As 2024 draws to a close, the team is releasing its latest report, which takes a close look at the end-of-year lists across 12 countries. These lists, which include Trending Topics, Top Creators, Songs, and Songs used in Shorts, look at the moments, channels, and music that broke through on YouTube this year. Despite their global spread, 2024’s lists share many commonalities — each list has at least one trending topic, if not more, found on another. Oftentimes, these topics were driven by fans, whose content helped propel individual moments into global phenomena. But they also suggest a larger theme: The franchises that shape pop culture today are increasingly ones that are born online or become accessible in digital spaces through creator activity.
The shift to a world in which anyone can actively shape and take part in a shared experience, is well reflected in the two trending topics that appeared most frequently across the lists: One, an original animated series on YouTube that fans helped turn into a fully-fledged franchise; the other, a mass culture sports moment that came to life online through creator-made trends.
As pop culture continues to become more personalized, fan-driven, and participatory, YouTube serves as a launch pad for new kinds of breakthrough entertainment series and a place where viewers are coming to take part in larger cultural moments in new ways.