Which chart-toppers do people actually want to sing? We matched every Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 since 2004 to US Google searches for "[song] karaoke" and "[song] instrumental". "Golden" (Huntrix: Ejae, Audrey Nuna and Rei Ami, ~2,417/mo) leads, then Adele's "Someone Like You" (~992) and "Rolling in the Deep" (~963), out of 201 No. 1s with measurable karaoke demand. Together, the No. 1s in our panel draw ~26,460 karaoke searches a month. Big-voice ballads and singalong pop dominate the top 20. Instrumental searches tell a different story: "Golden" leads (~785/mo) as people hunt the beat itself.
Top 20 No. 1 hits by monthly US "[song] karaoke" searches
| # | Song | Artist | First No. 1 | Karaoke searches/mo |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Golden | Huntrix: Ejae, Audrey Nuna and Rei Ami | 2025 | 2,417 |
| 2 | Someone Like You | Adele | 2011 | 992 |
| 3 | Rolling in the Deep | Adele | 2011 | 963 |
| 4 | All I Want for Christmas Is You | Mariah Carey | 2019 | 948 |
| 5 | Die with a Smile | Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars | 2025 | 913 |
| 6 | Shallow | Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper | 2019 | 897 |
| 7 | Choosin' Texas | Ella Langley | 2026 | 878 |
| 8 | Shake It Off | Taylor Swift | 2014 | 672 |
| 9 | Call Me Maybe | Carly Rae Jepsen | 2012 | 644 |
| 10 | All of Me | John Legend | 2014 | 598 |
| 11 | Ordinary | Alex Warren | 2025 | 596 |
| 12 | Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree | Brenda Lee | 2023 | 536 |
| 13 | When I Was Your Man | Bruno Mars | 2013 | 488 |
| 14 | Vampire | Olivia Rodrigo | 2023 | 482 |
| 15 | Someone You Loved | Lewis Capaldi | 2019 | 478 |
| 16 | Hey There Delilah | Plain White T's | 2007 | 463 |
| 17 | Despacito | Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee featuring Justin Bieber | 2017 | 438 |
| 18 | Drivers License | Olivia Rodrigo | 2021 | 431 |
| 19 | Set Fire to the Rain | Adele | 2012 | 407 |
| 20 | Drop Dead | Olivia Rodrigo | 2026 | 398 |
Top 10 by "[song] instrumental" searches
| # | Song | Artist | First No. 1 | Instrumental/mo |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Golden | Huntrix: Ejae, Audrey Nuna and Rei Ami | 2025 | 785 |
| 2 | Not Like Us | Kendrick Lamar | 2024 | 457 |
| 3 | All I Want for Christmas Is You | Mariah Carey | 2019 | 302 |
| 4 | Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It) | Beyoncé | 2008 | 284 |
| 5 | Ordinary | Alex Warren | 2025 | 245 |
| 6 | DTMF | Bad Bunny | 2026 | 242 |
| 7 | California Gurls | Katy Perry featuring Snoop Dogg | 2010 | 234 |
| 8 | Viva la Vida | Coldplay | 2008 | 227 |
| 9 | Shake It Off | Taylor Swift | 2014 | 226 |
| 10 | SexyBack | Justin Timberlake | 2006 | 216 |
Karaoke demand by chart era
| Era of first No. 1 | Songs with demand | Median/mo | Total/mo |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2004–09 | 52 | 16.5 | 2,618 |
| 2010–15 | 51 | 49 | 8,420 |
| 2016–20 | 39 | 48 | 5,065 |
| 2021–26 | 59 | 45 | 10,357 |
What it means
Every song on these charts started as a hook someone wrote down. Anyone who wants to sing it themselves can turn the original into a backing track with a karaoke song maker. For anyone who wants the track without the singer, a free vocal remover splits any song into vocals and instrumental in seconds.
Method
- US Google search volume (English), monthly, Oct 2022–Sep 2026. 'Avg/mo' = mean of the latest 12 months (Oct 2025–Sep 2026); '3-yr change' = latest 12 months vs Oct 2022–Sep 2023.
- Universe: the 295 distinct Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 songs, Jan 2004–2026 (Billboard list), cleaned title.
- Ambiguous titles (common words or titles that collide with products/brands, e.g. "Umbrella cover", "Happy karaoke") were excluded per query type.
Cite and download
Free to use and cite with a link back to this page.
aisong.lol Research. (2026). The Hot 100 songs people most want to sing: karaoke and instrumental searches for chart hits. aisong.lol. https://aisong.lol/research/the-hot-100-songs-people-most-want-to-sing-karaoke-and-instrumental-se
Use this data. Every table in this study as one spreadsheet-ready file.
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