I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)

Momentum

This song has not appeared on a Rotation chart, so it has no score and no receipts. The rank history below is the ledger; a score is only published once the momentum run puts it on a chart.

Why it's here

The song was written by George Merrill and Shannon Rubicam and produced by Narada Michael Walden, who reworked their rock-tinged demo into a funk-and-horn-laden arrangement aimed at broadening Houston's pop and R&B appeal after her ballad-driven debut. [1] It won Houston the 1988 Grammy Award for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance and an American Music Award, while Walden won the 1988 Grammy for Producer of the Year, Non-Classical. [2] It became her fourth consecutive number-one on the Billboard Hot 100 and topped the charts in 17 countries, while being certified 9x platinum by the RIAA and standing as the best-selling single by a female artist in the 1980s. [3]

In culture

Every place this record has lived. A solid chip states a fact and carries the citation that earns it; a dashed one is a connection somebody drew, and carries their name instead.

• Sampled by Aquarius, Aquaticsource
• Covered Ashley Tisdalesource
• Covered Cassey Doreensource
• Covered Constelaciónsource
• Covered Fatma Said, Tim Allhoffsource
• Written by George Merrillsource
• Covered Glee Castsource
• Covered Marius de Vriessource
• Covered Mini Pop Kidssource
• Sampled by Secret Service vs. Workidz, Somebody’s Dancesource
• Written by Shannon Rubicamsource
• Sampled by Super Mash Bros., “Yo dawg, I heard you like music so I put songs in this song so you can listen to music while you listen to music.” -Xzibitsource
• Covered Ten Masked Mensource
• Covered The Chipmunkssource
• Covered The Replicatorssource
• Covered The Shadowssource
• Remixed by Whitney Houston, I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)source
• Covered Young Divassource

Across markets · earliest pickup first

Every date here is the date the source chart covers, never the date we fetched it. Sources publish on different lags: the Spotify mirror runs about two days behind, TurnTable publishes weekly.

1. MarketFirst seenLatestDaysPeakRank path
2. United Kingdomgb · applemusic deezer spotify2026-07-182026-10-25#5146#51
   #51
3. United Statesus · deezer shazam · 9 cities2026-07-202026-10-29#3788#12
   #37
4. Australiaau · shazam spotify · 1 city2026-07-202026-10-29#7744#28
   #77
5. Papua New Guineapg · applemusic2026-07-232026-08-30#954#48
   #95
6. New Zealandnz · shazam spotify2026-07-232026-09-19#19318#128
   #193
7. Philippinesph · deezer2026-07-262026-08-24#382#38
   #38
8. Venezuelave · deezer2026-07-272026-07-27#781#78
   —
9. Costa Ricacr · deezer2026-07-302026-09-15#913#63
   #91
10. Show all 35 markets

Worldwide feeds · not markets

A source's own worldwide chart. These are feeds, not places, so they are kept out of the market count above.

1. MarketFirst seenLatestDaysPeakRank path
2. World feedworld · shazam2026-08-072026-09-18#19914#160
   #199

City pickups

City charts record their parent country as the market, so these do not add to the market count above. One line per country: how many of its rooms picked the song up, and the best of them.

1. us 9 cities · best #12 houston
2. se 2 cities · best #31 goteborg
3. au 1 city · best #28 brisbane

Listen

• Spotify ↗
• Deezer ↗

Editions

No published edition carries this song yet. Every edition it appears in will be listed here and stay listed: an edition is immutable, so a citation to one never rots.