Can You Still Change Your Spotify Wrapped Top Artist? Here's the Math

Your top artist is the first big reveal in Wrapped, and the one everyone screenshots. So who's it going to be this year? Your all-time favorite? Or the artist you got stuck on in the spring and haven't played since?

If it's the wrong one, there's still time. Wrapped 2026 keeps counting until mid-November. Here's how to see where you stand, and exactly how much listening it takes to change it.

First, see your Spotify Wrapped 2026 top artist race

You need your real numbers, not a guess. Spotify doesn't show them, but your Spotify data has them:

1. Request your Extended streaming history with our Spotify guide. Most people get it within a few days (Spotify says up to 30).
2. Upload the ZIP to mystats.music. It's free, runs in your browser, and your history never leaves your device.
3. Pick this year and open Top artists.

Now you can see your full 2026 ranking, with play counts for every artist. Open any artist to see how your listening went month by month: whether they're climbing, or whether their big moment was back in March.

Curious what that looks like? Here's a sample Top artists page in the stats preview, on example data, and the artist storyline that shows when each favorite arrived.

Then, do the math

It's simple:

Plays needed per day = (the gap + a safety margin) ÷ days until the cutoff

Say your top artist has 640 plays and the artist you actually want at #1 has 510. The gap is 130. Add a margin of about 10%, since your current #1 will keep getting a few plays too: call it 145.

With about 35 days left until mid-November, that's just over 4 extra plays a day. About 15 minutes of music. One commute.

Some gaps for comparison, with 35 days to go:

• 50 plays behind: about 2 a day. Easy.
• 150 plays behind: about 5 a day. One album most days.
• 300 plays behind: about 9 a day. Possible, if you really mean it.
• 1,000 plays behind: about 31 a day. That's a commitment. Maybe aim for #2.

Start early. The same gap is twice as hard with half the time left.

What counts (and what doesn't)

Before you start, know Spotify's rules. From Spotify's own explanation of Wrapped:

• A play counts after 30 seconds. Skips before then don't count.
• Every play counts the same. A two-minute song counts as much as an eight-minute one, so artists with short songs climb faster.
• The main artist counts more than featured artists. A feature helps a little, a song of their own helps more.
• Private Session plays and anything you've excluded from your taste profile don't count toward your top artists.

That last one works both ways. If your current #1 is there because of a playlist you don't really care about (a sleep playlist, a study playlist, a party), you can exclude that playlist from your taste profile. Spotify removes those plays from Wrapped, including the ones you already made. That can change the race without a single extra play.

Top song, too

The same math works for your top song, and it's often easier: song gaps are usually smaller than artist gaps. Find your #1 song for the year in mystats, check how many plays your favorite needs to pass it, and divide by the days left.

Check your progress

Request a fresh export in early November. It includes everything up to the day you ask, so you'll see whether your plan worked, with time left to push a little harder.

A note on matching: mystats counts every play in your export, including Private Session plays, while Wrapped leaves those out of your top lists. If you use Private Session a lot, your Wrapped can differ slightly.

Make it a race with a friend

Want to know whose top artist will win? Challenge a friend in a Music Duel and compare your stats head to head.

More ways to clean up your year: how to fix your Wrapped before the cutoff.