All 286 of Taylor Swift’s Songs, Ranked

Taylor Swiftthe celebrity is such a magnet for attention, she can distract from Taylor Swift the artist. But Swift was a songwriter before she was a star, and she'll be a songwriter long after she graduates from that racket. It's in her music where she's made her mark on history — as a performer, record-crafter, guitar hero and all-around pop mastermind, with songs that can leave you breathless or with a nasty scar. She was soaring on the level of the all-time greats before she was old enough to rent a car, with the crafty guile of a Carole King and the reckless heart of a Paul Westerberg — and she hasn't exactly slowed down since then.

So with all due respect to Taylor the myth, the icon, the red-carpet tabloid staple, let's celebrate the real Taylor — the songwriter she was born to be. Let's break it down: all 286 tunes, counted from the bottom to the top. The hits, the flops, the deep  cuts, the covers, from her raw 2006 debut as a teen country ingenue right up to Midnights and The Life of a Showgirl.

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Every fan would compile a different list—that's the beauty of it. She's got at least 5 or 6 dozen songs that seem to belong in her Top Ten. But they're not ranked by popularity, sales or supposed celebrity quotient — just the level of Taylor genius on display, from the perspective of a fan who generally does not give a rat's nads who the songs are "really" about. All that matters is whether they're about you and me. (I guarantee you are a more fascinating human than the Twilight guy, though I'm probably not.)

Since Taylor loves nothing more than causing chaos in our lives, she's re-recording her albums, including the outtakes she left in the vault before. ( Reputation and her debut are the only ones she hasn't released For the Taylor's Version remakes, both versions count as the same song. It's a tribute to her fierce creative energy — in the past couple years she's released an avalanche of new music, with more on the way. God help us all.

Sister Tay may be the last true rock star on the planet, making brilliant moves (or catastrophic gaffes, because that's what rock stars do). These are the songs that sum up her wit, her empathy, her flair for emotional excess, her girls-to-the-front bravado, her urge to ransack every corner of pop history, her determination to turn any chorus into a ridiculous spectacle. So let's step back from the image and pay homage to her one-of-a-kind songbook — because the weirdest and most fascinating thing about Taylor Swift will always be her music.

286. "Bad Blood" (2014)

Melodically parched, lyrically unfinished, rhythmically clunky – this was a mighty strange pick for a single from an album as loaded as 1989 . There are a million things Taylor has in common with Paul McCartney – one is that celebrity grievances tend to sound like a penny-ante waste of their time, even when they're totally understandable (unless you're a fan of Macca's "Dear Boy," where John Lennon is his Katy Perry). The single remix is improved by Kendrick Lamar – but he wasn't saving his A-game for this one.

Best line: "Band-Aids don't fix bullet holes."

285. "Santa Baby" (2007)

Yes, she made a Christmas album, which is full of contenders for the basement of this list. But an oldie about a gold digger wooing Little Saint Nick was perhaps a dubious pick for a singer still in her teens.

Best line: "I've been an awful good girl."

284. "A Place in This World" (2006)

Apprentice work from the debut, when she was still learning the ropes as a country songwriter. Yet, the seeds of greatness are already there. Historical significance: This was the song where Tay discovered rain imagery, which in her hands was the equivalent of Sir Isaac Newton inventing calculus.

Best line: "I'll be strong/I'll be wrong/Oh, but life goes on."

283. "Christmas Must Be Something More" (2007)

A hymn about how Jesus is the reason for the season, with the hook, "So here's to the birthday boy who saved our lives." Unlike most boys Swift sings about, Jesus didn't comment publicly.

Best line: "What would happen if God never let it snow?"

282. "I'm Only Me When I'm With You" (2006)

Could there be a less Swiftian sentiment? For better or worse, this girl is always herself. That's kinda the point.

Best line: "I'm only up when you're not down/Don't wanna fly if you're still on the ground."

281. "Two Is Better Than One," With Boys Like Girls (2009)

A long, long, very long duet with former Good Charlotte and Fall Out Boy tourmates Boys Like Girls, who are either from London or Nashville (they seem to switch accents at random). For some reason, they decided to delay her entrance until a minute into the song, arguably the worst decision in the history of decisions.

Best line: "You already got me coming…undone."

280. "Silent Night" (2007)

This bizarre version manages to miss almost every single note in the melody. They sure were in a rush to get this Christmas album out.

Best line: "Shepherds quake at the sight."

279. "Macavity" (2019)

This one will be tough to explain to future generations, but here goes: So they made this Hollywood movie out of the Broadway musical Cats . Full of magic, furry, singing cats. So much fur. So much magic. Taylor plus felines — it should add up to classic cinema, right? Not quite.

Best line: "Macavity's a mystery cat / He's called the Hidden Paw."

278. "Both of Us," With B.o.B (2012)

Nice try at remaking "Airplanes," but that Hayley Williams lightning does not strike twice.

Best line: "Your money's all gone, and you lose your whip."

277. "The Last Time," With Gary Lightbody (2012)

Her duet with the guy from Snow Patrol. Unfortunately, their voices don't mesh at all – what, is he auditioning for a Spandau Ballet tribute band? The funny moment is the très Eighties synth-horn blurp at the three-minute mark.

Best line: "This is the last time I'm asking you this/Put my name at the top of your list."

276. "ME!" With Brendon Urie (2019)

One of those beloved Taylor traditions: the Lead Single That Reveals Absolutely Nothing About the New Album. And for the second time in a row, it's the weakest track by a mile. Honestly, Taylor would have released "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" as the first single from Abbey damn Road . "ME!" is her only song title with an exclamation point, an oddity for this most !!! of singers. Even Brendon Urie sounds squeamish, and he's the guy who once released a song called "Folkin' Around." As we now know, she had "Cruel Summer" in the can, but opted not to make it the summer jam of 2019 because she decided to release "ME!" instead, a decision that will be studied by Swiftian scholars for years to come.

Best line: "Hey kids, spelling is fun!"

275. "The Outside" (2006)

Still a rookie, still learning, still trying to get away with "read between the lines" and "the road less traveled by" in the same verse.

Best line: "Nothing seems to work the first few times/Am I right?"

274. 'ThanK You AImee' (2024)

This track is 4 minutes and 24 seconds long, and involves 5 different cello players. The letters "K," "I," and "M" are capitalized in the title, a reminder that there's an excellent new Kim Gordon album. Sisyphus must appreciate the shout-out, but he'd probably rather roll a boulder uphill for all eternity than hear another song about this feud.

Best line: "The blood was gushin'."

273. "Hold On," With Jack Ingram (2008)

An early country throwaway, released a decade later on Ingram's From the Vault: Live 2007-2009 . A teenage Swift chirps back-up harmony, doing the part originally sung by Sheryl Crow.

Best line: "Sign our names in the dust on your family car."

272. "Beautiful Ghosts" (2019)

She wrote this with Andrew Lloyd Webber for the Cats soundtrack — as she said, "If you can't get T.S. Eliot, get T.S."

Best line: "I watch from the dark, wait for my life to start / With no beauty in my memory."

271. "Girl at Home" (2012)

A perfunctory cheating-is-bad homily, with barely any chorus.

Best line: "I feel a responsibility/To do what's upstanding and right."

270. "Half of My Heart," With John Mayer (2009)

The real prize from his Battle Studies album is "Heartbreak Warfare"; this is lesser J.M., with an underexploited T.S. cameo and an increasingly irritating premise of hearts having fingers, which they don't. No wonder the girl in the dress cried the whole way home.

Best line: "Half of my heart's got a grip on the situation."

269. "Sweeter Than Fiction" (2013)

A warm-up for the synth-pop of 1989 , from the One Chance soundtrack.

Best line: "What a sight when the light came on."

268. "Superman" (2010)

A Lois Lane fantasy left off Speak Now, but it gets a real upgrade with her Taylor's Version vocal muscle.

Best line: "Tall, dark and beautiful/He's complicated, he's irrational."

267. "Cold as You" (2006)

"I start a fight 'cause I need to feel something" – give her credit for honesty, even in this raw phase.

Best line: "Every smile you fake is so condescending."

266. "If This Was a Movie" (2010)

"Good evening, sir. May I help you? You're a guy in a Taylor Swift song who wants to stand outside the window in the pouring rain, begging the love of your life to forgive your sorry ass? Take a number and get in line. No, that line."

Best line: "But I take it all back now!"

265. "A Perfectly Good Heart" (2006)

"It's not unbroken anymore"? Paging the eminent cardiologist Dr. Toni Braxton.

Best line: "Why would you wanna make the very first scar?/Why would you wanna break a perfectly good heart?"

264. "White Christmas" (2007)

Unlike "Silent Night," this was a yuletide carol she could handle, with a straight-down-the-middle country rendition.

Best line: "Where the treetops glisten."

263. "I Don't Wanna Live Forever," With Zayn Malik (2016)

Neither she nor Zayn sound deeply interested in this dueling-falsettos battle from the Fifty Shades Darker soundtrack. Maybe it works in the movie, but who wants to go find out? Really, they sound like two ghosts standing in the place of…sorry, sore subject, let's drop it.

Best line: "I've been looking sad in all the nicest places."

262. "Mary's Song (Oh My My)" (2006)

A through-the-years romance, with a sweet homespun touch.

Best line: "I'll be 87, you'll be 89/I'll still look at you like the stars that shine in the sky."

261. "Highway Don't Care," With Tim McGraw and Keith Urban (2013)

A duet from McGraw's album Two Lanes of Freedom , with a guitar solo from Keith Urban. The plot: His ex is driving away, listening to a Taylor song on the radio, as Tay tries to coax the woman into turning the car around and going home. Perhaps McGraw's finest duet since his great lost Nelly jam, " Over and Over ."

Best line: "I bet you're bending God's ear talking 'bout me."

260. "Change" (2008)

Oh, the fall of 2008 – Chuck and Blair were still an item, Suede was killing it on Project Runway , and "Change" was a de facto victory song for Obama, complete with a thumbs-up for the "revolution." Yeah, those were different times.

Best line: "These walls that they put up to hold us back will fall down."

259. "Nashville" (2011)

A cover of an obscurity by country singer David Mead, tucked away as a bonus on the Target edition of the Speak Now Tour Live DVD.

Best line: "Was that a blood or wine stain on your wedding dress?"

258. "Sweet Escape" (2011)

From the same live DVD, a remake of the Gwen Stefani solo hit. Taylor's vocal sure fits the Gwen just-a-girl sensibility.

Best line: "I must apologize for acting stank."

257. "I Want You Back" (2010)

A live acoustic tribute to the then-recently departed Michael Jackson, with a bit of Motown tremble in her voice.

Best line: "Oh darling, I was blind to let you go."

256. "Only the Young" (2019)

"Only the Young" debuted in her excellent doc Miss Americana , a synth-pop tribute to the next generation of political activists. It's also a clever Swiftian fake-out, giving everyone a totally wrong idea of where she was headed musically — almost like she was announcing, "Nothing to see here, folks. Definitely no keepers left over from the Lover era." Was she already plotting to catch us off guard with Folklore ? Don't put it past her. But you'd never guess she was about to make an acoustic album full of folk songs about sweaters.

Best line: "Up there's the finish line / Our future is worth the fight."

255. 'I Hate It Here' (2024)

A tale of romanticism gone sour, with a precocious child grown into an alienated introvert who escapes to "the secret garden in my mind." The 1830s line isn't even the real verbal groaner in this song—that would be "if comfort is a construct," which wins this album's The Kind Under Where a Tree Has Grown award. But since "I Hate It Here" connects to "The Lakes," it's worth noting the 1830s sucked for Wordsworth and Coleridge. 

Best line: "I'll save all my romanticism for my inner life."

254. "I'd Lie" (2006)

A perky early throwaway about a teenage crush, recorded for her debut and briefly released as a bonus track.

Best line: "He loves to argue, born on the 17th."

253. "Umbrella" (2008)

The Rihanna hit, briefly covered on the Live from SoHo digital album. Her finest Ri tribute remains her 2011 version of " Live Your Life " with T.I. onstage in Atlanta – sadly unreleased, but a duet that deserves to be enshrined for the ages.

Best line: "Stand under my umbrella, ella, ella."

252. "Look What You Made Me Do" (2017)

The reason fans once cared about rap beefs: they inspired great songs, whether it was Queens vs. the Bronx ("The Bridge" vs. "The Bridge Is Over" vs. "Have a Nice Day") or LL Cool J vs. Kool Moe Dee ("How Ya Like Me Now" vs. "Jack the Ripper" vs. "Let's Go" vs. "To Da Break of Dawn"). But this just sounds like a trivial time-waster by her standards – Swift's celebrity feuds are not really one of the hundred most interesting things about her. The main attraction is the retro Panic! at the Disco vibe. "Look What You Made Me Do" turned out to be the lamest track on Reputation , but an impressively perverse head fake – a lead single that ended up having nothing to do with the album, musically or conceptually, making sure her new relationship songs would come as a surprise. To find a comparable stunt, you might have to go back to 1982, when Michael Jackson fooled the world into thinking Thriller was going to be a whole album of "The Girl Is Mine."

Best line: "It's much better to face these kinds of things with a sense of poise and rationality." Oh wait – that actually is Panic! at the Disco.

251. "Paris" (2022)

"I wanna brainwash you into loving me forever / I wanna transport you to somewhere the culture's clever"—for Tay, that means a fantasy of Gay Paree. But the whole point of this song is that you can make your own Paris wherever you are, just by drawing your own dream map on the bedroom ceiling. And if you have an amour to share the dream with, all the better. "All the outfits were terrible, 2003 unbearable"—sounds like Taylor found somebody's Friendster photo stash of crop tops and trucker hats. "Did you see the photos? / No, I didn't, but thanks though" is being kind. 

Best line: "Privacy sign on the door and on my page and on the whole world / Romance is not dead if you keep it just yours."

250. 'CANCELLED' (2025)

If "Karma" is a cat, "CANCELLED!" is a squirle. She's told this story countless times before, but almost always better, especially on The Tortured Poets Department , which makes you wonder if this is even a 2020s song or some still-unfinished Rep outtake. ("Did you girlboss too close to the sun," whew.) The Nineties indie-rock guitar intro and Macbeth quote deserve a snazzier castle to call home.

Best line: "You know who your friends are / They're the ones with matching scars."

249. 'The Joker and the Queen,' with Ed Sheeran (2022)

An Ed Sheeran ballad, refurbished into a sweet duet with his long-running favorite co-star. The video has the same actors who played Ed and Tay as little kids in the "Everything Has Changed" video — ten years later. Both singers sound right at home with the metaphor of a poker game — Ed can't see it in her face, but she's about to play her ace. 

Best line: "I've been played before, if you hadn't guessed/So I kept my cards close to my foolproof vest."

248. "September" (2018)

The Earth, Wind & Fire classic, already covered by every wedding band on the planet, becomes a mournful banjo lament. It's her tribute to the late great Maurice White, a songwriter who shared her knack for building hits out of quirky details. (Changing "the 21st night of September" to the 28th is a very Swiftian touch.) Next she might try "That's the Way of the World" or "After the Love Has Gone."

Best line: "Love was changing the minds of pretenders."

247. "Stay Beautiful" (2006)

An early stab at a take-the-high-road breakup song.

Best line: "He whispers songs into my window."

246. "End Game," with Ed Sheeran & Future (2017)

Future reaffirms her long-running bond with ATLien hip-hop, which goes back to her B.o.B. and T.I. duets. Plus her trusty wingman Ed Sheeran. She offers an update about her lipstick status (still red! good to know) and her relationship with drama: "I swear I don't love the drama — it loves me!"

Best line: "I bury hatchets, but I keep maps of where I put 'em."

245. "That's When" (2021)

A Fearless outtake refurbished as a duet with her old friend Keith Urban. She pleads for forgiveness after crushing a lover's heart for no particular reason, in the mode of "Back to December" or "Afterglow."

Best line: "I knew my words were hard to hear/And harder to ever take back."

244. "The Way I Loved You" (2008)

She meets a low-stress boy who doesn't want love to be torture. Alas, this suitor is toast, because he reminds her how much she misses the manic pixie drama vampire she dated before. Sorry, dude – she loves the players, and she loves the game.

Best line: "He respects my space/And never makes me wait."

243. "Thug Story," With T-Pain (2009)

The classic T-Pain and Taylor duet from the 2009 CMT Awards , still T-Swizzle's finest rap performance.

Best line: "No, I never really been in a club/Still live with my parents, but I'm still a thug/I'm so gangsta you can find me baking cookies at night/You out clubbing, but I just made caramel delight."

242. "I Wish You Would" (2014)

One of her many, many songs set at 2 a.m. – clearly the most inspiring hour on Swift Standard Time – with a staccato disco guitar lick.

Best line: "We're a crooked love in a straight line down."

241. "Big Star," With Kenny Chesney (2017)

"This song is about a girl who had a dream and followed it," Kenny Chesney tells the roaring Nashville crowd. One of those girls jumps onstage to sing along. "My friend Taylor Swift showed up on my birthday to surprise me," Kenny explained. "In a lot of ways, that song and that lyric is Taylor's journey." Their touching "Big Star" duet came out on his concert album Live from No Shoes Nation — 10 years after he gave this rookie a break as the opening act on his 2007 summer tour. There is no loyalty like Swift loyalty.

Best line: "She signed autographs like she was Garth Brooks in a skirt."

240. "Stay Stay Stay" (2012)

"Before you, I'd only dated self-indulgent takers" – but here she turns into a self-indulgent taker herself and (surprise!) she likes it, a phone-throwing nightmare dressed like a grocery-shopping daydream.

Best line: "You came in wearing a football helmet and said, 'Okay, let's talk.'"

239. 'Imgonnagetyouback' (2024)

A catchy oddity that resembles Olivia Rodrigo's "Get Him Back," except Taylor does not meet this guy's mom just to tell her her son sucks. 

Best line: "Once you fix your face, I'm going in."

238. 'Foolish One' (2023)

Some of the Speak Now vaulties sound like she's already rehearsing for Red , but "Foolish One" feels totally Fearless. It's a guileless country ballad about a girl learning to trust her instincts. Can you believe she went from this song to "Shake It Off" in four years? Talk about an upgrade in terms of Voices In My Head content. Love the way she wrote the hook "it's delicate," then decided to save that line until she could give it a song all its own. Like a lot of decisions she made in 2010, this was a prescient one.

Best line: "When my head is on your shoulder / It starts thinking you'll come around."

237. "Message In a Bottle" (2021)

The first song Swift wrote with Max Martin and Shellback — the day she met them. It makes sense she left "Message in a Bottle" off Red , since it sounds so similar to "22"— she chose the right one. But it sounds like she's already stretching ahead to 1989 . "How is it in London?" sounds like a fresh take on the transatlantic rendezvous of "Come Back…Be Here."

Best line: "I became hypnotized by freckles and bright eyes, tongue-tied."

236. "Say Don't Go" (2023)

"I would stay forever if you say 'Don't go' / But you won't." A 1989 v ault outtake co-written with Eighties hitmaker Diane Warren, "Say Don't Go" is relatively straight-forward and smooth compared to its peers, with echoes of "Mirrorball" in the tightrope imagery.

Best line: "We're a shot in the darkest dark."

235. 'Robin' (2024)

A light-hearted ode to childhood innocence, with swingsets and dragonflies.

Best line: "Long may you roar at your dinosaurs."

234. "Run," With Ed Sheeran (2021)

This Ed Sheeran duet from the Red vault is about two outlaw lovers making an upstate escape in the car — it makes a clever contrast with the drive in "All Too Well (10-Minute Version)," with Taylor at the wheel. This song also has the album's second-most-memorable cameo from a keychain. Not as dramatic as "Everything Has Changed," but every bit as intimate. (And if I'm not mistaken, it's about something good that starts in a getaway car.)

Best line: "I could see this view a hundred times/Pale blue sky reflected in your eyes."

233. "Castles Crumbling," With Hayley Williams (2023)

If you were a Taylor fan in 2010, you probably remember some of the mind-blowingly stupid cliches that experts kept saying about her. "Castles Crumbling" shows that she wondered if these experts had a point. (They didn't.) It's wild that she wrote this troubled-ingenue lament three years before "Nothing New." But Taylor was already feeling that Monster On The Hill terror when she was 20. In "Castles Crumbling," she bonds with Paramore's Hayley Williams—two peers who grew up in public at the same time, two women who learned early that people throw rocks at things that shine. It makes sense since Taylor loves Paramore almost as much as she loves castle imagery.

Best line: "You don't wanna know me / I will just let you down."

232. 'The Alchemy' (2024)

Welcome to the dawn of the Taylor sports-metaphor era. "When I touch down / Call the amateurs and cut them from the team"? "The Alchemy" feels like her post-Super Bowl "Dropkick Me Travis Through The Goalposts of Life" statement, and this is just the beginning. 

Best line: "These blokes warm the benches."

231. "I Forgot That You Existed" (2019)

Subtitle: "So I Sang About You First Thing On My Album." So yeah, maybe that's the opposite of forgetting — it's technically known as "reminding." Letting go of the past, moving on, calming down — let's face it, those aren't exactly topics where you look to Taylor for guidance. That's why we love her — she never lets go. (She hasn't forgotten Drew!) But there's something quintessentially Tay about how she keeps nudging to impress you with how indifferent she is. Her Aubrey Graham shout-out is fitting, since these two are the champion overfeelers of our time.

Best line: "In my feelings more than Drake."

230. "I Heart ?" (2008)

The trad country sound she soon left behind, from her Beautiful Eyes EP.

Best line: "Wake up, and smell the breakup/Fix my heart, put on my makeup."

229. 'Wood' (2025)

You see, kids, when your English teacher and your gym teacher love each other very much, songs like this happen, so be careful. Sabrina Carpenter had us all thinking she'd cornered the market on genitalia-positive tunes rhyming "eyes" and "thighs," but showgirls love a challenge, along with a kicky Chic-on-Motown guitar groove. If "Wood" is more erectile tissue than you can bear to allow inside your ear, that's totally understandable — it sounds like her showgirl role model is Lily Von Shtupp . But I love how the chorus includes the sound of Miss Thing literally knocking on wood—that's how you know this comes from the same masterminds who slipped that ballpoint-pen click into the chorus of "Blank Space." 

Best line: "Daisy's bare naked, I was distraught."

228. "Gasoline (Remix)," With Haim (2020)

Taylor officially joins the family as the fourth Haim sister. This anger-and-lust guitar jam was a highlight of their excellent Women In Music , but it gets even better with Sister Swift singing along. It's funny they didn't have her do the line "Watching the sun rise from the kitchen counter," since she's the one who's on a mission to have emotional experiences in every square inch of the kitchen.

Best line: "You needed ass/Well, what's wrong with that?"

227. "Breathe" (Ft. Colbie Caillat) (2008)

A gorgeous duet full of low-key nuances – her humming after the first verse, that "sorry, sorry, sorry" fade, the way Colbie's voice lifts hers.

Best line: "It's tragedy, and it'll only bring you down."

226. "Untouchable" (2008)

A rare case where she retools somebody else's song on one of her proper albums – the all-but-unknown Y2K-era rock band Luna Halo, who previously opened for Hoobastank. Her Fearless version sounds practically nothing like their original (though both name-check .38 Special's Eighties classic " Caught Up in You "). In fact, it's tough to fathom how she heard the original as raw material she could use – now that's ears.

Best line: "In the middle of the night when I'm in this dream/It's like a million little stars spelling out your name."

225. "Birch," With Big Red Machine (2021)

A Big Red Machine ballad sung by Bon Iver's Justin Vernon, with Taylor in a supporting role. She adds her celestial harmonies, picking up where the Justin/Taylor duets "Exile" and "Evermore" left off. Aaron Dessner summed up the spirit of the project: "Making music with your friends just to make it."

Best line: "So I beg on knees/Can we share IDs?"

224. "Pour Some Sugar On Me," With Def Leppard (2008)

She makes a daring leap into the hair-metal mom market by teaming up with Def Leppard on CMT Crossroads , a move that works almost frighteningly well. Peak glam, especially when she asks the gender-torching question, "Demolition woman, can I be your man?"

Best line: "Do you take sugar? One lump or two?"

223. "Christmases When You Were Mine" (2007)

Taylor writes her own ace lovelorn holiday standard, ambushing her ex with one of those squirm-packed Merry-Christmas phone calls. Awkward question: "When you were putting up the lights this year/Did you notice one less pair of hands?" Eat your heart out, Mariah.

Best line: "I bet you got your mom another sweater."

222. "American Girl" (2009)

A bang-up claim on the Tom Petty classic – she used his original as her live entrance music for a while. Then she switched to Lenny Kravitz's "American Woman."

Best line: "Oh yeah! All right!"

221. "Invisible" (2006)

A teen ditty about a boy who doesn't realize she's alive, from pretty much the last moment in history that was possible. Clever pop-obsessive touch: The final steel-guitar twang echoes Elton John's "Rocket Man." If you think that's an accident…this is Planet Tay. There are no accidents.

Best line: "We could be a beautiful miracle, unbelievable, instead of just invisible."

220. "Jump Then Fall" (2009)

Ironclad rule of pop music: Songs about jumping are never a bad idea. Dig that "listens to Sublime once" vocal.

Best line: "I watch you talk, you didn'tnotice."

219. "Breathless" (2010)

Digging deep in the Nineties modern-rock crates, she does right by a previously obscure (to me) nugget from the New Orleans band Better Than Ezra – from 2005!, 10 years after their MTV hit! – as a charity benefit for the Hope for Haiti Now album.

Best line: "I'll never judge you/I can only love you."

218. "Better Than Revenge" (2010)

One of the basic rules of stardom is "never punch down"—don't go after somebody one-thousandth as famous as you—but rules were made to be broken and Taylor is the girl made to break them. Here she goes Bruce Lee on a sexual rival who may or may not be the actress who had Alyssa Milano as her babysitter in the erotic thriller Poison Ivy 2 . It's immature and ridiculous, but she's smart enough to make herself the real butt of the joke, and as usual with Swift, her self-owns are the funniest part of the song. It was understandable to tweak the "she's better known for the things that she does on the mattress" line 13 years later, but she was already way beyond moth/flame cliches in 2010.

Best line: "She thinks I'm psycho because I like to rhyme her name with things."

217. "Innocent" (2010)

Little-known fact: Did you know Kanye West once went onstage to interrupt Swift's acceptance speech at the VMAs and threw a misogynist tantrum about how she didn't deserve an award? Strange but true! "Innocent" was her song publicly forgiving him — fifteen freaking years ago — then they both released brilliant albums and we all moved on with our lives. Dear Lord, if only this story had ended there.

Best line: "It's OK/Life is a tough crowd."

216. "Gorgeous" (2017)

Swift hits the club with her older boyfriend and gets her pheromones scrambled by the sweet young thing across the room. Dig those Eighties synth tones — straight from the first Howard Jones album. Tragic fact: Seven years after she wrote "Enchanted," Taylor still has zero "find out if dude has a freaking girlfriend" game. The shout-out to her cats Meredith and Olivia is such a cheap ploy, and you know what? It works brilliantly, as cheap ploys usually do when this is the woman working them. This song could rate higher, except she basically did an even better version with "You Need to Calm Down."

Best line: "You should take it as a compliment that I'm talking to everybody here but you." Listen here .

215. 'The Albatross' (2024)

A sea fable that could have been inspired by her man Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

Best line: "Cross your thoughtless heart  / Only liquor anoints you / She's the albatross / She is here to destroy you."

214. "Christmas Tree Farm" (2019)

Once upon a time, many Christmases ago, the label made poor Taylor bang out a shoddy quickie holiday album in time for December. She must have wondered, "Why is this happening? Why am I singing 'Santa Baby'? WTF, shouldn't I be singing about how in real life I literally grew up on a Christmas tree farm ?" It took a few years, but she finally got to jingle all the way, with this impeccably cozy carol.

Best line: "Sweet dreams of holly and ribbon / Mistakes are forgiven."

213. "Superstar" (2009)

"You smile that beautiful smile, and all the girls in the front row scream your name." No relation to the Seventies soft-rock hit by the Carpenters — except they're both poignant ballads about groupies crushing on distant guitar boys. Well, as Journey warned, lovin' a music man ain't always what it's supposed to be.

Best line: "You sing me to sleep every night from the radio."

212. "False God" (2019)

Her wintry tribute to Eighties R&B — that sax sounds like it dropped in from a lost Sade album between Promise and Love Deluxe . The highlight of "False God" is the final 30 seconds, where she sings exactly like Drake. She's showing off, but it's all right.

Best line: "Staring out the window like I'm not your favorite town / I'm New York City."

211. "Crazier" (2009)

Her ballad from Hannah Montana: The Movie , snagging her a cameo in the film . (But the highlight of the soundtrack will always be "Hoedown Throwdown.") This is where Taylor and Miley crossed light sabers – although they'd meet again. Great title, too – even Taylor might probably admit Miley had her beat in this department, at least until the "Blank Space" video.

Best line: "Every sky was your own kind of blue."

210. "The Alcott," With the National (2023)

Taylor sings back-up on a piano ballad she co-wrote with her friends in The National, a standout from their first post- Folkmore album, First Two Pages of Frankenstein . "The Alcott" is a secret meeting between two ex-lovers in a hotel bar. In the final minute, her voice takes off into a back-and-forth dialogue with singer Matt Berninger. 

Best line: "Everything that's mine is a landmine."

209. "Don't You" (2021)

A synth ballad rescued from the Fearless vault, where Taylor bumps into an ex-boyfriend and decides whether she feels like taking the high road or making a scene. Shocker: she makes a scene.

Best line: "Hey, I knew I'd run into you somewhere/It's been a while, I didn't mean to stare."

208. "This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things" (2017)

The most "therein" moment on Reputation . Also the only song (after "Look What You Made Me Do") devoted to the album's alleged celebrity-complaints concept, though shrewdly playing it for kicks and giggles. "Therein lies the issue" is some quality Swiftian spite content, but it's that sadistic tongue-clicking "mmm- mmmm " before the second chorus that really brings the Judgement Tay. "Here's to my mama, had to listen to all this drama" – has your mom met you? She might be used to that by now.

Best line: "Feeling so Gatsby for that whole year."

207. "Never Grow Up" (2010)

A folksy fingerpicking change of pace on Speak Now , pining for childhood innocence – though it feels more like a leftover from the debut. This has really grown over the years, especially when you hear her adult Taylor's Version voice sing it.

Best line: "You're mortified your mom's dropping you off."

206. "Closure" (2020)

Nothing could be more contrary to the Taylor worldview than the concept of "closure." Needless to say, she's opposed to it.

Best line: "Don't treat me like some situation that needs to be handled/I'm fine with my spite and my tears and my beers and my candles."

205. "Last Christmas" (2007)

Tay does the Wham! legacy proud – she should also cover "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go." The ache and quaver of her voice fit the George Michael melancholy; this might be the saddest "Last Christmas" since the original. Plenty of us communed with this version on Christmas 2016, the night we said goodbye to the guy who wrote it. R.I.P., George Michael.

Best line: "A girl on a cover but you tore her apart."

204. "Tell Me Why" (2008)

From Neil Young to the Beatles, "Tell Me Why" songs are tough to screw up, and even at 19, Tay's too seasoned to let that happen.

Best line: "I need you like a heartbeat/But you know you got a mean streak."

203. "Epiphany" (2020)

Inspired by her grandfather, a World War 2 veteran who landed on Guadalcanal in 1942. "Holding hands through plastic" is a stark image of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Best line: "Something med school did not cover / Someone's daughter, someone's mother."

202. "All You Had to Do Was Stay" (2014)

A 1989 banger that could have made an excellent single – it sounds a bit like "Out of the Woods," except with a livelier chorus and a stormier range of electro-Tay sound effects.

Best line: "Let me remind you this was what you wanted."

201. 'Cassandra' (2024)

Cassandra is a natural mad-woman heroine for a Swift song: the ancient Homeric prophet, the King of Troy's cursed daughter, with the power to see the future but not to make anyone believe her. (She knew the Greek soldiers were hiding in the Trojan Horse, but nobody listened.) The "snakes" line is the song's only false note. But "Cassandra" poses a question many of Taylor's narrators have asked: When everyone believes you, what's that like?

Best line: "When it's 'Burn the bitch,' they're shrieking/When the truth comes out it's quiet."

200. "The Very First Night" (2021)

An easy Red vault track to overlook, but the dance-pop zoom of "The Very First Night" could have fit right on 1989 . It makes a worthy part of the trilogy with "Come Back…Be Here" and "Message in a Bottle." She's causing trouble up in hotel rooms with a jet-set rock-star boyfriend — a predicament she'd explore in detail more later.

Best line: "Don't forget about the night in L.A./Dance in the kitchen, chase me down the hallway."

199. "You All Over Me," With Maren Morris (2021)

The first outtake she let slip from the Fearless vault was a proof-of-concept coup. Still just 17, she writes a song about getting clean, but decides to keep it a secret, so she can wait six years to release her classic "Clean," then wait six * more* years to release this prequel. I do not understand how this mind exists — honestly, it's just scary.

Best line: "Your hands in your pockets/And your 'don't you wish you had me' grin."

198. 'Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus' (2024)

A delicately etched ballad about getting tangled up with an addict, as she sings, "You needed me but you needed drugs more." It feels like a more downbeat version of "Maroon," where a love story begins on the floor with her roommate's cheap-ass screw-top rosé, only to go sour when the drugs take over.

Best line: "If I sell my apartment / And you have some kids with an internet starlet / Will that make your memory fade from this scarlet maroon?"

197. "I Think He Knows" (2019)

Lusty finger-snaps, crushed-out heavy breathing, skipping down 16th Avenue. (Isn't that underwater in the Hudson River?) "It's like I'm 17 / Nobody understands" is hilarious considering that when she was 17, she had the world wired to every teardrop on her guitar.

Best line: "He's so obsessed with me, and boy, I understand."

196. "Beautiful Eyes" (2008)

If you're a fan of Swift's Nineties modern-rock radio jones – one of her most fruitful long-running obsessions – check out this shameless tribute to the Cranberries. (But did she have to let it linger? Did she have to? Did she have to?)

Best line: "Baby, make me fly."

195. "Dancing With Our Hands Tied" (2017)

"Dancing With Our Hands Tied" has more of Romeo and Juliet 's actual plot than "Love Story" did. She slips away in secret with a forbidden lover who paints her blue heart gold, over Eighties "Take On Me"-style beats. The saddest line Fiona Apple ever wrote – "I know I'm a mess he don't wanna clean up" – finally finds a new home in a Swift song: "I'm a mess, but I'm the mess that you wanted."

Best line: "I'd kiss you as the lights went out / Swaying as the room burned down."

194. "You Need to Calm Down" (2019)

The first time I heard "Welcome to New York," back in 2014, I thought people would freak out over the explicit pro-queer lyrics. ("Boys and boys and girls and girls" — she was not afraid to burn her bridges.) But of course, people slept on it. So I love how she just did it a little louder for the people in back. Eighties New Wave synth-pop was one of the gayest musical movements ever, but at the time, it was all hidden — virtually none of the genre's (many) queer artists were out. So it's fitting how her New Wave homage foregrounds the music's LGBTQ roots. When she growls, "Damn, it's 7 a.m." we all know Taylor has been up pacing the floor at 2 a.m., because that's what she does.

Best line: "Can you just not step on our gowns?"

193. "Dear Reader" (2022)

"Reader, I married him" is one of the most famous lines in 19th century novels, from Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre , so "Dear Reader" is a suitable flex for Quill Pen Taylor, stretching her lit muscles after "The Lakes." It evokes the end of the "All Too Well" short film, when Author Taylor appears at the bookstore, with a crowd full of readers under her spell. It's a clever irony for her to warn, "Never take advice from someone who's falling apart" — especially since the art of falling apart is her favorite topic for giving advice.

Best line: "Dear reader, the greatest of your luxuries is your secrets."

192. "No Body, No Crime," With Haim (2020)

A country collabo with her longtime friends in Haim, for a "Goodbye Earl"-style murder story with a shout-out to Olive Garden. Clever detail: the killer husband reveals his guilt by buying "brand new tires, "continuing Taylor's recent fascination with shiny wheels. Question: Why did he buy new tires right after committing a murder? Is he the only guy who's never seen Goodfellas ? It's like Robert De Niro says after the heist: "Don't buy anything!" What a Johnny Roastbeef mistake.

Best line: "She was with me, dude."

191. "Drops of Jupiter" (2011)

I mistakenly thought this Train hit was deep-fried garbage until I heard Swift's version and realized, "Hey, she's right – this is the best soy latte I've ever had!" Props to Tay for bringing out the hidden greatness in this song – the stargazing lyrics and her voice go together like Mozart and tae bo. (The astrophysicist in my life would like me to point out that you can't "make it to the Milky Way" because that's the galaxy we already live in. In fact, you couldn't leave the Milky Way if you tried. Science!)

Best line: "Tell me, did Venus blow your mind?"

190. "Question…?" (2022)

A very Taylor dilemma: "Does it feel like everything's just like second-best after that meteor strike?" She gives a hint about this meteor by opening the song with a sample from "Out of the Woods." Taylor cross-examines an ex with a slew of questions, although she wishes she didn't already know the answers. There's a great flashback to "Betty" in the chorus, when two lovers kiss in a crowded room, in front of all their stupid friends.

Best line: "It was one drink after another/Fucking politics and gender roles."

189. "Can't Stop Loving You" (2019)

When Taylor stopped into the BBC's Live Lounge, she had a surprise up her sleeve: This Eighties pop aficionado busted out a Phil Collins cover, against all odds. "Can't Stop Loving You" is a 1970s obscurity that Phil turned into a sleeper hit in 2002. As Taylor explained, "I remember driving around Nashville when I first had my driver's license just screaming the words to this song." It's perfect for her — for one thing, it's about crying in the back of a taxi. If Taylor wants to keep digging into the Phil catalog, maybe she'll cover "I Don't Care Anymore."

Best line: "Got your leaving smile."

188. "Electric Touch," With Fall Out Boy (2023)

This Fall Out Boy duet came out ten years—minus a week—after Patrick Stump joined her onstage in New Jersey, on the Red Tour, for "My Songs Know What You Did In The Dark." At first "Electric Touch" might sound like a horrific mismatch (what, Boys Like Girls were busy?) but it all explodes in the fantastic bridge, when they milk the giant proto-"Treacherous" hook, "It's 8:05 and I see two headliiiights. " The way she turns "lights" into a ten-second song in itself? That's our girl, kinda like the way she decides this first date is "forever" before he's even gotten out of the damn car.

Best line: "Your electric touch could fill this ghost town up with life."

187. "Bette Davis Eyes" (2010)

Her kickiest left-field cover, from Speak Now Live . "I'd love to play you some music that I'm a fan of that's come from L.A. – is that OK?" she asks the West Coast crowd, strumming her guitar. "This one came out in 1981 – eight years before I was born!" Virtually nobody seems to recognize it or sing along. Kim Carnes hit Number One with "Bette Davis Eyes," but it was written by the great Jackie DeShannon, the only songwriter to collaborate with both Randy Newman and Jimmy Page. (Page wrote "Tangerine" for DeShannon!) The fact that Swift loves this classic ode to romantic espionage explains a lot.

Best line: "She's pure as New York snow/She's got Bette Davis eyes."

186. "I Bet You Think About Me," With Chris Stapleton (2021)

This rowdy hell-raising saloon sing-along about a rich ex is a delightful honky-tonk jam — the kind of straight-up Nashville vibe she was about to leave behind. In the classic "Friends in Low Places" country tradition, she taunts him for his "organic shoes" and "cool indie music concerts." Which in 2012 meant he was into the National and Bon Iver.

Best line: "The girl in your bed has a fine pedigree/And I bet your friends tell you she's better than me."

185. 'I Can See You' (2023)

"I Can See You" is a Speak Now vault track, but it has Red Era written all over it, a seductive early-Eighties guitar bop in the mode of the Police or the Romantics. It's definitely not the first time she had feelings in a hallway, or the first time somebody passed her a note in secrecy, but it's seething with lust, wit, and jacket-on-the-floor bravado. You can hear why she held it back—it might have sounded a little jarring on the same album as "Enchanted." But what a kick to discover it now.

Best line: "You won't believe half the things I see inside my head / Wait till you see half the things that haven't happened yet."

184. 'How Did It End' (2024)

A miniature aside on Tortured Poets , but a gorgeous one. Taylor always loves a story about a sad girl who finds herself the center of attention, surrounded by friends and strangers hungry for all the juicy details of how her life collapsed. "Didn't you hear? They called it all off" is a worthy successor to "Did you ever heard about the girl who got frozen?" and "She would have made such a lovely bride, what a shame she's fucked in the head." Dessner's guitar puts on the chill, as do the witchy back-up harmonies.

Best line: "My beloved ghost and me / Sitting in a tree / D-Y-I-N-G."

183. "Forever Winter" (2021)

"Too young to know it gets better" is an empathetic hook from a songwriter just moving into her twenties. "Forever Winter" is a Red vault outtake where she's worried about a troubled friend, wishing she could protect them from their tribulations. It makes a companion to a very different 2021 tune: her Big Red Machine single "Renegade," another song about the mechanics of compassion.

Best line: "He spends most of his nights wishing it was how it used to be/He spends most of his flights getting pulled down by gravity."

182. "Would've, Could've, Should've" (2022)

Taylor revisits the memory of her teenage self, with an adult sense of compassion. "Would've, Could've, Should've" comes on like a powerful sequel to "Dear John," but when she sang about a similar story before, her tone was more straightforward anger and regret. This song is messier, more confused, more ambivalent, as she struggles to understand the brash, complex 19-year-old artist/superstar/mirrorball she used to be. As she reflects, "I would have stayed on my knees/And I damn sure never would've danced with the devil at 19/And the God's honest truth is that the pain was heaven."

Best line: "If I was some paint, did it splatter on a promising grown man?"

181. "Soon You'll Get Better," With the Chicks (2019)

A touching duet with the Dixie Chicks (their final song under their original name) for her countriest tune in years, about her mother's battle with cancer. It's definitely heavy to hear the teenager who sang "The Best Day" and "Never Grow Up," once so mortified her mom was dropping her off at the movies, now an adult driving her mom to the hospital.

Best line: "Holy orange bottles / Each night I pray to you."

180. "Timeless" (2023)

A Speak Now vault song inspired by her grandparents, combining a few of her favorite stories—old photos, old couples, teen love that grows through the decades. "A crowded street in 1944" makes this sound like a sequel to both "Marjorie" and "Epiphany," while putting "Mary's Song" and "You Are In Love" inside an even bigger snowglobe.

Best line: "I'd die for you in the same way if I first saw your face."

179. "You're Not Sorry" (2008)

A dramatic piano-and-strings ballad from Fearless, showing off how much her voice has deepened between her first two albums.

Best line: "It's taken me this long, baby, but I figured you out."

178. 'So High School' (2024)

This song clearly comes from Taylor doing Fearless songs every night on the Eras Tour and asking the crowd, "Are you ready to go back to high school with me?" She must have kept thinking, "Damn, these teen crush songs are getting it done. Why stop writing these?" Even Aristotle would play air guitar to this hook, hitting that power-pop jangle in the sweet spot between "Hits Different" and "Paper Rings." 

Best line: "I wanna find you in a crowd just to hide from you."

177. "Gold Rush" (2020)

"My mind turns your life into folklore" is a clever way to connect Evermore to Folklore , although "Gold Rush" might have sounded more at home on Lover . "Gold Rush" could be a different view of the same torpor as "Happiness" and "Tolerate It," trying to remember why this relationship once seemed worth the pain.

Best line: "My Eagles t-shirt hanging from the door."

176. "When Emma Falls In Love" (2023)

"She's the kind of book that you can't put down / Like if Cleopatra grew up in a small town"—now there's a quintessential Swift heroine. A gorgeous Speak Now vault ballad that shows how great she's always been at observing other girls. She envies the way everyone gazes at Emma, but she sees Emma clearer than anyone else does, wishing she could be her. In so many ways, she's singing about her future self. (Emma's not the only one who can make the bad guys good for a weekend.) "When Emma Falls In Love" has a strong "Drops of Jupiter" vibe, which makes sense since she did a groovy cover version on the Speak Now tour. All songs about women named "Emma" rule (it's the law) and so do all songs about Cleopatra, so this is a flawless combo.

Best line: "She's so New York when she's in L.A."

175. "Come In With the Rain" (2008)

She leaves her window open overnight, just in case her ex falls out of a cloud. There's a great "oooh" in the second chorus — one of those moments you can tell she's an Oasis fan. (This song makes you suspect "Don't Look Back In Anger" is a fave.) One of the Fearless -era tunes that gets a drastic glow-up on Taylor's Version — it sounds infinitely better when she gets to belt it in her adult voice.

Best line: "I could stand up and sing you a song/But I don't wanna have to go that far."

174. "King of My Heart" (2017)

Love how this American queen pronounces "Jag-yew-waaar" – has she been listening to Hall & Oates, or has she just reached the English-accent point in her fame arc?

Best line: "Up on the roof with a schoolgirl crush / Drinking beer out of plastic cups."

173. "Paper Rings" (2019)

"The moon was high like your friends were the night that we first met" is quite an opening line, and she lives up to it. Especially since those might be the same stupid friends who showed up later at Betty's party. "Paper Rings" is a girl-group tribute with a pop-punk surge — a song Joey Ramone should have lived long enough to sing. "I wake up in the night and watch you breathe" is a bone tossed to all of us who still fall apart at the bridge of "Last Kiss."

Best line: "I hate accidents, except when we went from friends to this."

172. "Afterglow" (2019)

An ode to making up after a fight that was all your fault: "Tell me that I'm all you want / Even when I break your heart." In a good old-fashioned Taylor metaphor party, she compares herself to an arsonist, a wrestler, an island, a prison warden and an ambulance siren.

Best line: "Fighting with a true love is boxing with no gloves."

171. "So It Goes…" (2017)

She falls under the hypnotic spell of a magician, who gets her heart trip-trip-tripping and skip-skip-skipping. For a magic trick of her own, she stops the music cold to whisper "one-two-three." A great moment that lets you know Swift — like the rest of us — has been listening to Lorde.

Best line: "I'm so chill but you make me jealous."

170. "The Lucky One" (2012)

She's so lucky, she's a star. For the record, T.S. did cover "Lucky" live once (and damn well, too), as a Britney tribute in Louisiana back in 2011. This song got the ultimate real-life twist years later: the Red (Taylor's Version) remake came out the same day Britney finally got free.

Best line: "Everybody loves pretty, everybody loves cool/So overnight you look like a Sixties queen."

169. "The Other Side of the Door" (2008)

Again with the slamming doors. Tay, Tay — even the great songwriters can get away with exactly one slamming door per career. And just to be on the safe side, she throws in pouring rain, photo albums, a little black dress (which rhymes with "mess" and "confess"), a guy throwing pebbles at her window… In other words, this would be the ultimate Swift song — except there are over a hundred better ones. But "The Other Side of the Door" gets a boost from the Taylor's Version remake — of all the Fearless tunes, this one improves most drastically on the original. Her mature voice tackles the melody in ways her teen voice couldn't, sprucing up a dud into a keeper. This is the biggest sonic upgrade in the Taylor's Version project. So far.

Best line: "Me and my stupid pride, sitting here alone/Going through the photographs, staring at the phone."

168. 'Fresh Out the Slammer' (2024)

One of the most understated and least hyperdramatic moments on Tortured Poets , so easy to overlook at first, but it's a sneakily durable gauze-rocker with heist-flick guitar twang. Taylor never can resist her Great Gatsby imagery, and she never should.

Best line: "To the house where you still wait up and that porch light gleams/To the one who says I'm the girl of his American dreams."

167. "All Of The Girls You Loved Before" (2023)

Taylor has wept in so many bathrooms, across so many songs, but there's something tres "New Romantics" about the way she sings, "Crying in the bathroom for some dude whose name I cannot remember now." This Lover outtake is the flip side of Ariana's "Thank U, Next": she's so grateful for this guy's ex-girlfriends, and all the women in his past, because they taught him how to treat her. Even his mom gets high praise—"your mother brought you up loyal and kind"—which is a first in her songbook.

Best line: "A heart is drawn around your name / In someone's handwriting, not mine."

166. "Dorothea" (2020)

Could this be a hidden sequel to the Romantic poetry fetish of "The Lakes"? Dorothy was Wordsworth's sister, muse and closest companion, just as Augusta was Lord Byron's sister. "Dorothea" is the flip side to "'Tis the Damn Season," sending a long-distance dedication to an old flame who moved on to a shinier life in Hollywood.

Best line: "The stars in your eyes shined brighter in Tupelo."

165. "…Ready for It?" (2017)

Baby, let the games begin. Her island-breeze bass blast was a major rebound from her previous hit, one week earlier. (If by "it" she meant "literally any song that's not 'Look What You Made Me Do,'" the answer was "extremely ready.") It stands up to heavy rotation, too, with clever details like the way Ms. I'm Not Much For Dancin' clears her throat before the first line. The chorus has a little air in the mix, giving the room she needs to pull off her intricate breathy effects; Max Martin really knows how to shape a production around her voice. "He can be my jailor / Burton to this Taylor" – Liz and Dick got married and divorced twice , so those are some hardcore relationship goals.

Best line: "I keep him forever like a vendetta."

164. "Everything Has Changed," With Ed Sheeran (2012)

She and Ed Sheeran wrote this duet together in her backyard while bouncing on a trampoline, because of course they did. Why is Ed such a great duet partner? Because you can hear that he's really listening to her.

Best line: "All I've seen since 18 hours ago is green eyes and freckles and your smile."

163. "Peace" (2020)

The most stripped-down confession on Folklore , just her solo voice and a few guarded hopes for the future. She tries to scale her dreams down to a graspable size, asking, "Would it be enough if I could never give you peace?"

Best line: "Our coming-of-age has come and gone.

162. "Death By a Thousand Cuts" (2019)

The saddest break-up song ever inspired by a movie where Gina Rodriguez plays a Rolling Stone music critic , in Jenn Kaytin Robinson's Oscar-worthy Netflix comedy, Someone Great . It really soars in the live acoustic version from her Paris concert special, especially the hyperventilating bridge. Good question: "If the story's over, why am I still writing pages?" Taylor, have you met yourself?

Best line: "I asked the traffic lights if it'll be all right / They say 'I don't know.'"

161. "Eyes Open" (2012)

Finally, her long-overdue metal move, from The Hunger Games: Songs from District 12 and Beyond.

Best line: "Every lesson forms a new scar."

160. "Starlight" (2012)

"Oh my, what a marvelous tune" sounds like a quaint chorus, yet she makes it stick, in an F. Scott Fitzgerald-themed whirlwind romance. This Red deep cut just sat there waiting for its moment to shine, until it blew up into her de facto sequel "The Last Great American Dynasty," with a nastier perspective on the same ritzy social scene. Nobody knows how to play the long game like Taylor.

Best line: "We snuck into a yacht-club party / Pretending to be a duchess and a prince."

159. 'I Look In People's Windows' (2024)

A wistful ballad on Tortured Poets , with understated production from Jack Antonoff and Patrik Berger, as she sings about spying on other people's lives from afar. Swift has revealed she's obsessed with the classic 1937 Old Hollywood film Stella Dallas , where Barbara Stanwyck has to stand on the sidewalk outside her estranged daughter's wedding, watching through the window. Taylor turned that image into the final shot of the "All Too Well" film—but here, she turns it into "I attend Christmas parties from outside."

Best line: "I'm addicted to the 'if only.'"

158. 'Suburban Legends' (2023)

"I broke my own heart because you were too polite to do it"—now there's a line that sums up a lot of chaotic Swiftian love stories. "Suburban Legends" is a witty yet regretful tune with more of her 1950s fantasies, with Taylor fantasizing about a happy ending to a long-gone high-school romance. Like other 1989 vault tracks, "Suburban Legends" sounds like it would have fit right into Midnights —so many invisible strings between those two albums, in terms of her songwriting. 

Best line: "You kiss me in a way that's gonna screw me up forever."

157. "Speak Now" (2010)

In real-life weddings, the preacher hardly ever invites the groom's ex up to interrupt the ceremony. But if you're a fan of Tay in stalker mode, this is priceless – crouching behind the curtains in the back of the church, waiting to pounce. "Horrified looks from everyone in the room" – you don't say.

Best line: "It seems I was uninvited by your lovely bride-to-be."

156. 'The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived' (2024)

The saltiest break-up song she's ever written—it makes "Dear John" sound like "Stay Beautiful." After a couple minutes of overly muted prologue, it really kicks into high gear, with an awesome nasty one-chord rock clang as she spits out her bad-cop interrogation.

Best line: "Were you sent by someone who wanted me dead? Did you sleep with a gun underneath our bed?"

155. "Long Story Short" (2020)

Taylor has never once in her life made a long story short, and who would want her to? This synth-pop bop adds a dash of Reputation energy to the stark autumnal vibe of Evermore . I love how if she could go back in time, she'd tell her younger self all the things she actually did  say a decade ago. "Your nemeses will defeat themselves before you get the chance to swing" is basically the same sentiment as "people throw rocks at things that shine."

Best line: "If the shoe fits, walk in it till your high heels break."

154. 'Father Figure' (2025)

In "Father Figure" she sticks approximately 13 shivs into Scott Borchetta, her former Big Machine label boss. He was the mentor who discovered her as a kid singing at Nashville's Bluebird Cafe, but then betrayed her. The song is full of Godfather -coded mobster imagery, like "I protect the family," "all I ask for is your loyalty," and most brazenly, "You'll be sleeping with the fishes." "Father Figure" sounds nothing at all like the George Michael song, except the title, which was enough to snag a cut of the royalties. (Not George's first writing credit on a Swift album—she crooned "Last Christmas" on her 2008 Holiday Collection .) 

Best line: "I'll be your father figure, I drink that brown liquor, I can make deals with the devil because my dick's bigger."

153. 'The Bolter' (2024)

Like so many of the peaks on Tortured Poets , "The Bolter" hits home with the story of a woman who doesn't quite fit into other people's lives, but isn't sure she wants to change that. "The Bolter" is a dangerous woman who makes sure she never gets pinned down, running at the first sign of trouble. It's a showcase for Swift's nimble vocals, hopping through the chorus until she slides into that massively surly hook, "All her fucking liiiiives flashed before her eyes." 

Best line: "Splendidly selfish, charmingly helpless, excellent fun till you get to know her."

152. "Tied Together With a Smile" (2006)

An unsung highlight of the debut – a teen pep talk about self-esteem.

Best line: "Seems the only one who doesn't see your beauty/Is the face in the mirror looking back at you."

151. 'Florida!!!' feat. Florence + the Machine

"Florida is one hell of a drug," indeed. A outlaw of love flees down south to escape her past, her memories, and her bad reputation, burying her secrets in the swamp, chanting "Fuck me up, Florida!" Florence Welch makes a surprisingly well-matched co-narrator. It's in the proud pantheon of hiding-out-in-Florida songs, alongside Bob Dylan's "Key West (Philosopher Pirate)," Steely Dan's "Doctor Wu," and Neil Young's "Fontainebleau." Welcome to Destin—everything is cheaper than it looks. 

Best line: "Is that a bad thing to say in a song?"

150. "Bejeweled" (2022)

"Bejeweled" is full of late-night disco jitters, as Taylor sings about the the fear of stepping out onto the floor and putting her heart on display, until she takes the plunge because it's scarier to think about * not * doing it. It sounds like this could be the neglected wife of "Tolerate It," finally breaking free. (She boasts, "I polish up real nice," as opposed to "I polish plates until they gleam and glisten.") It's got that "tears on the dance floor" vibe of "New Romantics," except "New Romantics" was sung by a "we," yet the singer of "Bejeweled" is feeling very alone indeed. 

Best line: "Sapphire tears on my face/Sadness became my whole sky/Some guy said my aura's moonstone just 'cause he was high."

149. "Forever & Always" (2008)

She added this to Fearless at the last minute – just what the album needed. It's a blast of high-energy JoBro-baiting aggro on her most anomalously shade-free album. "It rains in your bedroom" is a very on-brand Tay predicament.

Best line: "Did I say something way too honest? Made you run and hide like a scared little boy?"

148. "Better Man" (2021)

Taylor gave this one away to Little Big Town, who turned it into a massive 2016 country hit. "Better Man" came to loom large in her legend as a writer, so it was worth the wait to finally get her own proper version. "Better Man" hits even harder with Taylor wailing her tale of adult regret, confessing to the mirror, "The bravest thing I ever did was run."

Best line: "I gave to you my best/And we both know you can't say that."

147. 'My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys' (2024)

Joni Mitchell once summed up her view of men falling out of love with their idealized dream women: " 'My toy is broken!' And that's basically the mentality of all the men of my generation that I met, just narcissistic, fair-weather types." "My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys" looks at the same syndrome, with a woman in the hands of a lover who sees her only as a disposable doll. As Swift said, it's about "being somebody's favorite toy, until they break you, and then don't want to play with you anymore." 

Best line: "Pull the string and I'll tell you that he runs because he loves me."

146. "Shake It Off" (2014)

A clever transitional single – great verses, grabby chorus, pithy lyrics with a shout-out to her obvious inspiration, Robyn's "Dancing on My Own." As a lead single, "Shake It Off" might have seemed meager after 1989 came out – she was holding back "Blank Space" and "Style" and (Lord have mercy) "New Romantics" for this? But "Shake It Off" got the job done, serving as a trailer to announce her daring Eighties synth-pop makeover.

Best line: "It's like I got this music in my mind, saying it's gonna be all right."

145. "Bye Bye Baby" (2020)

One of the top-notch Fearless (Taylor's Version) vault tracks. Like so many of her songs from this era, it has a giant Oasis-style hook: "You took me home, but you just couldn't keep me." Plus a bonus one in the bridge when she sings, "I'm so scaaared of how this ends!" What does it mean that the best Oasis songs of the past 20 years are Taylor songs?

Best line: "You're all I want, but it's not enough."

144. "Today Was a Fairytale" (2011)

Don't let the title scare you away – it's a plainspoken and genuinely touching play-by-play recap of a worthwhile date. In fact, "Today Was a Fairytale" and "If This Was a Movie" should trade titles, since this one feels realer and would make a better movie. It could rank higher, except she hugely improved it when she rewrote it as "Begin Again." (Docked a couple notches for coming from the soundtrack of Valentine's Day , which is the most dog-vomit flick Jessica Alba has ever made, and I say that as someone who paid money to see The Love Guru .)

Best line: "I wore a dress/You wore a dark gray T-shirt."

143. "High Infidelity" (2022)

A highlight of the Midnights 3 A.M. Edition. "High Infidelity" goes deep into the perils of musicians dating musicians, from "Put on your records and regret me" to "Put on your headphones and burn my city." Taylor uses audio distortion as a metaphor for a bad romantic connection, a la Elvis Costello's "High Fidelity," though Midnights collaborator Zoë Kravitz also starred in the reboot of the classic High Fidelity . As for the question of what she was doing on April 29, 2016…listening to Lemonade and crying over Prince, like the rest of us? 

Best line: "There's many different ways that you can kill the one you love/The slowest way is never loving them enough."

142. 'So Long, London' (2024)

Five years after "London Boy," the Tennessee Stella McCartney goes home, a Daisy Miller who makes it out of her English affair alive to tell the tale. The craftiest production on Tortured Poets , with a synth-pop pulse that adds a discreet percussive boost.

Best line: "I founded the club she's heard great things about."

141. "Back to December" (2010)

One of the rare ballads where she goes crawling back to an ex she treated like dirt – and she's surprisingly effective in the role. Although breaking into the guy's house is a little extreme. (If she's blocked by the chain on his door, that means she already picked the lock, right?) And sorry, but you're seriously dreaming if you think I'm bothering to Google the name of that Twilight guy, don't @ me.

Best line: "It turns out freedom ain't nothing but missing you."

140. "I Almost Do" (2012)

We're already at the zone on this list where every song seems like it should be ranked even higher, except it's just so crowded at the top. For almost any other artist, "I Almost Do" would have been a career peak. A Red slow jam that could have worked even better sped up into a punked-out rocker — though it's plenty affecting as is.

Best line: "Every time I don't, I almost do."

139. "Welcome to New York" (2014)

People sure do love to complain about this song – in fact, the most authentically New York thing about it is how it sends people into spasms of mouth-foaming outrage. An explicitly queer-positive disco ode to arrivistes stepping out in the city that invented disco – "You can want who you want, boys and boys and girls and girls" – that will be bugging the crap out of you in rom-coms for years to come. (It made me throw a napkin at my in-flight screen during How to Be Single , when Dakota Johnson's cab is going the wrong way on the Brooklyn Bridge – and I love this song.) Bumped up a few bonus notches for pissing everyone off, since that's one of this girl's superpowers.

Best line: "Searching for a sound we haven't heard before/And it said welcome to New York."

138. "We Were Happy" (2021)

This Fearless outtake would have made quite a highlight on the album. How did she let this one get away? Was it just too damn sad, even by *her* standards? To think of all the years we missed out on being traumatized by "You threw your arms around my neck/Back when I deserved it." "We Were Happy" has both Liz Rose * and * Aaron Dessner in the credits, making this the perfect storm of Taylor weepers.

Best line: "Oh, I hate those voices telling me I'm not in love any more."

137. 'Peter' (2024)

Swift returns to the story of Peter Pan and Wendy, the girl who kept waiting for him to grow up. This couple already appeared in "Cardigan" on Folklore , where Taylor sings, "Trying to change the ending, Peter losing Wendy." But in this song, Wendy's not trying to change him at all—she's just moving on, the lost girl ready to find herself.

Best line: "You said you'd come and get me, but you were 25/The shelf life of those fantasies has expired / Lost to the 'Lost Boys' chapter of your life."

136. "London Boy" (2019)

Nice one, London! You have inspired a Taylor Travelogue even more over-the-top than "Welcome to New York," with visits to Camden Market, SoHo, Highgate, and everyone's favorite tourist destination, Hackney. As the English are so fond of saying, she over-eggs the pudding, and no wonder some skeptics got their knickers in a twist, but her Britpop tribute evokes the louche music-hall parodies of London bands from Madness to Blur. (She was clearly bumping Parklife .) The best part of this song is its wide-eyed enthusiasm, the least London of emotions. We need more of these, please — maybe she'll do "Marseille, Je T'Aime" or "Arigato Kyoto."

Best line: "Stick with me, I'm your queen / Like a Tennessee Stella McCartney on the Heath.

135. "Mr. Perfectly Fine" (2021)

The opening act of Mr. Casually Cruel, a guy Taylor has kept meeting in her songs ever since. How did she possibly leave a song this strong off Fearless ? Because she clearly figured that she needed to save "casually cruel" for an even better song a few years down the road. (One Mr. Casually Cruel wears "a well-pressed suit," the other wears plaid shirts.) Poor Joe Jonas—now all her exes know that when Taylor sends their babies presents, it means there's a song on the way. "Mr. Perfectly Fine" was the song that truly proved her Taylor's Version project was for real—the outtakes from her vault weren't leftovers or juvenalia, but bona fide Swift songs. Never be so casual you forget to be cruel; never be so cruel you forget to be casual.

Best line: "Sashay away to your seat/It's the best seat in the best room."

134. "Hey Stephen" (2008)

Loaded with classic girl-group flourishes, right from the opening "Be My Baby" dru...