Billboard tropical charts

The Billboard tropical charts began in 1985 when an album chart were introduced as Tropical Albums in the June 29 issue of the magazine. In October 1994, Billboard then established Tropical Airplay, which initially rank the most-played songs played on tropical radio stations before switching to an audience-based methodology in January 2017. As the music and radio industries, as well as the technology to monitor and measure sales and airplay, have evolved, Billboard currently publishes three different tropical charts. On April 8, 2025, Billboard debuted the Hot Tropical Songs chart, which ranks the best-performing tropical songs across streaming, digital, and airplay from all radio stations in the United States.

According to Billboard, tropical music refers to music originating from the Spanish-speaking areas of the Caribbean, namely salsa, merengue, bachata, cumbia, and vallenato.