Over the past four weeks, the “Billboard” 200 and Hot 100 have seen a new No. 1 every single week—a month of upheaval driven by a hip hop resurgence, the ripple effect of the Super Bowl halftime show, the rise of women in country music, and Taylor Swift.

First, the back-to-back hip hop heavyweights. Don Toliver’s album “OCTANE” debuted at No. 1 on the “Billboard” 200 dated the second week of February, his first No. 1. All four of his previous albums reached the Top 10—“HARDSTONE PSYCHO” (2024), “Love Sick” (2023), “Life of a DON” (2021), and “Heaven Or Hell” (2020) at Nos. 3, 8, 2, and 7, respectively. He had, however, previously reached No. 1 twice as a member of JACKBOYS, the hip hop collective headed up by Travis Scott. “OCTANE” moved 162,000 units in its debut week, topping the Top Streaming Albums and Top Album Sales charts with nearly 139 million streams equating to 131,000 units, plus 31,000 in pure album sales, all setting personal records for Toliver.

That same week, 17 tracks off “OCTANE” entered the Hot Rap Songs chart, led by “Body” at No. 1, Toliver’s first chart-topper there. “Body” also debuted at No. 14 on the Hot 100. Hot Rap Songs only ranks the Top 25 songs for the week, and only five other artists in history have had 17 or more songs charting on it simultaneously—Drake, Kendrick Lamar, Lil Baby, Playboi Carti, and Travis Scott.

J. Cole’s album “The Fall-Off” then topped the “Billboard” 200 in the third week of February, the first time two hip hop albums from different artists have held the spot back-to-back since “JACKBOYS 2” was followed by “DON’T TAP THE GLASS” by Tyler, the Creator in July–August 2025—another win for Toliver’s group. “The Fall-Off” is Cole’s seventh No. 1, following “The Off-Season” (2021), “KOD” (2018), “4 Your Eyez Only” (2016), “2014 Forest Hills Drive” (2014), “Born Sinner” (2013), and “Cole World: The Sideline Story” (2011). That puts him sixth in the list of rappers with the most No. 1 albums, behind Drake and Jay-Z with 14 each, and Eminem, Future, and Ye with 11 each.

“The Fall-Off” moved 298,000 units in its debut week, the biggest week for an R&B/hip hop album since Playboi Carti’s “MUSIC” hit the same figure last March, and the biggest overall since the Stray Kids mixtape “DO IT” hit 295,000 in December. Streams came in at 169.5 million, equating to 166,000 units and placing it at No. 2 on the Top Streaming Albums chart. It also landed at No. 2 on the Top Album Sales chart on the back of 113,000 copies. Of those, 80,000 were vinyl, the most for any R&B/hip hop album since Lamar’s “GNX” moved 87,000 copies when the vinyl came out last February.

That same week, 21 tracks off “The Fall-Off” entered the Hot 100, ranging from “Two Six” at No. 16 to “Quik Stop” at No. 100. Cole’s career-total number of songs on the Hot 100 jumped from 90 to 111 in a single week, making him the 22nd artist in history to place at least 100 songs on the chart. Having 111 songs ties him for 16th place with 21 Savage, just ahead of big names like Morgan Wallen, Beyoncé, and Jay-Z.

Bad Bunny’s chart performance in the wake of the Grammys on February 1 and his Super Bowl halftime show on February 8 has been remarkable. Following his Album of the Year win at the Grammys, “DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS” surged from No. 9 to No. 2 on the “Billboard” 200 dated the second week of February, moving 85,000 units—up 138% from the previous week. Seventeen tracks from the album hit the Hot Latin Songs chart, 14 of them returning from previous runs, with the hit single “DtMF” returning to No. 10 on the Hot 100 and No. 4 on Streaming Songs.

The Super Bowl halftime show had an even greater ripple effect. Over the period from February 6 through 12—which began just before the performance—Bad Bunny’s entire catalog racked up more than 1.4 billion streams globally, up 85% from 773.6 million the previous week. Surpassing 1.4 billion streams in a single week is a personal best for Bad Bunny and a first for any male artist. The all-time record belongs to Taylor Swift with “The Tortured Poets Department,” which pulled in 2.3 billion streams during its release week in April 2024. Swift also surpassed 1.4 billion in the release weeks for “Midnights,” “1989 (Taylor’s Version),” and “The Life of a Showgirl.” Of Bad Bunny’s streams for the week, 34.5% came from the United States and 65.6% from abroad—a notable shift from the pre-Grammy split of 21% domestic and 79% international. The effect spilled over into the following week as well.

In the third week of the month, “DtMF” swept the Hot 100, Global 200, and Global Excl. US simultaneously, the first Spanish-language song to ever accomplish the feat. Bad Bunny also swept the Global 200 Top 5 and the Global Excl. US Top 3. On the Hot 100, the single jumped from No. 10 right to the top—only the fourth Spanish-language song ever to reach No. 1, and the first since “Despacito” in 2017. Although “DtMF” is Bad Bunny’s second Hot 100 chart-topper, it’s his first as a solo act. His first came in 2018 with “I Like It” alongside Cardi B and J Balvin. “DtMF” had previously peaked at No. 2 last January. Four other songs from his Super Bowl halftime show set also entered the Top 10.

Bad Bunny’s experience mirrors what happened last year when Kendrick Lamar surged back up the charts following his own Grammy wins and Super Bowl halftime show. Lamar’s catalog generated 758 million global streams in the week following his halftime show, sending “Not Like Us” immediately from No. 15 to No. 1 on the Hot 100 and filling half of the chart’s Top 10 with his songs.

Meanwhile, “DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS” moved 250,000 units that same week—nearly triple the previous week—but still only made it as high as No. 2 due to J. Cole’s record-breaking debut. His 2022 album “Un Verano Sin Ti” also jumped from No. 16 to No. 6, marking the first time the rapper’s had two albums in the “Billboard” 200 Top 10 simultaneously.

The following week, “FOToS” returned to No. 1 for a fifth time at the top. It moved 135,000 units, topping the streaming and album sales charts with 112.5 million streams, or 106,000 units, and selling 28,000 copies.

In the fourth week of February, Taylor Swift went another step further on the Hot 100 when “Opalite” jumped from No. 8 to No. 1, becoming her 14th chart-topper and tying her with Rihanna behind only the Beatles with 20 and Mariah Carey with 19. She’s put out nine No. 1s since 2020—more than anyone else, including Drake with seven and BTS and Ariana Grande with six each. Swift and Carey are also the only artists to have hit No. 1 every year since the start of the decade, though in Carey’s case, it’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You” doing the work each time.

“Opalite” is the second No. 1 single off “The Life of a Showgirl,” making it the second Swift album to produce multiple No. 1 singles, following 2014’s “1989.” “Opalite” sits at No. 17 on the Streaming Songs chart and No. 3 on the Radio Songs chart, but it was 168,000 in sales that pushed it to No. 1. Of those, 144,000 came from six versions of the CD single and one 7-inch vinyl, with an additional 24,000 in digital sales across various versions.

While hip hop, Latin, and pop battled it out at the top of the charts, women in country music were making history. Ella Langley’s “Choosin’ Texas,” which had been building momentum since the end of last year, finally hit No. 1 on the Hot 100 in the chart dated the second week of February. This was after it had already spent 11 weeks at No. 1 on the Hot Country Songs chart. It reached No. 1 on the Hot 100 just six weeks after entering the country charts, well ahead of the 10-year average of 15 weeks. It simultaneously hit No. 1 on the Country Airplay chart for the first time, taking just 16 weeks from first charting to reach the top—the fastest climb by a female solo artist in the past decade.

With that, “Choosin’ Texas” became the first song by a female artist to simultaneously top the Hot 100, Hot Country Songs, and Country Airplay charts. Only three songs have previously achieved that triple: “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” by Shaboozey, “I Had Some Help” by Post Malone, and “Last Night” by Morgan Wallen. For a country artist in the traditional sense—a female solo act, with no soundtrack tie-in, pop crossover, or collaboration to broaden her appeal—to achieve this is incredibly rare. “Texas” saw 22.1 million streams that week, topping the Streaming Songs chart, while also hitting No. 12 on Radio Songs and No. 2 on Digital Song Sales.

As Bad Bunny and Taylor Swift took turns at the top, “Texas” slipped to No. 4 and then rebounded to No. 2 before finally returning to No. 1 in the first week of March. With 20.4 million streams and 6,000 digital sales, it topped both the Streaming Songs and Digital Song Sales charts. It also reached a new peak of No. 9 in airplay.

That same week, Megan Moroney’s album “Cloud 9” debuted at No. 1 on the “Billboard” 200, the first time in history that female country singers have topped both the Hot 100 and the “Billboard” 200 simultaneously. Country music had previously dominated both charts only four times, but by male artists or groups in every instance. No. 1 country albums by female artists are rare to begin with. In the past decade there’s been just seven, three of which were Swift rereleases. Over the same period, 11 male artists have put out a combined 17 No. 1 country albums.

“Cloud 9” moved 147,000 units in its debut week, topping Album Sales with 78,000 copies and hitting No. 2 in streaming with 71.5 million streams equating to 69,000 units. The album is Moroney’s third to grace the “Billboard” 200, following “Am I Okay?” at No. 9 in 2024 and “Lucky” at No. 38 in 2023. It’s also the first No. 1 country album by a female artist since Beyoncé’s “COWBOY CARTER” in April 2024.

Two relatively young women in country music have made history in the past month, potentially opening the door to a larger share of both streaming and radio for female artists going forward.

• ATEEZ’s EP “GOLDEN HOUR: Part.4” debuted at No. 3 on the “Billboard” 200 dated the third week of February, their eighth Top 10 album. The group moved a career-best 200,000 units, with album sales accounting for the vast majority at 195,000 copies and putting them atop the Top Album Sales chart for a seventh time. Streams came in at 5.58 million, or 5,000 units. “Adrenaline” debuted at No. 19 on the Bubbling Under Hot 100 chart, and the group returned to No. 3 on the Artist 100.
  
  
• The “KPop Demon Hunters” soundtrack held on at No. 10 on the “Billboard” 200 in the fourth week of February, extending its run to 35 straight weeks in the Top 10—a soundtrack record, surpassing the 32-week run of the “Bodyguard” soundtrack in 1992. “KPDH” fell to No. 11 in the first week of March, bringing an end to its historic run. Third place belongs to the “A Star Is Born” soundtrack at 26 weeks—a significant gap.
  
  
• A new version of the Tame Impala single “Dracula” featuring JENNIE brought the song back to the Global 200 at No. 26 in the third week of February.
  
  
• IVE’s single “BANG BANG” debuted at No. 81 on the Global 200 in the fourth week of February.
  
  
• Jung Kook’s single “Seven” and Jimin’s single “Who” both returned to the Global 200 in the fourth week of February, at No. 192 and No. 197 respectively.
  
  
• The BLACKPINK song “JUMP” returned to the Global 200 at No. 166 in the first week of March.
  
  
• KATSEYE’s EP “SIS (Soft Is Strong)” returned to the “Billboard” 200 at No. 192 in the fourth week of February.
  
  
• “HOP” by Stray Kids returned to the Top Album Sales chart at No. 38 in the second week of February.
  
  
• TWICE’s album “THIS IS FOR” returned to the Top Album Sales chart at No. 47 in the second week of February, with the group also returning to the Artist 100 at No. 99 that same week.
  
  
• CORTIS’s EP “COLOR OUTSIDE THE LINES” returned to the Top Album Sales chart at No. 33 in the fourth week of February.
  
  
• ROSÉ and Bruno Mars’ duet “APT.” returned to the Digital Song Sales chart at No. 12 in the second week of February.
  
  
• ZEROBASEONE returned to the Emerging Artists chart at No. 50 in the fourth week of February.