The Top 25 Best Original Song Winners So Far (Updated for 2024)

We’re on to the newest list of the lot! Continuing a tradition I’ve been keen on for years, I’m ranking the new crop of Academy Award winners. For nearly all of the Oscar categories, you’ll see me list the top 25 recipients of that prize. Sometimes, our newest winner will appear. Other times, they’ll be relegated to the Honorable Mention category. Who knows, maybe one or two won’t even make the cut? It’s a list series that I’ll do each and every single year, in the weeks after the ceremony concludes. So, while this is a fun way to think about the Oscars in the aftermath of the latest telecast, it’s also a beginning for another column here on the site. Of course, definitely show us your own lists as well, in the comments section below. We’re definitely keen to know what you think!

Today, Best Original Song is the category that’s in the barrel. For my money, the winners here are some of the best, pound for pound, of any category. Now, the nominees themselves these days don’t stack up to where we once were at, but still…the victors are beyond reproach. Just look at one of our most recent winners in No Time to Die‘s song of the same name by Billie Eilish. It’s certainly good, but as it as good as the best Bond titles? No. And where does it even rank on this updated list?. You’ll see where it fell below this time in a moment. This is the category, after all, where people Lady Gaga and Bruce Springsteen can take home Oscars, so you do get some classics. My selections for the best of the Academy Award bunch below, in my humble opinion, are out and out classics. It’s no secret I loved Barbie, so how highly does What Was I Made For? place here? Where does Naatu Naatu from RRR stack up from the year prior? Find out now…

Here now are what I consider to be the 25 best winners of the Best Original Song Oscar, to date:

25. Naatu Naatu (RRR)
24. Up Where We Belong (An Officer and a Gentleman)
23. You’ll Be in My Heart (Tarzan)
22. City of Stars (La La Land)
21. Colors of the Wind (Pocahontas)
20. Take My Breath Away (Top Gun)
19. The Way We Were (The Way We Were)
18. Remember Me (Coco)
17. (I’ve Had) The Time of My Life (Dirty Dancing)
16. When You Wish Upon a Star (Pinocchio)
15. Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid)
14. Theme from Shaft (Shaft)
13. My Heart Will Go On (Titanic)
12. Under the Sea (The Little Mermaid)
11. Skyfall (Skyfall)
10. Let it Go (Frozen)
9. The Weary Kind (Crazy Heart)
8. What Was I Made For? (Barbie)
7. A Whole New World (Aladdin)
6. Over the Rainbow (The Wizard of Oz)
5. Can You Feel the Love Tonight (The Lion King)
4. Streets of Philadelphia (Philadelphia)
3. Beauty and the Beast (Beauty and the Beast)
2. Falling Slowly (Once)
1. Shallow (A Star Is Born)

Honorable Mention: I’m Gonna Love Me Again (Rocketman), Jai Ho (Slumdog Millionaire), Man or Muppet (The Muppets), Moon River (Breakfast at Tiffany’s), No Time to Die (No Time to Die), and Talk to the Animals (Dr. Doolittle)

Stay tuned for another list early next week!