‘Pasoori’ has become the first Pakistan-made music video to surpass one billion views on YouTube, Coke Studio announced on Sunday. The milestone comes nearly four years and seven months after the Ali Sethi-Shae Gill duet was released on February 7, 2022.
Coke Studio shared the news in an Instagram post, thanking “every single person who pressed play, sang along and made [‘Pasoori’] their own.” The platform also posted a reel featuring Sethi and Gill alongside music producers Zulfiqar Khan (Xulfi) and Abdullah Siddiqui, thanking fans for helping the song reach the milestone.
‘Pasoori’ has remained one of Pakistan’s most successful musical exports since its release. It was Spotify’s most-streamed Pakistani song in the year it came out and remains both Sethi and Gill’s most-streamed track on the platform, with nearly 405 million streams.
The song’s popularity extended well beyond Pakistan. It inspired numerous covers across Pakistan, India and countries outside the subcontinent, and was featured on the soundtrack of Disney’s “Ms Marvel,” a series centered on a Pakistani-American protagonist that drew heavily on Pakistani culture.
Coke Studio Africa also produced a remix of the track, blending it with Nigerian Afrobeats through a collaboration between Sethi, Marwan Moussa and Reekado Banks.
The song’s reach also drew controversy. Indian playback singer Arijit Singh released his own version of ‘Pasoori,’ a move that was widely criticized and sparked backlash from fans who accused Bollywood of attempting to appropriate the song.
