The sun is shining, and the beaches will soon be crowded, which can only mean one thing: Summer is underway. To celebrate the return of our favorite season, we’ve scoured the Billboard chart archives and updated this definitive list of the most popular songs about summer ever recorded.
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These 30 hot tunes with summer-specific themes are ranked based on each track’s performance on the Billboard Hot 100 chart from August 4, 1958 — the inception of the chart — through the chart dated May 31, 2014. Songs are ranked based on an inverse point system, with weeks at No. 1 earning the greatest value and weeks at No. 100 earning the least.
Text by Courtney Baldasare, Melanie Fried, Gabriella Landsman, and Jessica Letkemann