The Top 100 DJs Vs. Streaming Data

All of this information is not my own. I am just reporting the information directly from Viberate! Please make sure you check out their original post! Check out the Top 100 DJs from both DJ Mag and Viberate!

We’ve all heard of DJ Mag’s Top 100 DJs. Each year, they poll a specified amount of people to find out their top picks for DJs. And each year, I am a little shocked at the top. Of course, there are some that are obvious to me. I am never shocked when fan favorites like Martin Garrix, Hardwell, and Tiesto make the top picks. I am, however, shocked by all the artists that I don’t know on the list. As I’ve written quite a bit for The Festival Voice now, I am starting to pick out more and more artists of different genres, such as techno and house, which I am not an avid listener of. 

Viberate is a company that completely relies on data. We’ve posted some articles sharing their data before such as Radio Vs. Streaming, the Lockdown Winner of Spotify, and the Economic Impact of COVID on Festivals. They use quantitative data to share their results. DJ Mag relies on a relatively small sample size (how do you even vote for that poll??) Viberate had some interesting data to share.

Compare Viberate’s data-driven approach to DJ Mag’s poll approach.

So who is right? Who are the top DJs? Wouldn’t it seem to be that those artists who get the streams are the most popular rather than what people voted for? I found this information to be very surprising because there were some artists who I expected to be on DJ Mag’s list, such as Excision, Illenium, and Seven Lions, who weren’t (maybe I’m biased- I see those people everywhere! But then again, I am really into them!). Then there were artists on Viberate’s poll, such as Showtek, who I did not realize were so big. Viberate said that collaborations were the way to go. Collabs with big name artists brought artists up over 800 points on the scale. Crazy!

Overall, this was a very interesting post to me. What are your thoughts? Should we base the information on data from streaming? Or should we look at people’s votes? If you are an artist looking to up your game- Viberate is for you!