New Year's Eve Playlist 2026: The Best Party Songs to Ring In the Year
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My New Year's Eve Playlist 2026: Party Songs That Build to Midnight
My very first night as a DJ was New Year's Eve 1999. Ever since, I've learned one rule for a great New Year's party: pacing. Play your biggest anthem at 9 pm and you'll have nothing left when the clock strikes twelve. So my New Year's Eve playlist for 2026 runs in four stages.
1. Arrival and warm-up
- Earth, Wind & Fire – September
- Mark Ronson feat. Bruno Mars – Uptown Funk
- Dua Lipa – Levitating
- ABBA – Dancing Queen
2. Turning it up
- The Killers – Mr. Brightside
- Queen – Don't Stop Me Now
- Bon Jovi – Livin' on a Prayer
- Cascada – Everytime We Touch
3. Countdown and midnight
- Europe – The Final Countdown
- Prince – 1999
- Kool & The Gang – Celebration
- ABBA – Happy New Year
4. After the fireworks
- Whitney Houston – I Wanna Dance with Somebody
- Avicii – Levels
- AC/DC – Thunderstruck
- Robbie Williams – Angels
Let your guests pick the New Year's Eve songs
A playlist gets you started, but the best party music comes from the people in the room. Everyone has that one song that gets them on their feet. That's exactly why I built Juqed Go.
Here's how it works: you create an event in the app or with Juqed Web in your browser and show the QR code. Guests scan it and request songs right in their phone's browser, with no app, no account and no shared Wi-Fi. They vote on each other's requests, the majority decides what plays next, and when nobody is requesting, the auto DJ keeps the music going. The songs come from your Apple Music.
Quick tips for your party music
- Lock in your midnight song: add it as a host request so it plays right on time.
- Save the peak: raise the energy again around 11:30 pm, the best is yet to come.
- Last-minute is fine: setting up an event takes minutes, even on December 31.
Have a loud, happy night and a great start to the new year!