Are you ready for this? Jess Glynne's "Hold My Hand" has been crowned the UK's TikTok Song of the Year, thanks to the viral "nothing beats a Jet2holiday" trend. The 2015 hit has long been associated with holiday company ads, but it found new life when TikTok users used the audio to poke fun at their travel mishaps and chaos.
After claiming the title of TikTok's UK and global Song of the Summer earlier this year, the track has now soundtracked approximately 6.6 million videos on the platform, according to TikTok. The British singer originally released the song over a decade ago and it became her first single to top the charts. It has been an "insane" journey for the 36-year-old from London, who told BBC Newsbeat she "feels blessed" to secure the TikTok title this year.
"It's the most amazing feeling knowing that 10 years later, a song that means so much to me and was such an important part of my journey into music and earning my stripes as a solo artist - to be able to celebrate again and again throughout this year - has been insane," she said. Jess revealed that the trend has given the song a "new lease of life," and the "joy" she gets from performing it has made it one of her favorites.
The pop star shared a hilarious anecdote about listening to herself over the plane's PA system during a Jet2 holiday to the Greek island of Corfu with her family. "I was a bit nervous, I was sat right at the front next to my mum - it was quite funny actually," she recalled. Despite being part of the internet meme that dominated everyone's TikTok feed this summer, Jess's personal favorites look a little different. While scrolling through the app, she typically stops on cooking videos, cat compilations, and moments when people fall down. However, her all-time favorite Jet2 Holiday video featured a man getting a surprise in his hotel room. "He went to open the curtain and the window was like really tiny - it was like a prison cell," she said with a chuckle.
The popularity of the trend has shown Jess how important social media can be for artists, and now she sees it as an "amazing way to engage with people." "Seeing the way the song has reconnected with the younger generation and they've all heard it for the first time - it's just a really amazing thing to see," she added.
Jess rose to fame in 2014 following her feature on Clean Bandit's hit "Rather Be," followed by her collaboration with Route 94 on "My Love," both reaching the top spot in the UK charts. She released her debut album, "I Cry When I Laugh," in 2015 which also went to number one. Her follow-up, "Always In Between," also topped the charts in 2018, and she released her third self-titled album last year, which peaked at number six. Despite feeling inescapable this year, "Hold My Hand" didn't re-enter the UK singles charts in 2025.
TikTok works out its Artist of the Year rankings using a formula based on the number of videos that use their music and the popularity of the act's own posts. Posts using "Hold My Hand" audio have been viewed more than 80 billion times on the social media platform, and it secured the second spot on TikTok's top 20 global songs of 2025. But it is not the only older song that the platform has reintroduced this year through trends. Users rediscovered classic hits like Rihanna's "Breakin' Dishes" (2007), Radiohead's "Let Down" (1997), and The Black Eyed Peas' "Rock That Body" (2010). However, Connie Francis' "Pretty Little Baby" beat them all to claim TikTok's global song of the year, six decades after its release in 1962. The song was used more than 28 million times and often soundtracked wholesome videos of pets, families, and relationships.
