Trance on DJ Radar: 742 DJs, a 4-Point Gap at the Top, and the Sound That Refuses to Fade

# Trance on DJ Radar: 742 DJs, a 4-Point Gap at the Top

Trance is the genre that keeps getting written off and keeps refusing to leave. On DJ Radar right now there are 742 DJs filed under the trance family, and the eight names at the top of that board carry credit scores running from 995 down to 881. That is a crowded, competitive field with a very familiar cast at the summit.

Trance lives on tension and release. The structure is built around long builds, melodic breakdowns and a payoff that is engineered for the biggest rooms and the largest festival stages. Where techno strips things back, trance layers up: arpeggiated leads, sweeping pads, and a sense of emotional lift that fans describe as euphoric for a reason. It is also a genre with an unusually loyal community, and the DJ Radar vote counts bear that out.

Armin van Buuren sits at number one with a credit score of 995. Tiësto is directly behind him on 991. A spread of 4 points is as tight as it gets at this level, and the two Dutch artists split the underlying metrics in revealing ways.

On the DJ Radar vote itself, van Buuren is well ahead: 86,057 votes against Tiësto's 53,203. He also leads on TikTok, with 2,500,000 followers to Tiësto's 1,300,000, and on Resident Advisor, 58,187 to 35,724.

Tiësto owns the reach numbers. He posts 33,463,685 monthly Spotify listeners to van Buuren's 15,167,072, 8,521,527 Spotify followers to 4,790,575, 7,855,501 Instagram followers to 5,030,332, and 7,230,000 YouTube subscribers to 6,200,000. The picture is clear: Tiësto wins the audience, van Buuren wins the vote, and the ranking lands within a hair of each other.

Paul van Dyk, from Germany, ranks third on 949 with 14,268 votes. His profile stands out for a festival count of 252, the only such figure logged among the top eight, alongside 108,335 Mixcloud followers and 903,866 Last.fm listeners. His numbers skew toward platforms where DJ sets and long-form listening matter, which fits the genre.

Above & Beyond, from the United Kingdom, take fourth on 932. Marlon Hoffstadt, from Germany, is fifth on 929. That 3-point gap is the other genuinely close contest in the top eight.

Above & Beyond carry the highest Mixcloud following listed among the eight, at 193,200, plus 537,087 SoundCloud followers and 33,733 on Resident Advisor. Hoffstadt actually drew more votes than Above & Beyond, 12,195 to 11,371, and his 42,729 Resident Advisor followers are second only to van Buuren's in this group. That is a strong club-circuit signal for the newest-feeling name in the top five.

Ferry Corsten, the third Dutch name on the list, ranks sixth on 917 with 11,299 votes, 1,388,923 monthly Spotify listeners and 715,575 Last.fm listeners.

Paul Oakenfold, from the United Kingdom, is seventh on 892. Among ranks three through eight, he holds the largest Instagram following at 828,968 and the largest Last.fm audience at 932,266.

Markus Schulz closes the top eight on 881 with 7,592 votes. His 119,438 Mixcloud followers and 388,000 YouTube subscribers point to a fanbase that shows up for full sets.

The top eight splits neatly: three from the Netherlands, three from Germany, two from the United Kingdom. No other country appears. For a genre with a global festival footprint, its leadership on DJ Radar remains a distinctly European affair.

The takeaway is simple. Trance's leaders are not being displaced; they are being chased. With 742 DJs on the board, a 4-point gap at number one and a 3-point gap at number four, the top of this chart is anything but settled.