The Official Charts Company have today announced a new official top 20 Trending Chart.

The new song chart is devised by Official Charts in consultation with record labels and is based on the first four sales days of each chart week (Friday to Monday) and will rank the songs that are showing a week-on-week growth on the official Top 100 singles Chart.

The Official Trending Chart has been created to highlight hit tracks in the early stages of their growth, the new chart comes as some record labels now release music for consumers to download and or stream on the same day as they are released to media including TV and radio.

The change to the the way many labels are now releasing music means songs are increasingly initially charting lower down the chart before climbing over the course of the next few weeks.

Before this change songs were usually promoted and played on radio weeks and sometimes even months before their release date, meaning the single would often enter the charts higher up before trickling down the charts.

But there is now a shift in the way music is being released to the public, with the number of singles debuting at Number 1 in the second half of 2015 dropping to just 7, compared to the average of 14 for the same period across the last five years.

The Official Trending Chart will be published on the Official Charts Company website from the 16th February.

You can find out more info about the new Trending Chart by visiting the Official Charts website.

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