Year-End Niconico Chart Sheds Light on Japan’s 2025 Vocaloid Scene

Trending on Billboard Earlier this month, the 2025 year-end NICONICO VOCALOID SONGS chart was revealed. The list tallies the top 20 surging Vocaloid tracks on Japan ‘s video-sharing platform Niconico Douga by applying Billboard Japan ’s proprietary weighting to data such as views, number of creations, comments and likes. In this article, songs using voice synthesizer software other than Yamaha’s Vocaloid products, such as CeVIO and Synthesizer V, will also be collectively referred to as “Vocaloid.” The Vocaloid song of the year this year is DECO27’s “Monitoring.” On the mid-year list, Hiiragi Magnetite’s “Tetoris” edged out DECO27’s “Monitoring” for the top spot by a slim margin. But momentum shifted when “Monitoring (Best Friend Remix)” dropped on Sept. 5, acting as a catalyst that propelled the original track to No. 1 for the year. At the inaugural edition of Japan’s largest international music awards, MUSIC AWARDS JAPAN 2025, Kurousa P’s “Senbonzakura” won Best Vocaloid Culture Song. Meanwhile, Asia Creators Cross - a global expansion of Niconico Chokaigi’s Creator Cross - launched in full in November 2024, further accelerating the export of Japan’s Vocaloid culture across Asia. Popular Vocaloid producers (Vocalo-p) performed on major stages including the Strawberry Music Festival in Beijing (May), Anime Festival Asia in Jakarta (June), and Anime Festival Asia in Singapore (November). Culturally, Japanese listeners tend to favor the producers of the tracks, while English-speaking listeners often gravitate toward the characters associated with virtual singer software (voicebanks). For Satsuki’s “Mesmerizer” (No. 3), the bilingual music video composed around Hatsune Miku and Kasane Teto, two voicebanks with major fandoms; channel’s dynamic visual sense that brings the song’s rhythmic contours into focus with vivid color; and its denpa-kei sound functioned as elements that resonate overseas, and together they led to a viral moment. The video for Nakiso’s “Retry Now” (No. 8), where a magical-girl Miku appears, was also created by the same animator, channel. And with platforms consolidating around YouTube and TikTok, global connections have naturally become part of the landscape. Amala’s “DaiDaiDaiDaiDaikirai” (No. 7), conceived as a successor to “Mesmerizer” and again featuring Hatsune Miku and Kasane Teto, also highlights how the pair are often portrayed as opposites, a depiction that may stem from their differing origins as a Vocaloid and an UTAU-born voicebank. The internet memes and the layers of sentiment that have accumulated around these virtual singer characters can themselves function as a force that broadens the expressive range available to them. Hiiragi Magnetite’s “Zaako,” released on Feb. 9, drew criticism from Vocaloid listeners in English- and European-language regions for evoking the Japan-specific slang mesugaki and for having Kaai Yuki - a voicebank characterized as a nine-year-old - sing sexually provocative lines. The video was taken down the same day. Nunununununununu’s “Mimukauwa Nice Try” (No. 6), which became the fastest Vocaloid song in history to reach 10 million views on China’s video platform bilibili across all Vocaloid content including Chinese-language tracks, was likewise criticized by some overseas listeners as pedophilic, sparking debate. These cases underscored the importance...

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