Early life Taylor Alison Swift was born on December 13, 1989, in
West Reading, Pennsylvania. She is named after the singer-songwriter
James Taylor; her parents chose a unisex name, hoping it would help her succeed in business. Her father, Scott Kingsley Swift, was a
stockbroker for
Merrill Lynch, and her mother, Andrea Gardner Swift (), worked as a
mutual fund marketing executive. Swift's younger brother,
Austin, is an actor. The siblings are of Scottish, English, and German descent, with distant Irish and Italian ancestry; they are paternal great-great-grandchildren of
Charles Carmine Antonio Baldi, a prominent Philadelphia businessman. Their maternal grandmother,
Marjorie Finlay (), was an opera singer whose singing in church became one of Swift's earliest memories of music. During childhood, Swift spent her
holiday seasons on a
Christmas tree farm in Pennsylvania, and summers at her family's vacation home in
Stone Harbor, New Jersey, where she occasionally performed acoustic songs at a local coffee shop. Raised Christian, she attended preschool and kindergarten at a
Montessori school run by the
Bernardine Sisters of St. Francis before transferring to the Wyndcroft School in
Pottstown. When her family moved to
Wyomissing, she attended
Wyomissing Area Junior/Senior High School. At age nine, she aspired to a career in
musical theater, performing at local festivals and in Berks Youth Theatre Academy productions, and traveling regularly to New York City for vocal and acting lessons. After watching a documentary about
Faith Hill, she changed her goal and became determined to pursue a
country music career in
Nashville, Tennessee. At the age of 11, Swift traveled to Nashville with her mother to visit record labels and submit
demo tapes of
Dolly Parton and
Dixie Chicks karaoke covers. She was rejected by all the labels, which led her to focus on songwriting. She started learning the guitar at the age of 12 with the help of a computer repairman and local musician who assisted Swift in writing an original song. In 2003, she and her parents started working with the talent manager Dan Dymtrow. With his help, Swift modeled for
Abercrombie & Fitch, had an original song included on a
Maybelline compilation CD, and was given an
artist development deal from
RCA Records at 13. To help Swift break into the country music scene, her father transferred to Merrill Lynch's Nashville office when she was 14 years old, and the family relocated to
Hendersonville, Tennessee. Swift attended
Hendersonville High School for two years before transferring to Aaron Academy, which offered homeschooling.
2004–2008: Career beginnings and Taylor Swift Swift signed with
Sony/ATV Tree Music Publishing in 2004; at 14, she became the youngest person in that publishing company's history. In Nashville, she worked with experienced
Music Row songwriters, including
Liz Rose. Rose and Swift would write songs every Tuesday afternoon after school. After one year on the development deal, she left RCA Records, which decided to keep her in development until she turned 18. Swift made this decision because she wanted to release the songs immediately to ensure that they still resonated with her teenage experiences. Swift organized a showcase concert at the
Bluebird Cafe on November 3, 2004; among the attendees was
Scott Borchetta, a music executive who was planning to establish an
independent record label,
Big Machine Records. She signed a
recording contract with Big Machine two weeks after the concert, on the condition that her albums would be written by herself; her father purchased a three-percent stake in the company. The contract was finalized by July 2005, when Swift ended the working relationship with Dymtrow. She spent four months near the end of 2005 recording her debut album,
Taylor Swift, with the producer
Nathan Chapman. Swift's debut single, "
Tim McGraw", was released in June 2006. She and her mother spent mid-2006 sending promotional copies of the song to
country radio stations across the US.
Taylor Swift was released on October 24, 2006. On the US
Billboard 200 chart, the album peaked at number five and spent 157 weeks on the chart—the longest chart run by an album in the 2000s. With
Taylor Swift, she became the first female country music artist to write or co-write every track on a
platinum-certified debut album. The album was promoted by a six-month radio tour and by Swift
opening for other country artists, including
Rascal Flatts in 2006, and
George Strait,
Brad Paisley, and
Tim McGraw and Faith Hill in 2007. She opened for Rascal Flatts again in 2008, when she dated the singer
Joe Jonas.
Taylor Swift was supported by four more singles in 2007 and 2008: "
Teardrops on My Guitar", "
Our Song", "
Picture to Burn", and "
Should've Said No". "Our Song" and "Should've Said No" reached number one on the
Hot Country Songs chart; with the former single, Swift became the youngest person to single-handedly write and sing a number-one country single. "Teardrops on My Guitar" was Swift's breakthrough single on mainstream radio and charts, reaching the top 10 of the
Pop Songs,
Adult Pop Songs, and
Adult Contemporary charts. Her next releases were the
Christmas extended play (EP)
The Taylor Swift Holiday Collection in October 2007, and the
Walmart-exclusive EP
Beautiful Eyes in July 2008. Swift became the youngest person to be awarded with the
Nashville Songwriters Association's Songwriter/Artist of the Year in 2007.
2008–2010: Fearless ''. She had a cameo appearance in the film and wrote two songs for
its soundtrack.|alt=Taylor Swift in 2009 Swift's second album,
Fearless, was released on November 11, 2008, in North America, and in March 2009 in other markets.
Fearless spent eleven weeks at number one on the
Billboard 200, becoming her first chart topper and the longest-running number-one female country album; it was the best-selling album of 2009 in the US. The album's lead single, "
Love Story", became the first country song to top the Pop Songs chart, and its third single, "
You Belong with Me", was the first country song to top
Billboard all-genre
Radio Songs chart; both reached the top five of the
Billboard Hot 100 chart and peaked atop the Hot Country Songs chart. Three other singles—"
White Horse", "
Fifteen", "
Fearless"—all reached the top 10 of Hot Country Songs.
Fearless became the most-awarded country album of all time. It won the three highest awards for a country album: Album of the Year by both the
Country Music Association Awards and
Academy of Country Music Awards in 2009, and
Best Country Album by the
Grammy Awards in
2010. At the Grammys, it also won
Album of the Year, and "White Horse" won
Best Country Song and
Best Female Country Vocal Performance. Also in 2009, Swift was named Artist of the Year by both the
American Music Awards and
Billboard, and Entertainer of the Year by the Country Music Association Awards, becoming the youngest person to win the honor. "You Belong with Me" won
Best Female Video at the
MTV Video Music Awards. Her acceptance speech was interrupted by the rapper
Kanye West,
an incident that became the subject of controversy and widespread media coverage. Swift collaborated with other musicians in 2009. She featured on "
Half of My Heart" by
John Mayer, with whom she was romantically linked later that year. She wrote "
Best Days of Your Life" for
Kellie Pickler, co-wrote and featured on
Boys Like Girls' "
Two Is Better Than One, and wrote and recorded "
You'll Always Find Your Way Back Home" and "
Crazier" for the
soundtrack of
Hannah Montana: The Movie, in which she had a cameo appearance. She had her acting debut in the 2010 rom-com ''
Valentine's Day and wrote "Today Was a Fairytale" for its soundtrack. "Today Was a Fairytale" reached number one on the Canadian Hot 100. While shooting Valentine's Day
in October 2009, Swift dated co-star Taylor Lautner. On television, she made her debut as a rebellious teenager in a CSI: Crime Scene Investigation episode and hosted and performed as the musical guest on Saturday Night Live''; she was the first host to write their own opening monologue.
2010–2014: Speak Now and Red in 2011|left Swift wrote her third album,
Speak Now, entirely by herself. Released on October 25, 2010,
Speak Now expands on the
country pop sound of
Fearless and incorporates strong
rock music influences.
Speak Now debuted atop the US
Billboard 200 with over one million first-week copies sold, registering the highest single-week tally for a female country artist. Five of its singles—"
Mine", "
Back to December", "
Mean", "
Sparks Fly", and "
Ours"—charted in the top three of Hot Country Songs; "Sparks Fly" and "Ours" reached number one. Swift embarked on the
Speak Now World Tour from February 2011 to March 2012. In 2011, Swift was honored as Woman of the Year by
Billboard, Entertainer of the Year by both the Academy of Country Music Awards and the Country Music Association Awards, and Artist of the Year at the American Music Awards. She again won Entertainment of the Year by the Academy of Country Music Awards in 2012. At the
54th Annual Grammy Awards in 2012, "Mean" won Best Country Song and
Best Country Solo Performance. After the release of
Speak Now, Swift dated the actor
Jake Gyllenhaal. which featured collaborations with Chapman and new producers including
Max Martin,
Shellback,
Dan Wilson,
Jeff Bhasker,
Dann Huff, and
Butch Walker. Conceived as a record that expanded beyond Swift's country pop releases,
Red incorporates eclectic styles of pop and rock, such as
Britrock,
dubstep, and
dance-pop, leading to a critical debate over Swift's status as a country musician. The album opened at number one on the
Billboard 200 with 1.21 million sales, becoming the fastest-selling country album in US history. It was Swift's first number-one album in the UK. During the promotion of
Red, Swift was romantically involved with the political heir
Conor Kennedy, and subsequently the singer
Harry Styles. Both songs also reached the top five on the
UK singles chart, and the former was Swift's first chart topper in the US. Two other singles, "
Begin Again" and "
Red", peaked in the top 10 of the
Billboard Hot 100; Swift was named Artist of the Year at the American Music Awards in 2013. Swift wrote and recorded two songs for the
soundtrack album to the 2012 dystopian film
The Hunger Games:
"Eyes Open" and "
Safe & Sound". The latter, which was co-written with
the Civil Wars and
T-Bone Burnett, won the
Grammy Award for Best Song Written for Visual Media in 2013. She wrote and recorded "
Sweeter than Fiction" for the soundtrack to the 2013 biographical film
One Chance, and featured as a guest vocalist on
B.o.B's 2012 single "
Both of Us" and Tim McGraw's 2013 single "
Highway Don't Care". Her acting roles included a voice acting role in the 2012 animated film
The Lorax, a cameo in a 2013 episode of the sitcom
New Girl, and a supporting role in the 2014 dystopian film
The Giver.
2014–2018: 1989 and Reputation Swift relocated from Nashville to New York City in March 2014 and transformed her image from country to pop with her fifth album,
1989. She produced
1989 with Martin, Shellback, Chapman, and new collaborators
Jack Antonoff,
Imogen Heap,
Ryan Tedder, and
Ali Payami. Rooted in 1980s
synth-pop,
1989 incorporates upbeat
dance and
electronic arrangements of
synthesizers,
drum machines, and processed vocals. Released on October 27, 2014, the album spent eleven weeks at number one and one year in the top 10 of the
Billboard 200. It has sold 14 million copies worldwide, becoming Swift's best-selling album. , the highest-grossing tour of 2015|alt=Swift performing on a mic, dressed in white shorts and top Three of
1989 singles—"
Shake It Off", "
Blank Space", and "
Bad Blood"—reached number one on the
Billboard Hot 100; the first two made Swift
the first woman to replace herself at the top spot. Two other singles—"
Style" and "
Wildest Dreams"—peaked at numbers six and five, making
1989 the first album by Swift to have five consecutive top 10 singles on the Hot 100.
The 1989 World Tour was the
highest-grossing tour of 2015 with $250 million in revenue. She was named
Billboards Woman of the Year and received the inaugural
Dick Clark Award for Excellence at the American Music Awards in 2014, and "Bad Blood" won
Video of the Year and
Best Collaboration at the
2015 MTV Video Music Awards. At the
58th Annual Grammy Awards in 2016,
1989 made Swift the first woman to win Album of the Year twice; it also won
Best Pop Vocal Album, and "Bad Blood" won
Best Music Video. During the promotion of
1989, Swift publicly opposed free
music streaming services. She published an
op-ed in
The Wall Street Journal in July 2014 to stress the importance of albums as a creative medium for artists, and, in November, removed her discography from ad-supported, free streaming platforms such as
Spotify. Big Machine kept her music only on paid, subscription-required platforms. In a June 2015 open letter, Swift criticized
Apple Music for not offering royalties to artists during its free three-month trial period and threatened to withdraw her music from the platform, prompting
Apple Inc. to announce that it would pay artists during the free trial period. Big Machine returned Swift's catalog to Spotify and other free streaming platforms in June 2017. Swift dated the DJ
Calvin Harris from March 2015 to June 2016. They co-wrote the
EDM single "
This Is What You Came For", which featured vocals from
Rihanna; Swift was initially credited under the pseudonym Nils Sjöberg. "
Better Man", the 2016 single which Swift wrote for the country vocal group
Little Big Town, won the Country Music Association Award for Song of the Year. in 2018 In April 2016, Kanye West released the single "
Famous", in which he references Swift in the line, "I made that bitch famous." Swift criticized West and said she never consented to the lyric, but West claimed that he had received her approval, and his then-wife,
Kim Kardashian, released video clips of Swift and West discussing the song amicably over the phone. Although the clips were proven to be purposefully edited, the controversy made Swift a subject of an online "
cancel" movement, in which her critics denounced her as a fake and calculating "snake". In late 2016, after briefly dating the actor
Tom Hiddleston, Swift began a six-year relationship with the actor
Joe Alwyn and went on hiatus. In August 2017, Swift
countersued and won a case against David Mueller, a former
radio jockey for
KYGO-FM, who sued her for damages from loss of employment. Four years earlier, she informed Mueller's employer that he had sexually assaulted her by groping her at an event. Public controversies influenced Swift's sixth album,
Reputation, which explores themes of fame, drama, and finding love amidst the tumultuous affairs. A primarily
electropop album, its
maximalist production experiments with
urban styles of
hip-hop and
R&B. Released on November 10, 2017,
Reputation opened atop the
Billboard 200 with 1.21 million US sales and also reached number one in Australia, Canada, and the UK.
Reputation lead single, "
Look What You Made Me Do", topped the
Billboard Hot 100 with the highest sales and streaming week of 2017, and was Swift's first UK number-one single. The singles "
...Ready for It?", "
End Game", and "
Delicate" were released to pop radio and all peaked in the top 20 of the
Billboard Hot 100. In 2018, Swift featured on
Sugarland's "
Babe", surpassed
Whitney Houston as the most-awarded female musician at the American Music Awards, and embarked on the
Reputation Stadium Tour, which grossed $345.7 million worldwide.
2018–2021: Lover, Folklore, and Evermore In November 2018, Swift signed a record deal with
Universal Music Group, which promoted her albums under
Republic Records' imprint. The contract included a provision allowing Swift to maintain ownership of her
master recordings. In addition, if Universal sold any part of its stake in Spotify, it agreed to distribute a non-recoupable portion of the proceeds to its artists. , where she was named Artist of the Decade Swift's first album with Republic Records and seventh overall,
Lover, was released on August 23, 2019. She produced the album with Antonoff,
Louis Bell,
Frank Dukes, and
Joel Little.
Lover peaked atop the charts of such countries as Australia, Canada, Ireland, Mexico, Norway, Sweden, the UK, and the US, and was the global best-selling album by a solo artist of 2019. Three of its singles—"
Me!", "
You Need to Calm Down", and "
Lover"—were released in 2019 and peaked in the top 10 of the
Billboard Hot 100. "
The Man" was released in 2020 and charted highly, and "
Cruel Summer" became a resurgent success in 2023, reaching number one. In 2019, Swift was honored as Artist of the Decade by the American Music Awards and Woman of the Decade by
Billboard, and became the first female artist to win Video of the Year for a self-directed video with "You Need to Calm Down" at the MTV Video Music Awards. During the promotion of
Lover, Swift became embroiled in a
public dispute with the talent manager
Scooter Braun after he purchased Big Machine Records, including the masters of her albums under the label. Swift said that Big Machine would allow her to acquire the masters only if she exchanged one new album for each older one under a new contract, which she refused to sign. In February 2020, Swift signed a global publishing deal with
Universal Music Publishing Group after her 16-year contract with Sony/ATV expired. Amidst the
COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Swift
surprise-released two "sister albums" that she recorded and produced with Antonoff and
Aaron Dessner:
Folklore on July 24, and
Evermore on December 11. Joe Alwyn co-wrote and co-produced several songs under the pseudonym William Bowery. Both albums incorporate muted, atmospheric
indie folk and
indie rock sounds with
orchestrations; each was supported by three singles catering to US pop, country, and
triple A radio formats. The singles were "
Cardigan", "
Betty", and "
Exile" from
Folklore, and "
Willow", "
No Body, No Crime", and "
Coney Island" from
Evermore.
Folklore and "Cardigan" made Swift the first artist to debut a number-one album and a number-one song in the same week in the US; she achieved the feat again with
Evermore and "Willow". Swift won Artist of the Year at the American Music Awards in 2020 and Album of the Year for
Folklore at the
63rd Annual Grammy Awards in 2021, becoming the first woman to win the Grammy Award for Album of the Year three times. She played
Bombalurina in the
film adaptation of
Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical
Cats (2019), for which she co-wrote and recorded the original song "
Beautiful Ghosts". The documentary
Miss Americana, which chronicled parts of Swift's life and career, premiered at the
2020 Sundance Film Festival and received positive reviews.
2021–2023: Re-recordings and Midnights Swift released two re-recorded albums in 2021: ''
Fearless (Taylor's Version) in April and Red (Taylor's Version) in November. Both peaked atop the Billboard'' 200, and the former was the first re-recorded album to do so. The latter helped Swift surpass
Shania Twain as the female musician with the most weeks at number one on the
Top Country Albums chart. The song "
All Too Well (Taylor's Version)" from ''Red (Taylor's Version)
became the longest song in history to top the Billboard'' Hot 100. Swift's tenth album,
Midnights, was released on October 21, 2022. The album features a
minimalist electropop and synth-pop sound, with elements of hip-hop, R&B, and
electronica.
Midnights was Swift's fifth album to open atop the
Billboard 200 chart with US first-week sales of one million. Its tracks, led by the single "
Anti-Hero", made her the first artist to occupy the entire top 10 of the
Billboard Hot 100 the same week. The album peaked atop the charts of at least 14 other countries, including Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Norway, and Sweden. Two other singles, "
Lavender Haze" and "
Karma", both peaked at number two on the
Billboard Hot 100. In 2023, Swift released two re-recorded albums: ''
Speak Now (Taylor's Version) in July and 1989 (Taylor's Version)'' in October. The former broke
Barbra Streisand's record for the most number-one albums by a female artist, while the latter became her 13th number-one album on the
Billboard 200. The single "
Is It Over Now?" from ''1989 (Taylor's Version)
peaked at number one on the Billboard'' Hot 100. Swift featured on
Big Red Machine's "
Renegade" and "Birch" (2021),
Haim's "
Gasoline" (2021),
Ed Sheeran's "
The Joker and the Queen" (2022), and
the National's "
The Alcott" (2023). She wrote and recorded "
Carolina" for the
soundtrack of the 2022 mystery film
Where the Crawdads Sing, and had a supporting role in the 2022 period comedy film
Amsterdam. In 2022, Swift won Artist of the Year at the American Music Awards and Video of the Year for
All Too Well: The Short Film, her self-directed short film that accompanies "All Too Well (10 Minute Version)" at the MTV Video Music Awards;
All Too Well also won the Grammy Award for Best Music Video. The following year, she again won the MTV Video Music Award for Video of the Year with "Anti-Hero", became the first musician to rank at number one on
Billboard year-end top artists list in three different decades (2009, 2015 and 2023), and had five out of the 10 best-selling albums of the year in the US, a record since
Luminate began tracking US music sales in 1991. At the
66th Annual Grammy Awards in 2024,
Midnights made Swift the first artist to win Album of the Year four times; it also won Best Pop Vocal Album.
2023–present: The Eras Tour, The Tortured Poets Department, and The Life of a Showgirl in 2023 In March 2023, Swift embarked on
the Eras Tour, which she conceived as a tribute to her entire discography. The tour spanned five continents through December 2024. It exerted
a global cultural, economic, and political impact and culminated in an unprecedented height of popularity for Swift, resulting in a phenomenon that the media dubbed "Swiftmania". The Eras Tour became the first tour to gross $1 billion in revenue and the
highest-grossing tour in history, with $2 billion in total revenue.
Its 2023 concert film grossed $250 million, becoming the highest-grossing of its kind, and
its 2024 photobook sold nearly a million copies in its first week in the US, followed by
a 2025 documentary miniseries on
Disney+. The events that happened during the tour inspired Swift's eleventh and twelfth albums,
The Tortured Poets Department (2024) and
The Life of a Showgirl (2025). During the run of the Eras Tour, there were controversies surrounding
Ticketmaster's monopoly that led to
political scrutiny in the US, venue mismanagement that led to
a death in Brazil, and Singapore's exclusivity deal that led to political tension in Southeast Asia. In January 2024,
AI-generated pornographic images portraying Swift were posted to
Twitter and spread to other social media platforms, spurring criticism and demands for legal reform. In July 2024,
three children were killed in a stabbing attack at a Swift-themed workshop in
Southport, England, leading to
civil unrest in the UK. The following month, the
Vienna concerts were canceled following the arrest of suspects who planned
a terrorist attack.
The Tortured Poets Department was released on April 19, 2024. The same day, it was expanded as a
double album, subtitled
The Anthology. It became the first album to accumulate one billion streams on Spotify within one week and topped charts of various countries, including Australia, Canada, France, Germany, and the UK. In the US, it debuted atop the
Billboard 200 with 2.6 million first-week units and stayed at number one for seventeen weeks, becoming Swift's longest-running chart-topping album. The album was the global best-seller of 2024, with 5.6 million pure copies sold. Its songs made her the first artist to monopolize the top fourteen positions of the
Billboard Hot 100 the same week; On May 30, 2025, Swift finalized the purchase of the masters to her first six original albums from
Shamrock Holdings, which had acquired them from Braun in 2020. Swift began dating the football player
Travis Kelce in August 2023, with the media dubbing them a "
supercouple". They became engaged in August 2025. She introduced
The Life of a Showgirl on his podcast
New Heights that month. It was released on October 3, 2025, accompanied by the promotional film
Taylor Swift: The Official Release Party of a Showgirl, which
topped the US box office and grossed over $50 million worldwide.
The Life of a Showgirl debuted atop the
Billboard 200 with four million first-week units—3.4 million of which were pure sales—breaking the records for the
biggest debut or sales week for any album in the US. It was the best-selling album globally in 2025. The album's tracks occupied the top twelve spots on the
Billboard Hot 100, with the lead single, "
The Fate of Ophelia", at number one; it later became her first song to top the chart for ten cumulative weeks. "
Opalite", the album's second single, also peaked at number one on the Hot 100. == Artistry ==