Billboard has introduced a new policy effective with the chart week ending October 25, 2025, automatically removing songs from the Hot 100 based on age once they fall below specific rankings, addressing longtime chart clutter from tracks lingering for months or years.
- Below #5 after 78 weeks
- Below #10 after 52 weeks
- Below #25 after 26 weeks
- Below #50 after 20 weeks
The #50-after-20-weeks rule dates to 1992, while the #25 threshold tightens a 2015 policy from 52 weeks to 26; the top-5 and top-10 caps are entirely new.
Immediate casualties include Teddy Swims’ “Lose Control” (119 weeks, 80 in top 10), Benson Boone’s “Beautiful Things” (89 weeks), Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars’ “Die With a Smile” (60 weeks), Morgan Wallen’s “I’m the Problem,” Benson Boone’s “Just in Case” and “Sorry I’m Here for Someone Else,” Kendrick Lamar and SZA’s “Luther,” and sombr’s “undressed.”
The top-5-after-78-weeks rule appears aimed at “Lose Control,” which held #6 into early October before Taylor Swift’s The Life Of A Showgirl occupied #1–#12; without the policy, it likely would have re-entered the top 10, but its run is now capped at historic totals unlikely to be matched.
At its core, the Hot 100 measures America’s most popular songs each week, a tradition once synonymous with Casey Kasem’s American Top 40 countdowns in the 1970s and ’80s.