Taylor Swift’s career blossomed a little later in the UK than elsewhere (her first UK hit came four years after her US debut), but boy has she made up for it since.
In the last five years alone, she's earned eight (!) UK Number 1 albums with Lover (2019), folklore and evermore (both 2020), Fearless (Taylor's Version), Red (Taylor's Version) (both 2021), Midnights (2022), Speak Now (Taylor's Version) and 1989 (Taylor's Version) (both 2023).
Throughout a career that has transcended genres and shifted direction numerous times, Taylor has amassed 26 UK Top 10 hits, although it may come as a surprise she's only topped the Official Singles Chart three times - with 2017's gothic Look What You Made Me Do (more on that later), 2022's buoyant Anti-Hero and Is It Over Now? (Taylor's Version) in 2023.
Now, she's undertaking her biggest challenge yet - re-recording her first six albums due to the controversial acquisition of her original masters by record exec Scott Borchetta and artist manager Scooter Braun (although it was confirmed Braun had sold the masters to a private equity firm, Shamrock Capital for $300 million).
Last year, 1989 (Taylor's Version) became Taylor's eleventh UK Number 1 album. Taylor is now the female solo artist to have claimed 11 chart-topping albums in the fastest succession; with 12 years precisely separating her first Number 1 Red in 2012 and 2023’s 1989 (Taylor's Version).
Last year, Taylor overtook Madonna to claim the title with her ninth chart-topper Midnights. Madonna still holds the record for the female soloist with the most Number 1 albums, with twelve to her name. with the latter pulling her level with Kylie Minogue for the second-most chart-topping LPs for a female solo act ever.
And now, that Top 10 in full...
This slinky link-up with ZAYN, coming high off his Pillowtalk success, was the soundtrack for the second Fifty Shades of Grey film and while it wasn't an instant a classic as, say, Love Me Like You Do, it's high showing in this list is proof enough that even two years off from 1989's success, Tay was still riding the wave of her Imperial Phase.
Taylor's first-ever UK Number 1 single was the incendiary lead single from her braggadocious sixth album reputation, where she attempted to burn it all down and start again.
Helped along by an accompanying video packed with in-jokes and laden with references to her internet presence and numerous celebrity spats, Look What You Made Me Do went straight in at Number 1 in 2017, staying at the top for two weeks. As of 2022, it has chart sales of 1.4 million, and it's been streamed over 146 million times in the UK alone.
Endlessly elegant, the third single from 1989 was an instant fan favourite and another mercurial pop moment thanks to Taylor's partnership with Max Martin and Shellback. Riffing heavily off the post-disco movement and the music of dance acts like Daft Punk, Style feels at times like the darker sister of another pitch-perfect Max Martin production from the same era, Katy Perry's Teenage Dream.
Despite its popularity with fans and critics, Style only reached Number 21 on the Official Singles Chart, although time has done little to dull its shine. Taylor's 8th most popular track in the UK, with 1.4 million chart units and 126 million streams, we can confirm that it has never (and probably will never) go out of style.
Taylor Swift was always going to make pop music. The first single from Red was her biggest indication at the time that her eye was swiftly moving on from country, but the jubilant We Are Never Ever... still comfortably flits in between the two genres that interest her most.
The first official time she collaborated with Max Martin and Shellback (who would go on to produce much of 1989 and reputation), We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together is so un-serious, and all the better for it.
It's blue! In a true display of pop justice in action (and proving that, yes, if a song sounds this much like a hit then one day it probably will be one), Cruel Summer - a jagged New Wave banger written with Jack Antonoff and St Vincent -was beloved amongst hardcore fans but was denied the chance to reach a wider audience when it - for some reason!!! - wasn't made a single from Lover.
But one thing Taylor Swift does? She listens. Added to the setlist for her blockbuster Eras Tour, Cruel Summer finally caught fire more than four years after its original release, and was finally re-issued as a single in 2023, climbing all the way to Number 2 in the UK as aa result
Better known now for it's bone-shattering EDM trop, I Knew You Were Trouble was certainly of its time, but it's also proof that Taylor's partnership with Max and Shellback allowed her to experiment in musical corners she would have been hesitant to before.
Much of the surprise of Anti-Hero isn't in its sound (an 80s-influenced synth-pop song produced with Jack Antonoff, come on now) but in its lyrical content. It, like much of Midnights, shows Taylor putting forward some of her most self-analytical work to date. This time, there is no problem to contend with except her own inner neuroses.
Climbing up the ranks since its release, Anti-Hero is now Taylor's 4th biggest song ever in the UK, and is actually now her second-most streams, with a mind-blowing 204 million streams gathered in less than two years.
Taylor’s breakout hit in the UK was very nearly a Number 1, peaking at Number 2 behind Kelly Clarkson’s My Life Would Suck Without You (what a time to be alive).
As the title suggests, the song is a modern-day re-telling of Romeo and Juliet...without all the duels and accidental deaths. It's sweet, saccharine, and has a happy ending, as all good fairytales should.
As it stands, Love Story is Taylor's third most successful single in the UK - with total chart sales of 2 million (sorry, Kelly). In the UK alone, it's been streamed over 158 million times. It's a Love Story, baby just say yes...
So it's gonna be forever!
Blank Space, the self-aware second single from her 1989 album, saw Taylor claim control of the perceived public persona of her as nothing but a serial-dating man-killer, and deployed its sarcasm and subversion to maxiumum effect. It's one of her most dramatic, and engaging, works as a pop star, proving how beneficial her partnership with Martin and Shellback was - she began re-wiring her lyricism to fit in with the production, while the production was ramped up to meet her own ambition. When the drum kicks in the chorus, you feel it in your gut.
Co-written with Max Martin and Shellback, the track served as a tongue-in-cheek take on the media's incessant interest in her personal relationships, heavily influenced by the icy minimalist production on Lorde's Pure Heroine.
Her second-biggest track in the UK to date, Blank Space boasts a total of 2.2 million chart units so far. The single's also racked up 182 million streams in the UK and counting.
Nothing was left to change on the lead single from 1989, which was marketed as Taylor's first pure-pop anthem. Reuniting her with Max Martin and Shellback, there's not a guitar or a country twang in sight for this peppy statement of intent, clearly influenced by Toni Basil's Hey Mickey.
No longer concerned about penning songs about past lovers (a trope Taylor would magnificently parody in follow-up single Blank Space), Shake It Off is quite simple in its messaging and world view - the players gonna play, the haters gonna hate, baby you just gotta shake shake shake shake...
It's fitting then, that Taylor's first single as the biggest pop star in the world is also her biggest single in the UK. Shake It Off has amassed a massive 3 million UK chart units, including 240 million streams, with the most streams of any of Taylor's videos too (29 million video streams).
Shake It Off easily becomes her most popular song ever in the UK. The biggest surprise? That the track never reached Number 1, instead being held off by Meghan Trainor's All About That Bass (how very 2014!).
2022 saw Shake It Off claim another impressive string to its bow - becoming the first song in two years (and potentially one of the last ever) to cross the coveted 1 million pure sales mark in the UK.
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riley_jay
The fact Cruel Summer, Shake It Off, WANEGBT, IKYWT AND Blank Space never got to number 1 messes with my brain
FC
Fact Checker
The OCC sets a new record of its own by re-cycling an article in record time. The previous Taylor Swift Top 20 was published on 27th October 2022, and now we get another on 13th December 2022. Except it is identical, just pasted up with a new date.
I wish I could get paid for changing the date on something I wrote 7 weeks ago, and pretending it was brand new.
Norb Peti
her music is highly disposable. Interesting to bringing in "THE" Brit of the moment Ed Sheeran ~ End Game still flopped hard.
FC
Fact Checker
"I Knew You Were Trouble stands as Taylor's second biggest single in the UK, with 1.4 million download and streaming equivalent sales." Strangely, this track hasn't yet received a 2 x Platinum BPI certificate (which would come at 1.2 million chart sales). And it was only on 1.1 million at the end of April 2019, when you did your previous Taylor Swift Top 20. 300,000 extra sales in less than 4 months is over 17,000 sales per week, which would be enough for a place in the weekly Top 30 (or Top 60 for a track on ACR). Yet it hasn't appeared once in the weekly Top 100 since 2014.
The explanation ? Yet another one of the OCC's seemingly endless mistakes. It should be 1.14 million by my reckoning. But what do I know ? I'm not Official.
Zimowski
I thought it's up to label to update the certification if they feel like doing it.
Bengy
What streaming ratio is used for all-time sales? 100:1?
Bengy
Found the answer. From 29 June 2018 it's a ratio of 100:1 (for premium streams) and 600:1 (for ad-funded streams).
Piran
For as much as I love Taylor's pop music, I really wish her country hits did better here!
Surprised to see 'Safe & Sound' in this list, given that it was nowhere close to make the Top 40! Still good to see anyway though. :)
Brandon Mwinga
I wasn't the fan of her countryside but the pop loved it!
Especially 1989! remains the best of all time albums on my albums she's definitely in the top 10& RED TOO .
Reputation didn't like the lead single I could collect "Reputation " & Delicate
Fair enough Taylor Swift is incredible especially at writing !i could say she's been in my playlist since BACK THEN except County album
Piran
I loved both, haha! :D
My favourite album of hers is 'Fearless' & believe it or not, 'Reputation' is my least favourite (but it was still really good at points).
Blank
Are the modern albums (Folklore/Evermore) part of the re-recording program or do they stand as her own original work as they are?
Piran
They’re her own original work, as is ‘Lover’. :)
julesin09
I don't get the fascination for Taylor Swift. Her music does nothing for me. Although I am surprised more singers haven't copied her career path. Country music - get the album buyers in; then switch to pop music for mass appeal while keeping the album buyers.
GC
Graham Clarke
Look at the figures. There is nothing impressive. She is ok. But nothing to shout out about
Blank
Not quite the 3m UK only / 20m+ Worldwide sales of Come On Over is guess.
I Am A Stegosaurus
That Brock Lesnar version of I Knew You Were Trouble is legendary
I Am A Stegosaurus
Boi, I Don't Wanna Live Forever ahead of Bad Blood?