12 Signs That Women Ruled the World of Entertainment in 2023

Taylor Swift has now amassed 13 No. 1 albums on the Billboard 200, extending her record for the most among women in the chart’s history, which dates to 1956. Barbra Streisand is in second place, with 11 leaders.

Swift has amassed 11 No. 1 singles on the Hot 100, a total matched or surpassed by only four other female solo artists in chart history. Among women, Mariah Carey leads with 19, followed by Rihanna (14) and Madonna (12). Swift is tied with Whitney Houston with 11 leaders.

In addition, when “Cruel Summer” hit No. 1 on Pop Airplay in August, Swift scored sole possession of the most leaders, 12, in that chart’s archives (which date to 1992), surpassing the 11 each for Maroon 5, Katy Perry and Rihanna. Last but not least, Swift triumphs at No. 1 both on Billboard’s Top Artists chart for 2023.

Beyoncé claimed the year’s top-grossing tour, according to figures reported to Billboard Boxscore. Between May 10 and Oct. 1, the Renaissance World Tour grossed $579.8 million and sold 2.8 million tickets. With a tracking period of Nov. 1, 2022 – Sept. 30, all but one of those shows powers her record-breaking finish at No. 1 on Billboard’s year-end Top Tours chart.

Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour has not yet reported its boxscore results to Billboard Boxscore, and thus doesn’t appear on the list. When those numbers finally come in, stand back!

Films made of both stadium shows reached No. 1 on boxofficemojo.com’s weekly box office charts. Swift’s film became the first concert film to top the weekly box office charts two weeks running, on its way to becoming the top grossing concert film of all time. Swift and Beyoncé also attended each other’s film premieres, a show of mutual respect and support that was heartening to see.

Barbie, directed by Greta Gerwig, is the No. 1 box-office hit of 2023, according to boxofficemojo.com. This marks the first time that a film directed or co-directed by a woman has become the year’s top hit. Shrek, co-directed by Vicky Jenson, came closest; it was the No. 2 box-office hit of 2001.

Barbie became the year’s top-grossing hit in the U.S. on Aug. 24, when it pushed ahead of The Super Mario Bros. Movie. Barbie needed just a little more than a month to became the year’s box-office champ. The film was released in the U.S. on July 21.

Barbie has been both a commercial and critical hit. It received nine Golden Globe nominations, more than any other film, and is expected to do very well in the Oscar nominations, which will be announced on Jan. 23.

As we previously reported, Barbie has also become the top-grossing film in the U.S. that was directed or co-directed by a woman. The previous record-holder was Frozen II (2019), which was co-directed by Jennifer Lee. The previous record-holder for a film that was solely directed by a woman was Wonder Woman (2017), which was directed by Patty Jenkins.

Lee’s “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” topped the Hot 100 in December, after waiting longer than any other song in history to finally reach the top spot — 65 years after its 1958 release, and three days shy of 63 years after its 1960 Hot 100 debut.

After Lee topped the Hot 100 for two weeks, Carey made her annual return to No. 1 with her 1994 holiday classic “All I Want for Christmas Is You.” This is the fifth holiday season in a row that the song has topped the Hot 100. It has amassed a total of 13 weeks on top so far.

SZA’s SOS spent eight weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in 2023 – in addition to the two weeks it spent on top at the end of 2022. Only Morgan Wallen’s One Thing at a Time logged more weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in 2023 (16).

SZA also had a pair of smash hits on the Hot 100 – “Kill Bill” (No. 1) and “Snooze” (No. 2).

In addition, “Kill Bill” logged 21 weeks at No. 1 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart, surpassing the old record of 20 weeks on top set by Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road” (featuring Billy Ray Cyrus) in 2019.

Karol G made history in March as the first woman to send an all-Spanish-language album to No. 1 on the Billboard 200, with Mañana Será Bonito.

She may make more history still at the 66th Annual Grammy Awards on Feb. 4. Mañana Será Bonito may become the first album by a female artist to win for best música urbana album, now in its third year. Bad Bunny won the award each of the last two years.

Nine of the 10 artists with the most Grammy nominations leading into the 66th Annual Grammy Awards are women. SZA is the leader with nine, followed by Phoebe Bridgers and Victoria Monét, with seven each; and Jon Batiste, boygenius, Brandy Clark, Miley Cyrus, Billie Eilish, Olivia Rodrigo and Taylor Swift, with six each.

Note: Two non-artists also rank high on the leaderboard. Engineer/mixer Serban Ghenea has seven nods; songwriter/producer Jack Antonoff has six.

Female artists also dominate in the marquee categories of album, record and song of the year. Cyrus, Rodrigo, Swift and SZA received nominations in all three of those categories (as did Batiste). Boygenius, Eilish and Lana Del Rey received nods in two of those three categories.

Lainey Wilson won four awards at the Academy of Country Music Awards on May 11. She did even better at the Country Music Awards on Nov. 8, winning five awards, including entertainer of the year. She’s the first artist to go from winning new artist of the year to entertainer of the year in just one year since Garth Brooks did it in 1991. (Note: the CMA’s rookie award was called the Horizon Award when Brooks won it in 1990.)

Doja Cat’s “Paint the Town Red” hit No. 1 on the Hot 100 in September, becoming the first rap song to top the chart since Nicki Minaj’s “Super Freaky Girl” in August 2022. That 54-week drought for rap No. 1s on that chart was the longest for the genre since 2001.

“Paint the Town Red” prominently features a sample from Dionne Warwick’s 1964 classic “Walk on By.” Warwick received the Kennedy Center Honors on Dec. 3, along with Billy Crystal, Renée Fleming, Barry Gibb and Queen Latifah. (So women have a numerical edge there too.) The ceremony will air Dec. 27 on CBS.

Rodrigo’s “Vampire” debuted atop the Hot 100 in July, marking her third leader, following “Drivers License” and “Good 4 U” in 2021, both of which also launched at No. 1. With “Vampire” serving as the lead single from Rodrigo’s sophomore album Guts — after “Drivers License” introduced her first LP, Sour — she became the first artist ever to debut the lead singles from two career-opening albums at No. 1 on the Hot 100.

Rodrigo’s sophomore album, GUTS, also opened atop the Billboard 200.

Women held down seven of the top 10 spots on Billboard’s annual list of the Greatest Pop Stars of the Year, up from five in 2022 and just four in 2021. Taylor Swift, SZA, Beyoncé and Ice Spice held the top four spots for 2023 (in descending order), with Karol G at No. 6, Olivia Rodrigo at No. 7 and Doja Cat at No. 9.

Unlike with Billboard’s Year-End Charts, these Greatest Pop Stars are not mathematically determined by statistics like chart position, streams or sales numbers. Such stats play a big part in the final rankings, but so do things like music videos, live performances and social media presence, and more intangible factors like cultural importance, industry influence and overall omnipresence.

This is the third time Swift has led the rankings, more than any other artist. She also came out on top for 2015 and 2021. She’s the first artist to top the list twice in the space of three years.

Miley Cyrus took Comeback of the Year in Billboard’s Greatest Pop Stars of the Year package. It’s the second time in three years that a woman has walked off with that award. Willow took it two years ago.

Seventeen years into her most unusual career, Cyrus landed her biggest chart hit yet with “Flowers,” which entered the Billboard Hot 100 at No. 1 and stayed there for eight nonconsecutive weeks.

“Flowers” ruled the all-format Radio Songs chart for 18 weeks, the longest reign for a track by a woman in the list’s 33-year history. It has also topped Adult Contemporary for 34 weeks, the most for a song by a woman in the ranking’s 62-year archives.

Cyrus also received her first nominations in marquee categories at the Grammy Awards – sweeping nods for album, record and song of the year.