2025
Make Music Equal Report

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Foreword

The music industry has long been a mirror of cultural identity and expression, but its reflection of equality has remained distorted. At Chartmetric, we believe that data can not only reveal hard truths, but also help catalyze change. That’s the goal of Make Music Equal.

Make Music Equal by Chartmetric

What began with the question — who is visible in today’s music industry, and who is not — has grown into the industry’s ONLY pronoun dataset and identity tracker. Now the leading approach for measuring structural inequities in music, the project exists as three parts:

Publicly Available Dataset

A free and fully accessible database of 1M+ artist pronouns across the world

State of the Industry Tracker

A live dashboard about the current state of diversity in music

Artist Identification Tool

Ability to check and verify an artist’s pronoun data

What is our Pronoun Dataset?

Rather than assigning gender to artists, we have relied on the pronouns that artists and their teams include in their bios on digital streaming platforms. This has grown into a database of over +1M pronouns.
We use this data to analyze pronoun distribution across genres, playlists, and charts, aiming to highlight the industry's gender disparities and identify where improvements are most needed.

Our 2025 Report

Released in tandem with our dataset, tracker, and ongoing identification initiative, our 2025 report aims to address the current state of gender equity across different sectors in music. It’s important to note that while pronouns often align with gender identity, they are not synonymous.
This analysis, based on pronoun usage, is and imperfect step toward understanding and addressing gender equity in music.

Pronoun breakdown
(Solo Artists)

Across The Industry

Chartmetric has pronoun data on more than one million artists from 230 countries and territories.

Of this one million, 728k+ are solo acts. Today, 79% of these solo acts use he/him pronouns, 18% use she/her pronouns and 3% use they/them and other pronouns.

Top 100 artists by peak
Chartmetric score

The Top %

The top 100 artists by peak Chartmetric score are predominantly solo men (54%). However, there are signs of change: women now make up 33% of this top tier, up from just 26% in 2020.

While the gap remains, the growth signals a shifting landscape where female artists are increasingly breaking through into the industry’s most visible and influential ranks. It's a reminder that change is possible, but also that there's still work to be done.

Pronoun breakdown by career stage
(Solo Artists)

By Career Stage

As we climb up the career stage ladder, the percentage of solo artists using she/her pronouns increases significantly–from 17% at undiscovered to around 28% for superstar and legendary.

On the other hand, they/them pronouns experience a decline of nearly 5% across stages.

Though men dominate at every stage, women and non-binary artists are still managing to break through the noise. Especially at the undiscovered stage, which accounts for nearly two thirds of our dataset.

Pronoun breakdown of artists featured in movie syncs

Pronoun breakdown of artists featured in TV syncs

Pronoun breakdown of artists featured in video game syncs

TV, Movies & Games

Bands dominate the soundtrack of TV: 44% of top-used sync artists are groups, Still, the use of music from men and woman is almost equal at 29% and 26%, respectively.

Most-used movie tracks are by 50% bands, 35% solo men, 15% solo women. Of the three sync ecosystems, video games show the greatest gender disparity: 49% of featured solo artists are men, while only 6% are women.

Pronoun breakdown of artists performing at concerts

Pronoun breakdown of artists performing at festivals

Concerts & Festivals

The number of she/her artists performing at festivals has risen by 3% since the pre-pandemic era, with he/him acts also seeing a modest 2% increase.

This change appears to be fueled by a notable decline in bands on festival lineups, a trend that aligns with the rising global cost of touring. In today's tightening economic climate, visibility is becoming more attainable for individual artists, particularly women and non-binary acts. Similarly, bands used to dominate festival lineups in 2019, but by 2024, their numbers were replaced by solo artists.

Pronoun breakdown by career stage (Solo Artists)

Track Releases

Tracks released by bands have also decreased - a near 8%. This has given room for the increase in solo female and male artists, with +2% and +5%, respectively.

Smallest gap

Largest gap

By Country

Taiwan leads as the country with the smallest gender gap among solo artists—29% more men than women—while Bangladesh sits at the opposite end, with a striking 83% gap favoring male artists.

Though these figures only account for solo male and female artists, the prevalence of solo members from large regional pop groups—such as K-Pop or C-Pop—may allude to smaller gaps in East Asian countries.

Radio play differences

Radio

Historically, men have often dominated many genres across airwaves, particularly those in country and hip-hop.

Male artists in these genres still experience a significantly greater number of plays than women.

That being said, women are thriving in other genres such as r&b and soul, receiving as many as 11M+ times more plays than artists using he/him pronouns. This is likely due to the latest cohort of women in r&b that are ushering in success through authenticity and honesty.

Female artists reaching #1 in Spotify country charts

Number of solo female artists with a #1 track in a country's
Spotify Top 50 chart in 2024

Top Charts

Women are seeing success in the charts, not only in western countries, but across the world as well. Thought the US leads with 13 female artists that landed a No. 1, an impressive number of countries trail: United Arab Emirates (10), Ukraine (9), and Saudi Arabia (8).

Thanks to the recent success of many solo-female artists within Latin music, South America also emerges as an impressive scene for women at the top.

Top Male Artists

Social media audience demographics of top male artists by Chartmetric rank

Top Female Artists

Social media audience demographics of top female artists
by Chartmetric rank

Social Audience

Among the top 10 male artists by Chartmetric score, female followers outnumbered male followers for all but three—Drake, Eminem, and Kendrick Lamar. Meanwhile, the top 10 female artists saw female fans dominate across the board.

This pattern highlights the strength and consistency of female fandom culture, particularly their roles in driving artist engagement on social platforms. In today’s music economy, where digital presence often fuels career momentum, the loyalty and enthusiasm of female fans continue to shape who rises to—and stays at—the top.

Conclusion

The data in this report paints a layered picture of progress and inequality. While underrepresented groups are gaining visibility across some sectors, longstanding barriers continue to shape who gets heard.
Here are our takeaways:
  • Men remain overrepresented in nearly all sectors, accounting for 79% of the dataset
  • Women are breaking through, particularly in the top level of artists, highlighting cultural shifts in the desire for female-fronted content
  • Non-binary representation has remained stagnate, with an arguable loss of visibility over time
  • The decline of bands is creating space for more solo acts to rise
  • Female fandom fuels success, particularly among top-performing artists

Why Pronoun Metadata Matters

Pronoun data holds massive potential and equips us with tools to track where progress is happening—and where it isn’t. This is why we encourage artists and their teams to self-identify pronouns on their Chartmetric profiles. Because when artists own their identities, we all gain a clearer understanding of who is shaping the sounds of today.
To update information on an artist profile, including pronouns, reach out to hi@chartmetric.com.