2016 Songs That Are Still Popular
Ten years is a long time in music. Trends come and go, artists rise and fall, and most songs that were everywhere one summer are completely forgotten by the next. But 2016 was different.
Something about that year produced a batch of tracks with a staying power that defies the usual pattern. Some of them still sit near the top of all-time streaming charts.
Others have quietly become the kind of songs that show up at every wedding, every party, every road trip playlist without anyone having to think twice. And right now, in 2026, a full-blown nostalgia revival on TikTok is pulling these songs back into the spotlight all over again.
Here are the ones that refused to disappear.
Starboy — The Weeknd & Daft Punk
This one doesn’t just have longevity — it has dominance. Starboy sits among the top five most-streamed songs in the history of Spotify, with over four billion plays. The Weeknd’s album of the same name is also the oldest album still sitting in the platform’s top ten most-streamed albums ever.
That’s a remarkable feat for anything released nearly a decade ago. The song works because it sounds timeless without trying to.
Daft Punk’s production gives it a sleek, almost futuristic quality, while The Weeknd delivers the kind of hook that lodges itself in your head for days. It’s the kind of track that plays in movie trailers, shopping centres, and car speakers around the world — and people never seem to get tired of it.
One Dance — Drake ft. Wizkid & Kyla
One Dance was Drake’s first number one as a lead artist on the Billboard Hot 100, and it spent ten weeks at the top. But the real story isn’t what happened in 2016. It’s what’s still happening now.
The song has pulled in over 3.7 billion streams on Spotify and lands in the top ten most-streamed songs on Apple Music as well. The dancehall influence was a bold move at the time, blending Nigerian and British vocal hooks into mainstream pop in a way that hadn’t been done quite like that before.
It opened doors for a whole wave of Afrobeats crossovers and remains a go-to track at clubs and parties worldwide.
Closer — The Chainsmokers ft. Halsey
Closer spent twelve consecutive weeks at number one on the Hot 100 and topped charts in seventeen countries. A decade later, it has accumulated over 3.3 billion Spotify streams and still ranks among the top fifteen most-streamed songs on the platform.
There’s a reason this track stuck. It’s a simple song built around a catchy melody and an honest lyric about a complicated relationship. The blink-182 reference in the chorus gives it a little wink of self-awareness.
And Halsey’s voice adds enough emotion to keep it from feeling like just another dance track. It became one of the defining sounds of 2016 and hasn’t really faded since.
Love Yourself — Justin Bieber
Written by Ed Sheeran, Love Yourself gave Justin Bieber one of the most satisfying comeback moments in recent pop history. The song was a massive hit in its own right, but what kept it alive was how often it gets used as a breakup anthem in real life.
People quote it, play it in the car after a bad day, and put it on revenge playlists to this day. Sheeran’s songwriting gives it a sharp, slightly tongue-in-cheek edge that most Bieber tracks lacked before.
It’s the kind of song that sounds effortless but is actually put together with real care.
Can’t Stop the Feeling — Justin Timberlake
This one became unavoidable in 2016 partly because it was tied to the animated film Trolls, but it would have been a hit regardless. The song is pure, uncut joy — the kind of track that makes people stand up in grocery stores and start dancing without caring who’s watching.
It’s still a staple at school dances, sporting events, and family gatherings. Radio stations still play it. It has that rare quality of being genuinely fun without being annoying, which is harder to pull off than it sounds.
Formation — Beyoncé
Formation arrived on the morning of Black History Day weekend and hit like a freight train. It wasn’t just a song — it was a statement.
The music video, the Super Bowl performance, and the cultural conversation that followed made it one of the most talked-about releases of the year. A decade on, it remains a touchstone.
DJs still drop it at events. It shows up in montages, ads, and playlists built around confidence and empowerment.
Beyoncé has released plenty of music since, but Formation still gets a reaction every single time it comes on.
Cheap Thrills — Sia ft. Sean Paul
Sia’s version of Cheap Thrills was already a strong track before Sean Paul’s remix turned it into a global smash. The song spent 38 weeks in the UK Top 40 and racked up over 1.46 million combined sales in 2016 alone. It’s still played at parties and on the radio regularly.
What makes it work is the contrast between the lyrics — which are essentially about not needing money to have a good time — and the infectious production. It’s a feel-good song in the truest sense, and those tend to have longer shelf lives than most.
7 Years — Lukas Graham
7 Years took an unusual path to popularity. It wasn’t a traditional pop hit built around a hook designed to get stuck in your head. Instead, it’s a reflective, almost philosophical song about growing up and watching life pass by.
The piano-driven arrangement gives it a weight that most singles from that year didn’t bother with. It found a home on adult contemporary radio and on personal playlists — the kind of song people return to at different stages of life and hear differently each time.
That’s a rare kind of staying power.
Stressed Out — Twenty One Pilots
Stressed Out became the unofficial anthem for an entire generation of millennials trying to make sense of adulthood. The lyrics about wanting to go back to childhood, about feeling overwhelmed by responsibility, hit a nerve that hasn’t dulled with time.
The song has been referenced, sampled, and played on nostalgia playlists countless times since its release. Twenty One Pilots built much of their mainstream identity on this track, and it continues to show up in conversations about what defined that era of pop music.
Heathens — Twenty One Pilots
While Stressed Out was the bigger commercial hit, Heathens arguably has the longer cultural tail. It was written for a major film soundtrack and immediately became one of the band’s signature songs.
The dark, theatrical energy of the track made it stand out from everything else on the charts that year. Twenty One Pilots have a dedicated fanbase, and Heathens remains one of the songs that new listeners discover first.
It’s been used in countless fan-made videos, trailers, and edit compilations online, keeping it circulating well beyond its original release window.
I Took a Pill in Ibiza — Mike Posner
The Seeb remix of this track turned it from a quietly personal confession into one of the biggest dance songs of 2016. It spent four weeks at number one in the UK and became a staple of summer playlists worldwide.
What’s interesting about its continued popularity is that the song isn’t really a dance track at its core. It’s a candid, almost vulnerable story dressed up in a danceable production.
That tension between the lyrical honesty and the party-ready beat gives it a depth that keeps people coming back to it even years later.
Lush Life — Zara Larsson
Lush Life had a solid run in 2016, spending thirteen weeks in the UK Top 10. But its second wave of popularity is what makes it stand out on this list.
In early 2026, the song surged back into the UK Top 10 after it became the soundtrack for a wave of nostalgia-driven TikTok videos tied to the viral “2016 is the new 2026” trend. That kind of chart re-entry nearly a decade later is genuinely rare.
It shows how deeply the song is connected to the emotional memory of that year for a large chunk of listeners.
Goosebumps — Travis Scott ft. Kendrick Lamar
Goosebumps led its year in hip-hop streaming and has since passed three billion plays on Spotify. The eerie, atmospheric production and the way Travis Scott and Kendrick Lamar trade verses make it one of the most replayed rap tracks of the streaming era.
It also marks a turning point for Travis Scott as an artist. The song showed he could create something genuinely compelling beyond hype, and it’s become one of the tracks that defines his catalog years later.
We Don’t Talk Anymore — Charlie Puth ft. Selena Gomez
This collaboration gave both artists a significant boost. Charlie Puth had been on the rise since Wiz Khalifa’s “See You Again,” and “We Don’t Talk Anymore” cemented him as a pop presence in his own right.
The song is a clean, well-crafted breakup track with two vocals that complement each other well. It’s still regularly added to heartbreak playlists and shows up in curated mixes on every streaming platform.
For Charlie Puth fans, it remains one of his most recognizable songs, even with everything he’s released since.
The Nostalgia Machine
Out of nowhere, 2016 is back in focus – like a quiet echo returning louder. Numbers from TikTok reveal the tag 2016 jumped over 450 percent lately across American users.
At the same time, queries about songs from that year climbed fast around January 2026. People started calling it: “2016 is the new 2026,” dragging old sounds, styles, and even how apps looked, right into today’s view.
When things feel shaky, minds drift back more often. Familiar bits of culture become go-to anchors then. That year, 2016? It sits just right emotionally for late millennials and early Gen Z.
A time before feeds twisted what we saw online. Before digital life sped into overdrive.
Songs from those months hold weight because of that backdrop.
A Decade Later and Still Playing
Strange how music changes over the years. A few tunes sound old almost right away.
Yet some beat the clock without trying. These picks managed more than hits – they slipped into feelings, stayed there.
Music fills wedding halls, drifts through open car windows, rides along quiet night roads – people rarely wonder how old those songs are. They simply fit.
By 2026, a renewed fondness breathes energy into tracks once thought fleeting, revealing that what emerged in 2016 held stronger roots than imagined.
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