spotify Wrapped (first launched as “Spotify Year in Music”) is the streaming giant’s yearly gift to users: a personalized, visually stunning recap of everything they listened to over the past 12 months. The moment the calendar flips to December, the app greets you with a cheerful pop-up inviting you to dive into your own musical time capsule, complete with your top songs, favorite artists, most-played genres, total listening minutes, and plenty of colorful slides designed for instant sharing.
What started as a simple stats summary has turned into one of the internet’s biggest annual events. Each year, millions of users flood Instagram Stories, TikTok, Twitter, and Snapchat with their Wrapped results, turning personal playlists into public bragging rights (or humble brags). For many, the first day of December isn’t complete until they’ve posted their “Top 5 Artists” or that inevitable “I listened to THIS band 47,000 minutes” screenshot.
Love it or hate the oversharing, Wrapped has become modern music culture’s version of a holiday tradition. Even in countries like Pakistan, Spotify has solidified its presence, pumping fresh music and giving indie artists a special niche.
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