As of 25 August 2025, gqom’s thunderous “taxi kick” has never sounded more global. This list ranks the 20 artists pushing the sound the hardest in 2025 — not just in Durban and Cape Town, but across London warehouses, EU club circuits, and diaspora street festivals. Our criteria privilege impact you can measure and feel: international bookings and bill position (headliner versus undercard), the pace and quality of 2025 releases, YouTube traction on official audios and live sets, radio and mix-show rotation, playlist support, and how often a producer’s drops become the IDs other DJs chase. We also weighed scene leadership: signature drum design, whistle/tom language, chant-ready hooks, and the ability to bend gqom toward adjacent lanes (3-step, afro-tech, amapiano) without losing its spine.
Expect veterans who still define the template, breakout DJs whose 2025 mixes became weekend canon, and collaboration architects linking Durban energy to global dance floors. While South Africa remains the movement’s heart, this ranking treats gqom as an international conversation: what makes it onto peak-hour sets in Berlin or Brooklyn matters alongside township street anthems and local radio heat. Above all, it’s a snapshot of momentum — who shaped crowds, timelines, and tracklists in 2025 to date. Use it to dig into official videos, book smarter for your next lineup, or simply find the mixes that will carry your weekend. Turn it up loud; gqom is built for big rooms and bigger lungs.
1. DJ Lag – South Africa
DJ Lag sits at #1 because in 2025 he’s been the clearest global standard-bearer for gqom’s futurist edge and festival heft. His spring 2025 world routing showed sustained demand across Europe and North America (club headliners plus key tastemaker radio/streaming appearances), while management Black Major billed an EU/US/world tour run for 2025 that kept him on premium stages and in prime time slots. On YouTube, his April 2025 long-form set “Gqom Live Mix — DJ LAG” (published April 2025) has clocked strong view-through from fans looking for the latest Durban pulse. On Spotify he sat around 625–630K monthly listeners in August 2025 — unusually high for a niche club genre artist — with spikes whenever new edits or live clips circulated on socials. The setlist captured why he leads: locomotive “taxi kick” drum programming, hypnotic negative-space riffs, and Swahili/Zulu vocal chops folded into industrial synth swells. 2025 radio and playlisting were solid, with mix-show spins on BBC 1Xtra and Apple Music 1‐adjacent shows, and continued support across specialist playlists that foreground high-tempo African club. Add in steady Shazam momentum in London and Amsterdam around his marquee weekenders, plus viral TikTok rip-ups of drops from the April set, and you have the most internationally booked, most consistently influential gqom artist of the year — and the one other producers still pattern their kick design against.
2. Dlala Thukzin – South Africa
At #2, Dlala Thukzin is gqom’s crossover engine in 2025. Even while straddling 3-step/afro-tech, his drum grammar and shouted Zulu call-and-response remain gqom-led — and the year’s output proved it. “Welcome 2 Durban” with Goldmax (official audio, published May 2025) pulsed through clubs and taxis alike, raking in six-figure YouTube views within weeks and becoming a set-opening weapon for DJs across South Africa. On Spotify he hovered near the 1.9M monthly listeners mark in August 2025, outsizing the scene and lifting collaborators into new territories. Festival-wise, Thukzin’s 2025 calendar packed headline South African dates and export club hits in London and Amsterdam, where Shazam spikes aligned to weekend appearances. Programming-wise, the drums are unmistakably Durban: swung toms, clipped whistles, nagging lead stabs, and elastic bass that lets the toplines breathe — the very toolkit other producers copied on underground 2025 singles. Editorially, the “Welcome 2 Durban” cuts landed in a wave of DJ-driven gqom/3-step playlists this year, and radio mix shows from Clouds FM to Trace Urban Africa cycled the record as a high-energy reset. Add robust TikTok challenge usage on snippets of the drop (tens of thousands of creations by mid-August) and reliable ticket sell-through for his regional tours, and Thukzin is this year’s movement-builder — the most streamed, most clubbed-out gqom-led act not named DJ Lag.
3. We Dem Boyz – South Africa
We Dem Boyz surge to #3 on the back of relentless 2025 releases and road energy. Their Gqom Appreciation “Asinalanga Lonke” 2025 episode (published early 2025) became a reference point for the Cape-to-Durban sound, and the duo pushed multiple new singles (“Batman,” “Holy Ghost,” “Gqom lama 2k”) while featuring across peers’ projects. On Spotify they sat around 100K+ monthly listeners in August 2025, buoyed by new EP/album drops (including *NGOB IDOMBOLO* and *VEL’UYISKEBHE*) and steady day-to-day discovery via fan mixes. Their drum approach is textbook heavy-taxi kick with modernized synth brass and football-chant hooks — the kind of motifs that travel at festivals. 2025 saw the pair seeded across South African radio mix-shows and regional club rotations (Durban, Joburg, Cape Town), while on YouTube the duo’s official audios and collab clips tallied six-figure aggregate views with peaks around weekend posting. “Vala” (with Dankie Boi & Black Jnr; mid-2025) also drew measurable Shazam lifts in Durban and Pietermaritzburg. Importantly, they’re cross-scene conduits, jumping onto collabs with Campmasters, Dj Pepe x KwaH and Goldmax to keep the ecosystem bubbling. With new-music consistency, performance content that travels, and anthemic hooks leaning into isiZulu slang, We Dem Boyz turned 2025 into their most globally visible year yet.
4. Campmasters – South Africa
The duo claim #4 after a marquee 2025 single cycle that punched far beyond Durban. “Vathela” with We Dem Boyz (official video, published February 2025) sped past the million-view mark on YouTube in half a year and landed in countless DJ playlists as the year’s straight-up gqom banger. On Spotify they sat just under 190K monthly listeners in August 2025, a healthy position for an act focused on dance-floor utility over pop crossovers. Bookings stretched nationally with festival main-support slots and select diaspora shows where South African expat communities are strong (London, Birmingham, Amsterdam), and radio mix-show love from Trace, 1Xtra guest mixes and regional SA stations kept the record hot. Sonically, “Vathela” is all about tightly gated kicks and a zig-zag synth riff that channels taxi-rank energy without losing headroom. On TikTok and Reels, choreo clips around the hook drew thousands of creations by July, reinforcing ground-level demand. The Campmasters’ broader influence is structural: their sound design (short-decay kicks, clicky percs, airhorn phrasing) shows up in a wave of 2025 underground releases, and their collaborations continue to platform rising names. With a genuine YouTube hit this year, streaming momentum, and festival-tested arrangements, they’re one of 2025’s most impactful gqom exports.
5. Mr Thela – South Africa
Mr Thela ranks #5 — Cape Town’s gqom powerhouse refined for 2025. His single “The Influencer” (2025) kept the “Ekapa” line alive with a more muscular mid-bass and whip-crack snares, while features like “Lay Low” and remixes maintained his streaming footprint. Spotify monthly listeners hovered around 160K–190K during August 2025 across different trackers, with spikes surrounding early-year drops and a mid-year playlist push on regional dance lists. Though Cape Town gqom emphasizes gospel/choral touches, Thela’s 2025 palette leans harder into club-first minimalism — pounding kick stacks, brisk clap doubles, and pitched-down choral stabs that feel ceremonial on big rigs. On YouTube, “The Influencer (2025)” circulated through specialist channels and DJ set rips, adding five-figure cumulative views by late August. He remains a fixture on weekend mixes and appears in “Best Gqom” 2025 compilations that trend on Fridays, a proxy for club resonance. Shazam action in Cape Town and Gqeberha around release weekends hints at broad street pickup. Combine those signals with reliable ticket draws in the Western Cape, strong collab gravity (Rhass, Mapressa), and sustained Apple Music visibility on local genre pages, and Mr Thela’s 2025 shows a veteran levelling up rather than coasting.
6. Omagoqa – South Africa
Omagoqa take #6 thanks to a jet-propelled spring and summer that pushed the trio’s hyper-percussive gqom well beyond South Africa. Their *Kiosk Radio* session from Brussels (published April 10, 2025) racked up strong organic views among EU club heads and was widely shared by tastemaker pages; coupled with a May 2025 *GQOM LIVE MIX* appearance, the run cemented them as this year’s most export-ready live/DJ act from Durban’s new school. On Spotify they sat just under 10K monthly listeners in August 2025 — modest topline, but the depth of scene influence is outsized: their tom voicings, whistle hits and pedal-to-the-floor build design appear across younger producers’ 2025 uploads. Festival bookings included under-card but tightly packed EU club rooms (Berlin, Brussels, Amsterdam), with audience clips showing air-horn chaos and circle dances that fuel subsequent Shazam spikes in those cities. Editorially, the trio’s tracks and edits found their way into niche Apple Music and Spotify African club lists, and the Kiosk performance earned blog pickup in EU underground outlets. By mid-year, TikTok snippets of the session’s heaviest sections spawned hundreds of creator cuts across SA and Benelux — rare underground traction that matters for future routing. Omagoqa’s 2025 is what gqom globalisation looks like from the engine room.
7. General C’Mamane – South Africa
General C’Mamane jumps to #7 on a wave of live momentum. His *GQOM LIVE MIX E01* with TrenchArt (published March 2025) became a scene moment, drawing well over six figures in combined views across reposts by mid-year and spawning multiple ID hunts in the comments — a reliable sign that DJs and dancers alike were locked in. The formula is core Durban: clipped kicks, kilimanjaro-high whistles, chanting hooks, break-neck snare rushes — but 2025 arrangements stretch out with dramatic mid-set breakdowns tailored for big rooms. The set ran hot across radio and web shows, showing up in March/April round-ups and weekend “Friday gqom” upload stacks. While Spotify monthly listeners remain boutique compared to crossover names, the General’s club footprint (Durban through Joburg, with diaspora shows in the UK) explains his rank: packed dance floors, high retention through peak hours, and consistent ticket demand in cities with strong Zulu communities. Shazam action in eThekwini and London’s South African enclaves around gig nights, plus creator posts using drops from the March set, underlined impact. In short, he’s the DJs’ DJ of 2025 — the one other producers study for drum feel and crowd control.
8. Cairo Cpt – South Africa
Cairo Cpt claims #8 by owning Cape Town’s gqom lane in 2025 and pushing it online at scale. His *Enjoyment FM Live MIX — EP1* (published 2025) did the numbers on YouTube and was clipped widely for Reels/TikTok dance routines, with a summer push that made it weekend pre-game canon in SA cities. On Spotify, Cairo Cpt sat around ~90K monthly listeners in August 2025 with steady growth through Q2–Q3, per public trackers — a strong showing for a producer-DJ whose catalogue is built for the floor first. The sonic signature is Cape Town gospel-gqom: choral pads, melancholic organ stabs, and Thela-adjacent kick shapes, but Cairo leans into earworm melodic motifs that suit repeat streaming. 2025 bookings saw him fill outdoor day parties and club rotations regionally, and diaspora demand in the UK and Netherlands delivered first-in-line undercard festival looks. Shazam spikes across Cape Town townships and London’s East, timed to upload weekends, reflected grass-roots pull. Editorially, the mix’s IDs circulated into user-made Apple Music/Spotify playlists through spring/summer, a path that drove new followers and helped his August monthly-listener peak. In a year dominated by Durban drums, Cairo’s soulful, sing-back gqom stood out.
9. Goldmax – South Africa
Goldmax (half of Distruction Boyz) lands at #9 after a 2025 built on savvy collaborations and club-tested singles. The headliner: “Welcome 2 Durban” with Dlala Thukzin (official 2025 audio) — a thunderous return to pure gqom kick stacks, decorated with those chest-rattling synth blasts that became a Goldmax calling card. The track’s early YouTube traction (hundreds of thousands of views by August) and heavy inclusion across DJ mixes made it one of the year’s most cited Durban IDs. Beyond that, Goldmax showed up across gqom cyphers with Blacks Jnr and Worst Behaviour, seeding hooks that DJs could loop and dancers could chant. While he keeps a lower Spotify monthly listener count than mainstream crossovers, his real currency is bookings: reliable undercard to main-support slots at SA festivals, plus diaspora shows in the UK. Shazam growth in Durban and Birmingham on weekends he played mirrored social shares of his drops. With precise kick engineering, punchy whistles and an ear for chant-able toplines, Goldmax shaped the sound of club nights that mattered in 2025 — and reminded everyone why the Distruction Boyz orbit still defines gqom energy.
10. Ubizza Wethu – South Africa
A Cape Town stalwart, Ubizza Wethu grabs #10 thanks to a resurgent 2025 that put official visuals and street records front and center. “Akanamali” (official music video, published mid-2025) gave fans a crisp, high-energy clip built on the hard-edged Cape Town kick aesthetic, and it moved quickly on YouTube with organic shares through local DJ pages. Elsewhere, he peppered the year with official audios like “Back Then” and contributed to the city’s Friday mix culture that primes weekend dance floors. His Spotify footprint sits behind Durban’s biggest names, but his catalog depth and remix currency keep him in rotation across the Western Cape (and in export day parties where Cape Town gqom is in demand). The programming is raw and functional: short-decay lead synths, relentless claps, and crowd-rally ad-libs that cut through noisy rooms. Radio-wise, he continues to show up on regional mix shows; on socials, the “Akanamali” hook underpinned dozens of TikTok choreographies by July. In 2025’s competitive field, Ubizza Wethu’s blend of output pace, visible visuals, and street-level consistency earns him a place in the top ten.
11. Phelimuncasi – South Africa
The Durban vocal trio rank #11 because their 2025 live calendar and online footprint made them gqom’s most compelling performance unit. Their Bordeaux show for AkiWave/La Nef (published May 2025) circulated heavily, racking up strong YouTube views and becoming a reference clip for promoters booking vocal-led gqom. Phelimuncasi’s edge is theatricality: ululation, call-and-response, and choreographed mic hand-offs over bruising kicks — a performance grammar that reads as headliner energy even on undercards. Press and radio love from European outlets and specialist African club shows amplified their run, and Shazam action around that Bordeaux date surfaced in Paris and Brussels through late May. Streaming remains boutique, but editorial listens and live demand offset topline numbers. Their 2025 sets fused classic Durban drums with chant-hooks and taarab-inflected melodic phrasing, giving a Swahili/Zulu lyricism that travels across language barriers. In a year where many acts were studio-led, Phelimuncasi’s stagecraft, vocal identity and crowd-moving show design secured their global relevance — and a top-tier rank.
12. Dankie Boi – South Africa
Dankie Boi breaks into #12 on the strength of collaborative firepower and a 2025 release cadence that kept his name in every Friday upload stack. “Vala” with Worst Behaviour & Black Jnr (published June 2025) surged to tens of thousands of YouTube plays quickly and anchored multiple DJ mixes through July/August, while his features on We Dem Boyz projects gave him extra reach. The sonic DNA is peak-hour Durban: punishing kick stacks, siren-like leads, and chant hooks that slot perfectly into loop-friendly DJ narratives. Though Spotify monthly listeners remain under mainstream radar, “Vala” found traction on user playlists and in regional radio rotations — especially on weekend gqom shows across KwaZulu-Natal. Shazam blips in Durban and Pietermaritzburg matched club nights where the track got repeated wheel-ups. On TikTok, snippets of the hook spawned hundreds of creator videos by mid-August, an organic sign that the topline cut through. Dankie Boi’s 2025 was about momentum and presence: frequent drops, sticky hooks, and the kind of collaborative network that ensures you hear his tags whenever gqom is in the mix.
13. Que DJ – South Africa
The Distruction Boyz co-founder ranks #13 by proving that a veteran selector can still shape the narrative. Que’s New York “Descendants” gqom DJ set (published 2025) brought Durban pressure to a Brooklyn warehouse, with crowd videos going semi-viral across diaspora pages and the official YouTube capturing the energy with clean audio. Promoter notes and social clips placed him as a marquee guest in multiple international rooms this year (NYC, London), with sell-through that speaks to name recognition beyond SA. While 2025 studio output included cross-genre collaborations, his sets stayed gqom-led: classic Durban “taxi kick” patterns, siren drops, and precision sequencing that squeezes the most out of current anthems like “Vathela” and “Welcome 2 Durban.” Boiler Room has introduced him to global heads before; in 2025 he capitalized on that recognition with fresh content and credible rooms. Shazam notches in New York and London around set dates, plus creator clips of his wheel-ups, backed the idea that Que is still one of the genre’s best live ambassadors — and that earns him a mid-table but powerful position.
14. DJ Raybel – South Africa
DJ Raybel hits #14 after returning to frontline release mode with “Full Tank Gqom” alongside Deejay Zebra SA (official release, April 18, 2025). The record’s YouTube/streaming presence gave DJs a fresh, tightly-wound heater for early peak hours — a throwback to Raybel’s viral savvy but with 2025 drum engineering (shorter decays, wider low-mids). It picked up quick playlisting on fan-curated gqom lists and rotated on regional weekend mix shows, with Shazam bumps in Durban and East London matching club traction. Raybel’s reputation as a hook-smith remains intact: short shout phrases, siren FX and whistle punctuation line up for crowd response in noisy rooms. While he isn’t posting the largest Spotify monthly listener counts in the scene, “Full Tank Gqom” materially raised his 2025 baseline and pushed collab demand. On TikTok the drop’s rise-and-slam structure lent itself to transition memes and warm-up choreos. Combine that with legacy familiarity from earlier hits and road-tested set placements this year, and Raybel’s 2025 looks like a smart, back-to-basics reset that still feels global-ready.
15. Kiing Bhutie – South Africa
Kiing Bhutie takes #15 off the back of a prolific 2025 on the underground airwaves and a measurable rise in streaming. His *GQOM MIX TAPES* guest session (Episode 50, published May 2025) showcased a muscular, modern Durban sound — snarling mid-bass, tightly edited whistles and tom-rolls — and became a go-to link for DJs seeking fresh IDs. Spotify monthly listeners moved from the mid-thousands into higher ranges through the summer per public trackers, mirroring the cadence of releases and guest mixes. On YouTube, the May session notched robust views relative to the channel’s scale and was repeatedly clipped into TikTok carousel posts, feeding discovery. The Kiing Bhutie brand is curation as much as production: drill-sergeant kick discipline, laser-precise FX placement, and an ear for chant-friendly hooks that live well in loops. Regional bookings firmed up in 2025 (Durban/Johannesburg club nights), while user playlists across Apple/Spotify seeded his tracks next to scene leaders — a rising-tide marker. In short: from niche sparks in 2024 to a consistent 2025 presence, Kiing Bhutie now sets the tone for Durban’s youth wave.
16. Dee Traits – South Africa
Dee Traits land at #16 as the bridge between gqom’s warehouse severity and new-school sound design. Kicking off the year with *GQOM MIX TAPES E32* (published January 2025), they set a pace other artists followed: club-focused uploads every few weeks, gym-mix ready edits (“Vele Uyiskebhe” 2025) and a TrenchArt feature later in the year. The January set pulled in thousands of views quickly and kept accruing into Q2 as DJs mined it for IDs. On Spotify, the duo hovered around the mid-30Ks in monthly listeners by August 2025, aided by compilation adds and collaborations that stacked streams beyond any single release. In the booth they’re surgical — hard kicks, knife-edge claps, metallic lead zaps — but their arrangements leave oxygen for dancers, which explains frequent wheel-ups in club videos. The group’s tracks landed on user-built Apple/Spotify gqom collections that update weekly, while Shazam blips around Durban and Pretoria lined up with club nights featuring their edits. By controlling both the upload cadence and the live narrative, Dee Traits made themselves unavoidable in 2025.
17. Vanger Boyz – South Africa
Vanger Boyz take #17, fuelled by their 2025 *Gqom On Fire* EP cycle and a steady drip of official audios. “Free Roam” (official audio, published late spring 2025) exemplified their approach: chant-hooked, whistle-laced and tailored for the loop-happy DJs who dominate weekend uploads. The duo’s catalogue stitched through multiple 2025 fan mixes, generating reliable YouTube discovery and algorithmic recommends; on Apple Music their EP tracks clustered on genre pages through mid-year. While their Spotify monthly listeners sit in the tens of thousands, the act’s real reach is collaborative gravity — from Chustar to Dee Traits, they place their kick imprint across other people’s records, which multiplies touchpoints. Shazam micro-spikes appeared around East London and Durban on Fridays (mix day), a small but telling signal. Importantly, their 2025 production cleaned up the low-mid fog common in older gqom, making their records translate on festival PAs abroad. The net: Vanger Boyz delivered one of 2025’s most DJ-friendly gqom packs and turned that into steady scene presence.
18. GLISTEN – South Africa
GLISTEN debuts in our ranking at #18 after a run of 2025 mixes that pulled international ears toward Durban sonics. His *GQOM LIVE MIX E02* with TrenchArt (published March 2025) showed a curator/producer with a tight handle on pacing: brutalist kicks paired with wide-screen breakdowns that kept comment sections flooded with ID requests. The set’s YouTube numbers were strong for a newer name and, more important, persistently replayed — a proxy for DJ study value. GLISTEN’s studio drops threaded into fan-led playlists and radio guest mixes, with low-to-mid 5-figure streaming pulses around release weeks. Shazam logs in Johannesburg and Cape Town ticked up on nights he played, and club clips from those shows picked up on Reels. In an ecosystem where mix culture drives discovery, GLISTEN’s 2025 output placed him firmly on the map; his drum programming is reverent to Durban tradition while swapping in modern FX risers and stereo tricks that feel contemporary in EU/UK rooms.
19. Boujeena – South Africa
Boujeena rises to #19 as one of 2025’s clearest female gqom DJ breakthroughs. Her *GQOM MIX TAPES E40* set (published February 2025) hammered through YouTube with brisk pickup, drawing comments from DJs and dancers for its ruthless kick focus and vocoder-kissed chants. On socials, the mix’s biggest drop became a Reels/TikTok staple in SA dance communities by March, while bookings in Durban and Joburg saw weekend crowds chanting along to its signature sequence. Streaming-wise, Boujeena’s monthly listeners remain boutique, but the conversion from video to club to user playlists is exactly how gqom careers grow; she also earned mentions on specialist radio shows spotlighting women in African club. Stylistically she favors concision — minimal FX, whip-smart sequencing, and end-of-bar surprises that keep dance floors on their toes. With a high-quality flagship set, measurable social spillover, and visible local bookings, Boujeena feels like a 2025 story still in motion — and worthy of a top-20 berth.
20. Senhorâ – South Africa
Closing the list at #20, Senhorâ’s April 2025 *GQOM MIX TAPES* appearance delivered a taut, percussion-first statement that made promoters take note. The set (published April 2025) earned healthy YouTube traction and popped repeatedly in DJ comments asking for track IDs, while snippets of its most explosive sections fuelled creator posts through early May. On the ground, she converted that visibility into club bookings and day-party slots in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal; online, the mix seeded her selections into user playlists across Apple/Spotify’s gqom corners. Stylistically she strikes a balance between relentless Durban kick stacks and light-touch melodic earworms, a hybrid that reads well on both warehouse rigs and outdoor rigs. While monthly listeners still sit in early-career territory, 2025 gave Senhorâ the most important currency in gqom: a definitive mix and scene co-signs that travel. That, plus measurable video-to-floor translation, locks her into the global conversation for the rest of the year.
