The launch of Spotify’s annual, highly hyped release of Spotify Wrapped today had me thinking about year-end traditions. This time of year is all about traditions, more and more of them bunched up and tailgating each other than ever.

Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber Monday, GivingTuesday, Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, and New Year’s. Half of these have been around for ages, the other half only in our new century.

But have any of the 21st-century inventions been so universally beloved and eagerly anticipated, or garnered as much participation as the annual post-Black Friday drop of Spotify Unwrapped?

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Spotify WRapped 2025: it’s here

Sometimes it’s late November, other times early December. Like much of the holiday season that suc

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