My favourite end-of-year list to compile changes every given year, but 2025 certainly feels like an exceptional year for music videos. I’ve adored revisiting so many different unique, inventive and entertaining visuals, many of which still feel fresh and exciting many months down the line. I truly think this is our strongest crop of videos to date, many of which could well have been worthy winners in their own right had the timing been a little different. So before we dive into the best music of the past year, let’s first feast our eyes on 2025’s most arresting visuals.

10. Moron Police – King Among Kittens

Easily the music video that I’ve shared the most this past year. It feels like a relic of the bygone era of the internet that I grew up with. So ridiculous that it comes right back around to become sheer brilliance. The visuals are delightfully zany, with the random “did you know?” facts being a fun mix of playful nonsense and genuine home truths. I defy anyone to watch this without a smile on their face.

9. Patricia Atzur – Freddy Krooner

It’s a surprisingly difficult task to nail the right vibe, in order to pay proper homage to Twin Peaks. Finding the perfect balance between the familiar and the mysterious. Being simple, striking and stylish, while also building up layer upon layer of the unsettling and uncanny. This gorgeous and trippy video punches well above its budget, proving that the most important part of making a great video is having a clear artistic vision in mind.  

8. Black Country, New Road – Happy Birthday

No “best videos” list would be complete without at least one appearance from stop motion animation. I just adore how intricate and tactile it is as a medium, so much heart, charm and intention behind every single frame, and for my money this year’s finest example came from BCNR. This dark little fairy tale manages to be both cute and creepy in equal measure. A little homemade folk horror.

7. Amelia Coburn – Something Wild

Speaking of twisted fairy tales, the glorious gothic folk of ‘Something Wild‘ is paired beautifully with a video that flips the script on the classic story of Red Riding Hood. Not some scared, lost child walking unknowingly into danger, but someone confident, cunning and fully in command. Amelia cuts a striking figure, striding through the woods adorned in deepest crimson, eyes full of presence and purpose.

6. Griff – Last Night’s Mascara

Great choreography has become a given for Griff videos at this point. That girl is pure poetry in motion, the gold standard pop star dancer. There’s something so satisfying about that gracefulness being used to deface this pristine white room with inky black ichor. Then, just when you think the video has thrown everything it’s got at you, we’re treated to those stunning shots of golden light streaming in through the window. Captivating from start to finish.

5. Chloe Slater – Harriet

Weaponizing her status as Daisy Edgar-Jones’ doppelganger, the video for ‘Harriet’ sees Chloe Slater recreating iconic scenes from the hit series Normal People. Frankly, whoever was in charge of production design for this shoot deserves a bloody medal. Such incredible attention to detail. The video so perfectly replicates the locations, sets and outfits from Normal People, that for the longest time I thought the music video was spliced together with actual clips from the show. 

4. Luvcat – Lipstick

The hardest part of this list was narrowing down to just one Luvcat video. Between the tantalising tango of ‘Vicious Delicious‘, the torrid whirlwind romance of ‘Love & Money‘, and the captivating cabaret of ‘Bad Books‘, she’s left us spoilt for choice this past year. However, the top spot surely has to go to ‘Lipstick’, for its sultry reimagining of the classic ‘Doll on a Music Box’ scene from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

3. Durry – This Movie Sucks

It feels criminal giving this the bronze medal given how much I adore it, but that just shows how good this year’s videos have been! ‘This Movie Sucks‘ sees Durry recreating a bunch of iconic scenes from classic blockbusters – in scrappy, low budget, Be Kind Rewind fashion – from Jurassic Park and Terminator 2, to Kill Bill and The Matrix. The duo clearly had a blast bringing this to life, and the video’s light-hearted, DIY spirit just captures the band’s essence to a tee.

2. Sabrina Carpenter – Manchild

This video has no right to be as good as it is. ‘Manchild’ has better lighting, blocking and colour grading than 90% of Hollywood movies in the past two decades. There are so many cool stunts, quirky visuals, and beautiful vignettes packed into this video, which are given mere seconds of screen time, that it feels borderline wasteful. It feels like I’m watching a trailer for the greatest movie that never existed. It’s so good, that I’m genuinely angry there isn’t more of it. Someone give Sabrina and her team the funding to make a full movie, please.  

1. OK Go – Love

Sabrina was so close to being a back-to-back best video winner, but when it comes to music videos, OK Go are in a league all their own. In typical OK Go fashion, ‘Love‘ sees the band take an interesting concept and push it to the utmost, mind-boggling extremes. I’m simply blown away by the incredible creativity and patience needed to even conceive of this mechanised hall of mirrors, let alone pull off such a logistical nightmare in a single unbroken take. Their seemingly boundless ingenuity is always such a joy and delight to behold.