Megan Thee Stallion’s latest single “Lover Girl” is getting plenty of love—enough to end a historic absence of anything from the genre on the top 40. According to Billboard, no rap songs appeared in the Hot 100’s top 40 tracks—a standard metric that indicates the most popular songs in a given week—on the charts dated October 25 and November 1. It was the first time since February 3, 1990 that a single hip hop song had failed to crack the top 40 for two consecutive weeks.
The genre’s notable, albeit short-lived, drought came to an end when “Lover Girl” debuted at No. 38 on the Hot 100 dated November 8. The 90s-tinged lyrical love letter is also the first rap song to reach the top 40 since Kendrick Lamar and SZA’s “Luther” spent its 44th week on the chart dated October 18.
“Lover Girl” boasts 8.5 million official U.S. streams, 1.5 million in radio airplay, and 5,000 sales. Billboard predicts that it’ll likely slip out of the top 40 on the next Hot 100, based on the falling performance of next two highest-charting rap songs on the Hot 100: YoungBoy Never Broke Again’s “Shot Callin” (43-48) and BigXthaPlug’s Ella Langley-featuring “Hell at Night” (50-52).
Megan Thee Stallion’s highest-charting singles all reached No. 1 the Beyoncé-featuring “Savage” and the Cardi B-led “WAP” in 2020, and her unaccompanied “Hiss,” the second single from 2024’s Megan, her third and most recent studio album. Outside of the booth, Meg has stayed busy on the festival circuit, headlining Lollapalooza in 2024 and Summerfest in 2025. At Coachella 2025, her star-studded set went viral thanks to special guest appearances from Queen Latifah, Ciara, Victoria Monét, and Courtney LaPlante of metal band Spiritbox.
