The Most Popular Songs and Artists to Listen to At the Beach

Whether you’re driving the coastal road ready to surf the waves or just to flop on a towel and soak up the rays, you’re all set to have a great day.

But, let’s be honest, a day on the sand just isn’t complete without a playlist that sets the right tone.

Being well versed in beautiful beaches ourselves, we decided to comb Spotify to find out exactly what songs people are listening to when at the coast. And with a list of just over 24,000 songs across 300 playlists, we were able to crown a winner!

It was Jimmy Buffett’s 1977 career-defining classic, Margaritaville, that topped the list by featuring on 52 of the 300 playlists researched. The song has a whopping 111,608,9900 plays on Spotify, which is hardly surprising considering it was inducted into the 2016 Grammy Hall of Fame for its cultural and historical significance!

So, whether you have a day on sand planned, or just want to simply close your eyes and be transported to sandier pastures, we’ve put together the ultimate beach playlist based on our findings.

Click here to listen on Spotify…

Queen's Bath

The Most Popular Beach Songs

When it comes to sandy beats, it seems that people enjoy the classics, with the most recent song in the top 10 being released more than a decade ago. And when it comes to genres, it is quite an eclectic mix, with the most popular tunes spanning across country, both pop and alternative rock, and reggae.

Kauai sunset

The Most Popular Beach Artists

While Jimmy Buffett may have the top song, it’s fellow country star Kenny Chesney who takes the top spot for the most popular artist, with his songs accounting for 164 of the total 24,000, closely followed by The Beach Boys and, of course, Jimmy Buffett.

Kauai beach

Methodology

We collated a list of just over 24,000 songs by using playlists created by users and by Spotify that had the word ‘beach’ in their titles. This gave us a total of 300 playlists from which we got our list of songs.

By taking the songs from each of these playlists, we were able to find which songs and artists featured in the largest number of playlists, allowing us to discover which song is the most popular to listen to when at the beach and which artists are most listened to.

Published on Wednesday, November 16, 2022