Connie Francis was 87 years old when she posted her first TikTok earlier this year, marveling at an impossible second act: a song she’d recorded in 1962 – the year of the Cuban Missile Crisis – was suddenly climbing the charts for the first time and soundtracking millions of videos for an audience born decades after it was recorded. Meanwhile, a girl group with members from four continents was being celebrated as the biggest artist on the planet this year, two years after forming as a band. Welcome to music in 2025.
KATSEYE has been crowned TikTok’s Global Artist of the Year 2025, cementing their status as the biggest band on the platform and one of the most influential pop acts in the world today. Formed in 2023 with six members hailing from the U.S., South Korea, Switzerland, and the Philippines, the group has achieved the almost-impossible in an increasingly fragmented music landscape: genuine global reach. In just two years, they’ve amassed over 15 million TikTok followers, landed their first Grammy nominations (Best New Artist and Best Pop Duo/Group Performance), and built the kind of fervent, participatory fanbase that drives music culture the world over.
“We had an unforgettable year on TikTok, and it was all because of the EYEKONS who showed up for us every single day,” KATSEYE said in a statement. “You turned our songs, our moments, and our chaos into something truly global.”
That chaos became content gold. Their track “Gnarly” emerged as one of TikTok’s Songs of 2025, with its infectious choreography being adopted by everyone from LE SSERAFIM to Camila Cabello. “Gabriela” went viral on TikTok, racking up 2.4 million TikTok creations on its way to becoming a top-10 Spotify global track and earning a Grammy nod. And their iconic collaboration with Gap, soundtracked with “Milkshake” by Kelis? Over 150 million views on TikTok alone, with a dance recreated by American social media personality and dancer Charli D’Amelio and millions of others.
But if KATSEYE represents TikTok’s power to build new stars, then Connie Francis represents something equally remarkable: its ability to breathe new life into older music for a new generation.
“Pretty Little Baby,” a sweet, uptempo pop tune, recorded in 1962 by the late, great Connie Francis, became TikTok’s most unexpected viral phenomenon of the year. At its peak, the track was driving over 600,000 daily creations, as users paired it with wholesome pet videos, family moments, and tender relationship clips – all soundtracked by Francis crooning “pretty little baby, I’m so in love with you.“
And celebrities poured fuel on the fire of its popularity: Kylie Jenner’s video with daughter Stormi racked up over 100 million views. Timothée Chalamet, Kim Kardashian, Ariana Grande, Shaq, and Jimmy Fallon all joined the trend. The result? A 63-year-old song hit number one on the TikTok Top 50 in both the U.S. and UK, climbed to number 67 on Spotify’s Global Top 100, and became Francis’s most-streamed song ever with 130 million streams on Spotify..
Francis herself joined TikTok to thank fans, calling the revival “a dream come true.” In her first post, she marveled: “To think that a song I recorded 63 years ago is captivating new generations of audiences is truly overwhelming for me.”
This duality – to surface the very best of new music while introducing older music to new generations – defined TikTok’s 2025. Eight of the year’s ten Billboard number ones had viral TikTok moments first, from Alex Warren’s “Ordinary” to Sabrina Carpenter’s “Manchild.” Catalogue tracks like Jess Glynne’s “Hold My Hand” and Black Eyed Peas’ “Rock That Body” were discovered by new fans for the first time. Doechii’s 2019 demo of Anxiety became a Billboard top-10 smash hit, thanks to the Fresh Prince of Bel Air-inspired dance trend, featuring Will Smith himself.
The platform also continued championing emerging talent through initiatives like Behind the Breakthrough, which shines a light on the best new emerging talent that got its big break on TikTok, such as Ravyn Lenae’s ‘Love Me Not’, which went to number five on the Billboard Hot 100.
TikTok’s critics have long questioned whether the platform is influencing music and culture in a healthy and diverse way. But 2025 offered a compelling answer: when a newly minted girl group and a 63-year-old track can both dominate cultural conversation, the old rules simply don’t apply anymore. The algorithm doesn’t care about your release date. It only cares if you connect.
