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What are some of Disney’s most successful original songs?
Key Takeaways
- "Let It Go" from Frozen is Disney's most successful original song, with over 570 million global streams on Spotify.
- "How Far I'll Go" from Moana is Disney's second-most successful original song, with over 444 million global streams on Spotify.
- "You're Welcome" from Moana is Disney's third-most successful original song, with almost 406 million global streams on Spotify.
Introduction
Some of Disney's most successful original songs are "Let It Go", "How Far I'll Go", "You're Welcome", "We Don't Talk About Bruno", and "Into the Unknown." The most popular songs were determined according to pre-compiled rankings, along with the volume of global streams they have attained on the streaming platform Spotify. Each of them was released post-2010 and has generated hundreds of millions of streams on Spotify. Further details have been presented below.
Most Successful Original Disney Songs
1. Let It Go (From Frozen)
- The most streamed original song from Disney is "Let It Go" from the movie Frozen, both of which were released in 2013. In the movie, the song was performed by Idina Menzel.
- As of September 7, 2022, "Let It Go" has garnered close to 570 million global streams on Spotify. Meanwhile, the Frozen: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack has sold more than 10 million units worldwide.
- The top performing song of 2013 on the Billboard Hot 100 was "Thrift Shop" by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis (featuring Wanz), which was a non-movie song. As of September 7, 2022, it has garnered more than 874.5 million global streams on Spotify. Also, "Royals" by Lorde was released in the same year, and it has nearly 945 million streams on Spotify.
2. How Far I'll Go (From Moana)
- The second most streamed original song from Disney is "How Far I'll Go" from the film Moana, both of which were released in the year 2016. The original version of the song was performed by Auliʻi Cravalho, who played the film's title character.
- As of September 7, 2022, the song has more than 444 million global streams on Spotify. The accompanying Moana: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack sold over 1.254 million album-equivalent units in the United States alone by the conclusion of 2017.
- Another popular song that was released in the year 2016 was "One Dance" by Drake (featuring Kyla Reid and Wizkid). As of September 7, 2022, the song has generated over 2.4 billion global streams on Spotify.
3. You're Welcome (From Moana)
- Disney's third-most streamed original song is "You're Welcome" from the film Moana. Both the song, which was performed by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and the movie were released in the year 2016.
- As of September 7, 2022, the song has garnered nearly 406 million global streams on Spotify. Furthermore, the Moana: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack sold over 1.254 million album-equivalent units in the United States alone by the conclusion of 2017.
- In comparison, a non-movie song that was also released in 2016, "Closer" by The Chainsmokers (featuring Daya), has totaled approximately 2.36 billion global streams on Spotify.
4. We Don't Talk About Bruno (From Encanto)
- The fourth-most streamed Disney original song is currently "We Don't Talk About Bruno" from the film Encanto, although its streaming figures have not been referenced on lists of the most popular songs in the studio's discography due to recency (the song was released in 2021).
- "We Don't Talk About Bruno" has generated a total of more than 343.3 million global streams on Spotify, as of September 7, 2022. The Encanto (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) has sold 1.03 million album-equivalent units, as of March 2022, in the United States alone.
- Comparatively, Olivia Rodrigo's "Good 4 U" was also released in the year 2021, and the song has produced nearly 1.6 billion global streams on Spotify.
5. Into the Unknown (From Frozen 2)
- The fifth-most streamed original song from Disney is "Into the Unknown" from Frozen 2 (both the film and song were released in 2019). As with the first song on this list, this particular song was also sung by Idina Menzel.
- As of September 7, 2022, "Into the Unknown" has garnered a total of more than 300 million global streams on Spotify. The Frozen II Original Motion Picture Soundtrack has sold 1.3 million album-equivalent units in the United States, as of November 2020.
- Sam Smith and Normani's "Dancing With a Stranger" was also released in 2019. Currently, the song's global streams on Spotify have exceeded 1 billion.
Research Strategy:
To determine the most successful Disney original songs based on the number of streams, we leveraged some of the most reputable sources available in the public domain. Our research commenced by searching for pre-compiled lists curated by trustworthy news, media, and blog sites, including those focused on the entertainment industry. Such sources included the likes of The Scotsman, Back to the Movies, Forbes, and Billboard, among others. Through this strategy, we were able to find a number of lists ranking the most successful original songs in Disney's discography by global streams on Spotify. To ensure that we were providing the most up-to-date figures, we searched for each song on Spotify to obtain their streaming figure as of September 7, 2022.
Afterward, we searched for information on the album or equivalent-album unit sales of the relevant soundtrack. However, most of the numbers that we came across were slightly outdated, as sales figures did not appear to have been updated in recent years for some of the albums. Nevertheless, we included the figures in this research brief. Finally, to identify examples of non-movie popular songs released in the same year as the Disney songs, we leveraged Billboard's Hot 100 Year-End lists. We then searched for their current global streaming count on Spotify to compare them to Disney originals.