There are many things to look forward to as the year draws to a close. Summer holidays. Family get-togethers. A well-earned break from work.
But in recent years, a new annual ritual has staked its claim on the festive season: Spotify Wrapped.
What began as a fun summary of our most-played songs has become a hotly anticipated moment in the cultural calendar. And a masterclass in how to build brand influence with user-generated content (UGC) – when audiences voluntarily distribute brand content on its behalf.
We spoke to Rosie Rothery, AUNZ Head of Marketing at Spotify, to unwrap the rise of Wrapped – and what your brand can learn from its runaway success.
Spotify Wrapped has become a cultural event with millions of participants around the world. But its origin story is much more modest.
‘The first iteration of Wrapped in 2016 was simply a playlist of users’ top songs from the year,’ says Rosie Rothery, AUNZ Head of Marketing at Spotify.
‘But it’s evolved into a rich, emotional and shareable data-led experience.’
It’s also a brilliant example of storytelling with data – turning raw listening behaviour into a narrative people want to share.
And shared it certainly is.
Every November, just as the Christmas content machine starts cranking up, a flurry of personalised listening stats floods social media. And with each post showing their top artists and most-played songs, a Spotify user becomes a Spotify ambassador.
That’s the genius: Spotify doesn’t just show people the data – it packages it into a story with a punchline.
It’s a brilliant example of how data-driven marketing and UGC can scale brand impact. And the impact is undeniable.
In 2025, Wrapped saw around 200 million users engaging and500 million shares in the first 24 hours alone.
‘Last year’s edition became Spotify’s biggest Wrapped global launch ever, with a 19% increase in engagement compared to 2024,’ says Rosie.
With results like that, it’s no wonder other brands want in. Video platforms, language apps, even banks and AI tools have since launched their own ‘year in review’-style roundups.
But what exactly is it that makes the formula so successful?
According to Rosie, the secret to Wrapped’s success is emotional relevance.
‘Wrapped works because it taps into three very human instincts: self-knowledge, self-expression, and community.
‘In a world where cultural reference points are niche and fragmented, Wrapped gives users around the world a shared language to talk about their year and the content that defined it.’
It also draws another powerful motivator: comparison.
‘Listeners can see their total number of hours, which becomes a huge point of comparison every year,’ Rosie continues. ‘And discovering you’re one of an artist’s top fans? That gives dedicated listeners bragging rights.’
The 2025 Wrapped features leaned even harder into that sense of comparative identity.
‘The Listening Age feature, for example, tells you whether your taste skews older or younger than your peers. And the Wrapped Party experience lets groups of up to 10 people compare their Wrapped data with each other.’
And the crowning detail that ensures traction year after year? It’s zero effort, all reward.
‘Wrapped provides something of value to users and asks for nothing in return,’ explains Rosie. ‘You don’t have to pay for it. You don’t have to sign up for it. You don’t have to share it.
‘It’s a way of rewarding and thanking users for all the time they’ve spent with Spotify over the year. Not just through the voice of the brand but, importantly, through the voice of the artists and creators they love most.’
Offering a fun, personalised product feature for free is a smart way to drive engagement. But, for Spotify, the real return only comes when users share the results.
That’s data-driven marketing at its best: behavioural insights turned into content designed for distribution.
So, how do they maximise the chances of Wrapped content being shared?
‘User-generated content is the engine that turns Wrapped from a product feature into a cultural moment,’ says Rosie. ‘So we provide highly shareable templates, visuals and story formats that are designed to be shared organically across TikTok, Instagram, X and beyond.’
And those formats are built to spark interaction.
‘Rather than just listing your Top Songs, Wrapped turns it into a quiz. Top Artists are presented as a visual “race”. These little game mechanics invite people to react, guess, argue. And that makes them highly shareable.’
In 2025, Spotify took these tactics even further.
‘Features like Listening Age and Clubs (which sorted listeners into personality-based music groups) land as a reveal or a punchline. People share them because they’re funny, flattering or occasionally confronting. Last year, this helped Wrapped travel around the world at lightning speed.’
Removing friction and making sharing effortless also plays akey role.
‘Simplicity is everything when it comes to shareability,’ Rosie adds. ‘You need a bold design that tells a visual story and the ability to share it quickly and seamlessly on your preferred platform.’
Beyond the screen, Spotify amplifies the conversation with real-world experiences designed to spark social sharing.
‘Last year in Australia, that included celebrating local artists. We designed a 5 Seconds of Summer Walk of Fame and a giant sand installation on Manly Beach to celebrate Don West’s breakout year. And we setup Wrapped Club kiosks personalising keyrings with your minutes listened in Melbourne and Sydney.’
These experiences, Rosie says, reward fans for their loyalty– and light up the internet in the process.
When a user-generated campaign gets as big as Wrapped, it can be hard to ensure it still feels personal, relevant and culturally specific.
But Spotify has learnt a few tricks along the way.
‘The key learning for us has been that people don’t want to feel part of one big audience. They want to feel part of their specific corner of culture: their genre, their fandom, their city, their in-jokes,’ Rosie explains. ‘Wrapped respects that by starting with the individual and then zooming out.
‘First, you see your stats. Then you see how you compare with your age group, your country and the rest of the world. The personalisation of the experience is what enables authenticity at scale.’
And though Wrapped may be global by design, Spotify still uses regional data to amplify local stories.
Every year, the team looks at country-specific stats to understand how people in each market listened. They then bring those stories to life through local artists, creators, cultural moments and physical activations.
In 2025, for example, they marked the breakout year of Australian dance music by flying DJ and producer CYRIL over Sydney with a giant flag.
‘Our data shows Australian listeners are incredibly community- and scene-driven,’ says Rosie. ‘These aren’t just stunts. They’re ways of taking what we see in the data and giving specific communities a physical place to celebrate the music they love.’
With a campaign as successful as Wrapped, it would be easy to coast. But Spotify treats it as a constant work in progress.
‘Wrapped is essentially an annual feedback loop,’ says Rosie. ‘Each year, we study what people loved, what they skipped, what they screenshotted and what they complained about. That directly informs the next year’s roadmap.’
For example, after 2024, users called for the return of TopGenres and Top Albums. Both came back in 2025 alongside entirely new features like Listening Age and the AI-powered Listening Archive.
The same mindset applies to how Wrapped is marketed.
‘Just as the product keeps evolving, so do our comms and marketing ambitions. Every year, we push for bigger, more innovative ways to bring Wrapped to life and maintain its place in the cultural zeitgeist.’
When you strip it all back, the Wrapped strategy is deceptively simple: make it personal, make it accessible, make it worth sharing.
‘Offering something for nothing, inviting your consumers toco-create something with you… it’s scary territory,’ says Rosie. 'But that’s what earns real connection with users.’
And clearly, users can’t get enough.
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