MrBeast, ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ and Joe Rogan Top YouTube’s 2025 Trends

It’s not just your kid who has been watching “KPop Demon Hunters” nonstop. It’s the entire internet. YouTube released its annual list of the biggest trends of 2025 on Tuesday, and the Netflix animated movie is all over YouTube’s rankings.

Not only was “KPop Demon Hunters” one of the top trending topics of the year. Four of the top YouTube songs of 2025 came from the movie (“Golden,” “Soda Pop,” “Your Idol” and “How It’s Done”), and one of the top songs on YouTube Shorts channeled the Honmoon (“Soda Pop”). “Squid Game,” another Netflix original that aired its third and final season this summer, also made the Trending Topics cut. The Trending Topics list was compiled by the YouTube Culture and Trends team, which analyzed several signals including views, uploads and creator activity around these topics. Only topics that were significantly popular this year, either because they were new or because they experienced notable increases, were eligible.

The only other show or movie to place on the Trending Topics list was “Blue Lock,” which is both a manga and an anime. However, because Kodansha — the company behind “Blue Lock” — was one of the first companies to give Roblox creators access to its licensed IP, there’s a good chance interest in “Blue Lock” had to do with its popularity on Roblox.

As usual, video games took up a huge amount of YouTube’s trending topics. But instead of “Fortnite” or “Minecraft” dominating the list, Roblox did. Specifically, Roblox games like “Grow a Garden,” “Dandy’s World,” “Forsaken” and “Steal a Brainrot” accounted for the game builder’s place on the list. “Cookie Run Kingdom” also made the list as did the Nintendo Switch 2, which was released in June.

On a more serious note, the late Charlie Kirk made two of YouTube’s lists. Kirk was one of the top trending topics of the year, and he was also ranked as the sixth most popular creator of the year. Kirk’s boost in popularity likely had to do with his assassination in September.

As for the top YouTube creators of 2025, MrBeast and his 452 million followers once again secured the No. 1 spot. The Top Creators list is based on in-country subscribers gained in 2025 and excludes artists, brands, media companies and children’s channels.

MrBeast was followed by the Roblox streamer CaylusBlox (7 million followers) in second place, the stunt-focused IShowSpeed (46.1 million followers) in third place, the relationship competition account Double Date (26 million followers) in fourth place and the lifestyle account Cadel and Mia (12.8 million followers) in fifth place. It should be noted that this ranking doesn’t reflect which accounts have the most followers. It reflects the creators who received the most attention in 2025.

Similarly, the list of top podcasts isn’t too surprising if you pay attention to podcast rankings. But YouTube’s rankings do tend to skew more toward bro podcasters than Spotify or Apple’s lists. “The Joe Rogan Experience” (20.5 million followers) led the pack followed by Tony Hinchcliffe’s “Kill Tony” (2.5 million followers). That list was determined determined by the most popular podcast playlists on YouTube based on total watch time in the U.S. in 2025.

Rhett and Link’s “Good Mythical Morning” (19 million followers) came in third place, which is interesting. Because “Good Mythical Morning” is so visually focused, it primarily lives on YouTube and helps prove that the growing audience interest in video podcasts is very real. That was followed in fourth place by the true crime podcast “Rotten Mango” (6 million subscribers) and in fifth place by the left-leaning “The MeidasTouch Podcast” (5.6 million subscribers).

As for the Top Songs list, that was based off of in-country views of songs that either debuted in 2025 or saw significant year-over-year growth, including official music videos, lyric videos and art track videos. The same is true of the Top Shorts Songs list.

Check out the full lists below:

Top Trending Topics of 2025 (Not ranked)

• “Squid Game”
• User-generated Roblox games:
  • “Grow A Garden”
  • “Dandy’s World”
  • “Forsaken”
  • “Steal A Brainrot”
• “KPop Demon Hunters”
• Brainrot 
• Charlie Kirk
• Labubu
• Nintendo Switch 2
• “Cookie Run Kingdom”
• “Blue Lock”
• KATSEYE

Top Creators 

1. MrBeast
2. CaylusBlox
3. IShowSpeed
4. Double Date
5. Cadel and Mia
6. Charlie Kirk
7. Law by Mike
8. CoryxKenshin
9. Zack D. Films
10. Outdoor Boys

Top Songs

1. “Die with a Smile” by Bruno Mars and Lady Gaga
2. “APT.” by Rosé and Bruno Mars
3. “Golden” by HUNTR/X (“KPop Demon Hunters” cast)
4. “Soda Pop” by Saja Boys (“KPop Demon Hunters” cast)
5. “Your Idol” by Saja Boys (“KPop Demon Hunters” cast)
6. “El Mayor de los Ranas” by Victor Valverde and Jr Torres
7. “How It’s Done” by HUNTR/X (“KPop Demon Hunters” cast)
8. “Ordinary” by Alex Warren
9. “Luther” by Kendrick Lamar and SZA
10. “tv off” by Kendrick Lamar

Top Songs on Shorts

1. “YOUR WAY’S BETTER” by Forrest Frank
2. “Passo Bem Solto (Slowed)” by ATLXS
3. “Rock That Body” by Black Eyed Peas
4. “Pretty Little Baby” by Connie Francis
5. “Chess” by Joyful
6. “Anxiety” by Doechii
7. “Doot Doot (6 7)” by Skrilla
8. “Soda Pop” by Saja Boys (“KPop Demon Hunters” cast)
9. “Confess your love” by Jiandro (feat. ola.wav)
10. “Ocean Eyes” by Billie Eilish

Top Podcasts

1. “The Joe Rogan Experience”
2. “KILL TONY”
3. “Good Mythical Morning”
4. “Rotten Mango”
5. “The MeidasTouch Podcast”
6. “48 Hours”
7. “Shawn Ryan Show”
8. “Smosh Reads Reddit Stories”
9. “This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von”
10. “The Diary Of A CEO”