Drake breaks streaming records with 3 surprise album releases

WASHINGTON: Canadian rapper and singer Drake has broken multiple streaming records on Spotify after unexpectedly releasing three albums on Friday, setting new platform highs for 2026.

Spotify confirmed that Drake became the platform’s most-streamed artist in a single day this year, while his album ‘Iceman’ and its opening track ‘Make Them Cry’ also secured the records for the most-streamed album and most-streamed song in a single day this year.

“On May 15th, Drake became Spotify’s most-streamed artist of 2026 in a single day, ICEMAN became the most-streamed album of 2026 in a single day, and ‘Make Them Cry’ became the most-streamed song in a single day in 2026 so far,” Spotify said in a post shared across its social media platforms on Friday.

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The streaming milestone followed Drake’s surprise triple-album rollout during his “Iceman Episode 4” livestream, which generated widespread attention among fans and across music streaming platforms.

Alongside the heavily anticipated ‘Iceman’, the Toronto-born artist also surprise-released ‘Maid of Honour’ and ‘Habibti’. Together, the projects delivered 43 new tracks.

The releases mark Drake’s first solo project since 2023’s ‘For All the Dogs’. In 2025, he released the collaborative album ‘Some Sexy Songs 4 U’ with fellow Canadian musician PARTYNEXTDOOR.

According to Billboard, the 18-track Iceman surpassed the streaming record previously held by BTS’s album ‘ARIRANG’, which had achieved the highest single-day album streaming numbers on Spotify in 2026 after its release in March.

Drake also references BTS on ‘Make Them Cry,’ rapping, “I’m feeling like BTS, ’cause it took the whole career for me to be so discovered,” as per Billboard.

A clip shared on Instagram Stories by V showed him listening to the track alongside fellow BTS member J-Hope and reacting to the lyric.

Apart from Spotify, Drake’s surprise release reportedly created another major milestone on Amazon Music, earning the platform’s biggest first 24-hour streaming debut globally for any artist in 2026. (ANI)