Beauty and a Beat

On May 4, 2012, Justin Bieber stepped into the studio to record a song he didn't write. That track, "Beauty and a Beat," became the only non-co-write on his third album Believe. Built by Max Martin and Zedd using digital production techniques like sidechain compression, the beat pulses with a club-ready energy. Nicki Minaj drops a guest verse that lifts the track further. The lyrics, co-written by Savan Kotecha in his Stockholm apartment after a call from Martin, promise to party "like it's 3012."

Released as the album's third single on October 24, 2012, the song debuted at No. 72 on the Billboard Hot 100. After its GoPro-shot music video arrived, it climbed to a peak of No. 5 in January 2013. The video, filmed with a casual home-movie feel, now has over 1.3 billion views on YouTube. The song earned an 8x Platinum certification from the RIAA and went multi-platinum in several other countries.

Nearly fourteen years later, the track roared back. In April 2026, after Bieber sang along to his early hits during a Coachella set, "Beauty and a Beat" hit No. 1 on the Global Spotify chart with over 8.5 million daily streams. It re-entered the Billboard Hot 100 at No. 26 and topped both the Global 200 and Global Excl. U.S. charts. The resurgence proved the song's lasting pull as a staple of early 2010s dance-pop. [edit]