Universal Music Latin Entertainment announced yesterday that there was a new most streamed song of all-time. The hit song "Despacito," by Puerto Rican artists Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee, set the new mark across all streaming platforms. It is also skyrocketing up the charts of the most watched YouTube videos of all-time in a little over half a year.
The new most streamed song of all-time
“Despacito” has become the most streamed song of all-time across all platforms, having over 4.6 billion plays. The hit song by Luis Fonsi featuring Daddy Yankee, along with the accompanying remix that features Justin Beiber, surpassed the old record holder.
Ironically enough that was Beiber's hit song from 2015, “Baby.” That song had 4.39 billion plays before “Despacito” blew by it. However, this is only the recent steaming success this year for Daddy Yankee. A little over a week ago he became the first Latino artist to lead Spotify in streams, moving past Ed Sheeran for the top spot thanks in part to the success of “Despacito.”
Climbing up the YouTube rankings
“Despacito” came out on January 12th, the same day its music video was uploaded to YouTube. In a little over half a year, it has become the third most-watched video in the history of the site, amassing a total of 2,673,960,857 views -- behind only Psy's “Gangnam Style” and the song that recently climbed to the top of YouTube, “See You Again” by Wiz Khalifa.
“See You Again” is currently at 2,937,726,662 views, having been up on the site since April 6th, 2015.
The video reached one billion views on April 20th, after only 97 days, making it the second-fastest video to hit that mark. Only “Hello” by Adele got to that mark faster. It reached the two billion view mark on June 16th, after only 154 days, the fastest of any video.
Topping charts around the world
“Despacito” has topped the chart in 45 different countries and gotten into the top ten in 9 others. It is currently the most successful single to date for both Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee. The song has been at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 for weeks. It is also the first mostly Spanish song to have made it to the top since “Macarena (Bayside Boys Mix)” by Los del Rio in 1996.
So far the song has won the award for Perfect Combination and Best Song for Singing at the Premios Juventud awards show presented by Univision. It has also been nominated for Choice Song - Male Artist at the Teen Choice Awards.
