Ariana Grande is the Biggest Pop Star in the world (2024)

Ariana Grande is the first pop diva of the streaming generation.

Many of today’s top female pop stars, such as Taylor Swift and Lady Gaga, first rose to stardom when iTunes was king and only broke out in the streaming universe this year. Others, who have recently arrived at the peak of the industry, like Dua Lipa and Billie Eilish, can’t match Grande’s overall track record. Grande has now released five albums that topped the Billboard charts.

Her latest, “Positions,” was the best-selling album of November thanks to the popularity of her music on streaming services. Last month, Grande’s songs generated more than 493 million streams on Spotify, more than double any other act.

She also received more than 165 million views on YouTube. Her top countries span the planet, including Thailand, Indonesia, Mexico, Peru, the Philippines, Brazil and the U.S.

All of which was enough to earn Grande the top spot on Bloomberg’s new Pop Star Power Rankings. In a year dominated by Korean pop, reggaeton and dead rappers, Grande joins Lady Gaga and Cardi B as one of the few active U.S. acts to top the charts.

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Grande, who grew up in Florida, first rose to fame as the star on a pair of Nickelodeon TV shows. She released her debut album, “Yours Truly,” in 2013. Her next two albums, “My Everything” and “Dangerous Woman,” performed well. But it was her fourth, “Sweetener,” in 2018 that established her as one of the biggest pop stars in contemporary music. Nine different songs from the album cracked Billboard’s Hot 100.

Grande’s ascent has been shaken at times by personal and professional tragedy. In 2017, she was touring in Manchester, U.K. when a suicide bomber killed 23 people and wounded more than 800 as fans were leaving her concert. Last year, her ex-boyfriend Mac Miller died of a drug overdose.

In 2019, her follow-up record, “thank u, next,” set records on Spotify. Grande became the first solo act to ever occupy the top three spots on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Grande was one of the 10 best-selling acts in the world in both 2018 and 2019.

“Ariana is not just a powerhouse performer, she knows her voice, her audience and never sacrifices her authenticity in everything she touches,” said Scooter Braun, the founder of SB Projects, which represents Grande. “That’s why she continues to break records and top the charts with each new release.”

“Positions” hasn’t quite matched the popularity of her two previous records, but it still reflects her global, cross-platform appeal. Grande was one of the 10 most popular acts on Instagram last month and remains the second most-followed person in the world.

“Positions” combines her newfound sexual bravado with the vocal virtuosity that has always defined her music. New York Magazine critic Craig Jenkins writes that the album “ups the ante, seeking to dethrone the Weeknd’s After Hours for the title of the year’s hornie*st quarantine album.”

Source: Pollstar, Spotify, Nielsen Music/MRC, CrowdTangle and YouTube

Design, development and data by Christopher Cannon, Julian Burgess and Alex McIntyre.

Methodology:
Bloomberg ranked the world’s most influential pop stars based on six criteria:

1. Trailing three-month gross revenues from live shows
2. Trailing 30-day ticket sales for live shows
3. Trailing four-week album sales
4. Trailing four-week digital song streams
5. Trailing 30-day total interactions on Instagram
6. Trailing four-week YouTube views

Data for live shows is provided by Pollstar , which ranks the top 100 artists by average gross revenues received per show and top 75 artists by average number of tickets sold per show. Both datasets are released on a weekly basis, with Bloomberg using the final weekly releases for that calendar month. From this universe of artists for this date, Bloomberg calculates the total gross revenues over the trailing three months and total ticket sales for the previous 30 days.

Album sales data is provided by Luminate. Figures are released weekly for the Billboard top 200 albums based on “total activity,” which is defined as albums, track-equivalent albums and audio on-demand streaming-equivalent albums combined. To construct the universe of eligible artists for that month’s ranking, Bloomberg includes any artist who is in the top 100 for any given week. Bloomberg then sums each artist’s total activity throughout the month. Figures for a given week are included as long as the final day of that week occurs during the calendar month.

Digital-song streaming data is provided by Spotify . Figures are released weekly for the top 200 songs. To construct the universe of eligible artists for that month’s ranking, Bloomberg includes any artist who is in the top 100 for any given week. Bloomberg then sums each artist’s total number of streams throughout the month. Figures for a given week are included as long as the final day of that week occurs during the calendar month.

Instagram data is provided by CrowdTangle . Interactions are measured over the course of the calendar month, from the start of the first day of the month through the end of the last day of the month. The top 100 artists qualify for inclusion in the ranking.

YouTube releases weekly data on its top 100 most-viewed artists and videos. Bloomberg uses artists from the category of “Global - Top Songs” to construct the universe of performers who qualify for the ranking. Bloomberg then sums each artist’s total views throughout the month. Figures for a given week are included as long as the final day of that week occurs during the calendar month.

For any given show, song or album that involves a collaboration of multiple artists, each artist is considered as a separate entity and credited with the total number of gross revenues, ticket sales, song streams, or views associated with the collaborative effort. If an act is an established duo or trio, the act is treated as a single entity. Artists who participate on a soundtrack album (as part of “various artists”) are not included. For March, April and May 2020 rankings, collaborating artists were not included for Spotify and YouTube data. They are included in rankings from June 2020 onward.

Comedians, models and other artists who appear in the top 100 of the six metrics (top 75 for 30-day ticket sales) but do not have musical careers are eliminated from the final universe. Each artist’s ranking within the six variables reflects their position among this final list of qualified artists. An artist with no ranking for one of the six metrics means they did not appear within the top 100 (top 75 for 30-day ticket sales) at any point during the previous month.

With the universe established, each artist is ranked on each metric. Artists are then scored on a scale of 0 to 100 for each metric based on their relative position within the metric’s ranking. The best-performing artist receives a score of 100, the worst-performing artist a score of 0, while all other artists are scored proportionally based on their position between the best- and worst-performing artists. The six metrics are equally weighted and averaged for a final score between 0 and 100.

Note: Beginning with April 2020 edition of the ranking, two changes were introduced:

1. Most artists have canceled or rescheduled tours due to the coronavirus, so there is no new data on ticket sales or box office grosses. It’s unclear when that will change. The four remaining metrics are weighted at 25% each in this new version.
2. For data that is released weekly, the ranking now includes any data whose week ends in the given calendar month. Previously, a week’s data was used if it was released in the calendar month.