Ranking explained¶
We calculate changes in ranking by comparing positions from a previous date range. We always compare adjacent date ranges, such as the last 30 days to the previous 30 days or 2023 to 2022, and so on. The exception is the All Time ranking, where we compare how your streams changed in the all time ranking over the past 7 days.
What the badges mean¶
Next to a position you will see one of these:
| Badge | What it means |
|---|---|
| 3 | This position moved up in the ranking. In this example, it moved up by 3 positions. |
| 4 | This position moved down in the ranking. In this example, it moved down by 4 positions. |
| This position did not change in the ranking, it maintained the same position. | |
| This position is new to the ranking, it was not seen before. | |
| This information is locked because the user does not have a premium account. |
The counters¶
Each position also carries two numbers:
| Icon | What it shows |
|---|---|
| The play icon indicates the number of streams a position has. | |
| The clock icon indicates the number of minutes a position has. |
Top rated charts¶
The rankings above are built from streams. Separately, Musicat ranks tracks, albums and artists by the ratings people give them in reviews. Only items with at least one review appear in these charts.
Your own top rated¶
Your personal charts are ordered by your own average rating for each item. Nothing else goes into it, and other people's reviews never affect your charts.
The global top rated¶
A global chart cannot simply use the average, or an album with a single perfect 10 would outrank one that hundreds of people rated 9. So the position comes from a weighted rating:
| Symbol | What it is |
|---|---|
| \(v\) | How many reviews the item has |
| \(R\) | The item's average rating |
| \(m\) | A fixed weight, currently 5 |
| \(C\) | The average rating across everything else in the same chart |
The score always lands somewhere between \(C\) and \(R\). An item with very few reviews sits close to the overall average, and the more reviews it collects, the closer the score moves to its own average. It takes roughly \(m\) reviews for an item to be pulled halfway from the overall average towards its own.
\(C\) is recalculated for the chart you are looking at rather than taken from all of Musicat. Narrow the chart down to a date range or to a single artist and the comparison narrows with it.
Artist scores¶
Artists have no ratings of their own, so their score is built from reviews of their music. An album review counts a little more than a single track review:
Here \(r_i\) is a single review's rating and \(w_i\) is its weight. This \(R\) then goes into the weighted rating above. It is the same average shown on the artist's profile, so the number on the profile and the position in the chart always agree.
Shared positions¶
Positions are ranked with ties allowed. If two items score the same they share a position, and the next item after them skips ahead accordingly, so two items tied at 1 are followed by 3. Tied items are listed alphabetically.
What counts¶
| Included | Excluded |
|---|---|
| Reviews written inside the selected date range | Reviews on deleted notes |
| Reviews from anyone, on global charts | Reviews from accounts excluded from leaderboards |
| Reviews of tracks and albums | Items nobody has reviewed yet |
One thing worth keeping in mind when reading a global chart: the score describes how the people who chose to review something rated it. Music with a large, enthusiastic following tends to be reviewed mostly by that following, which lifts its average compared to music that gets rated by a broader mix of listeners.