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Twenty-four weeks. That’s how long Ella Langley’s “Choosin’ Texas” had owned the Billboard Hot 100, a longer reign than any song in the chart’s history, and it took Taylor Swift to end it. “Patient Zero” debuts at No. 1 on the chart dated Oct. 10, and Langley slips to No. 2.
The lead single from The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore opened with 34.5 million official U.S. streams, 28.5 million in radio airplay audience and 65,000 sold in the tracking week of Sept. 25 to Oct. 1, Billboard reports, citing Luminate. It’s her 12th No. 1 on Streaming Songs and her record-extending 33rd on Digital Song Sales. Radio is still catching up: it enters Radio Songs at No. 16.
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The milestones stack up fast. It’s Swift’s 16th Hot 100 No. 1, third only to The Beatles (20) and Mariah Carey (19), and her 10th to debut at the top, which ties Drake for the most ever. It also gives her a 50th career week at No. 1, a mark only five artists had reached before her. And after “Opalite” and “I Knew It, I Knew You,” it’s her third new No. 1 of 2026, making her the first act with three in a year since Kendrick Lamar in 2024.
The rest of the Encore came along for the ride. “Cleveland!” (No. 3), “Babylon” (No. 4) and “Pink Clouding” (No. 5) all debut in the top five, giving The Life of a Showgirl 14 Hot 100 top 10s across its editions, the most from any album. The set also returned to No. 1 on the Billboard 200 for a 13th week, with 173,000 units.
The new songs came out of a trip Swift took to Sweden with Max Martin and Shellback, who cowrote and coproduced “Patient Zero” with her. It’s Martin’s 31st No. 1 as a songwriter, one behind Paul McCartney. In the Instagram note that announced the Encore, Swift said the sessions weren’t really planned:
Really we just wanted to reflect and take in how grateful we were for the moment we were in, but there was a studio there and we did what we do when we feel anything at all: We wrote more songs.
Taylor Swift, on Instagram, Rolling Stone Australia
Why the video premiered on TV, not YouTube
The rollout skipped the usual first stop. Swift premiered the video, which she directed and which stars Dakota Johnson and Colin Farrell, during the VMAs broadcast on Sept. 27, and it didn’t go up on YouTube until two days later. Rolling Stone noted that the earlier Showgirl videos weren’t on YouTube right away either, and that the strategy coincides with YouTube’s exit from Billboard’s charts. YouTube stopped sharing its data with Billboard after Jan. 16, objecting to a formula that counts paid streams for more than free ones. An extended eight-minute cut went to Apple Music as an exclusive on Oct. 3. Watch the official video below.
“Choosin’ Texas” isn’t finished. It’s still No. 1 on Hot Country Songs for a 43rd week, while “Patient Zero” has already spent a second week at No. 1 in the U.K. The next Hot 100, dated Oct. 17, is the first to count Drake’s four new FOMO songs.
- Hot 100
- No. 1 debut, chart dated Oct. 10
- Tracking week
- Sept. 25–Oct. 1
- First week
- 34.5M streams, 65,000 sold
- Career Hot 100 No. 1s
- 16
- No. 1 debuts
- 10, tied with Drake
