I have to say that this is probably my favorite thing about being a part of Squidge.org and all the various entities. Sure, you can see the growth of fandom spaces and how people are using them – but when it comes to the year in review, this is where you can see the real, tangible evidence of what’s been going on for the last year. So without further ado, I present SquidgeWorld’s Year in Review based on what’s been read! Please note this is graphics-heavy so I’ll attempt to hide behind a cut.
For 2023, Harry Potter has de-throned N.C.I.S. as the most-read fandom in the archive. But beyond that (Harry Potter holds 3 of the top 20 spaces) there are fandoms that didn’t even exist until this year that have run up the charts. Fandoms like Módào Zǔshī and The Untamed weren’t even a part of the archive on January 1st, 2023 – and yet readers were pretty voracious when it came to reading works in those fandoms:
As with previous years, some of the most read relationships are either Jim Ellison/Blair Sandburg from The Sentinel, or Gibbs/DiNozzo from N.C.I.S. However, there are a few Harry Potter and Star Wars relationships thrown in there, so there’s definitely room for growth!
When it comes to characters – Well doesn’t Snape take the cake? He tops the chart for 2023, though Minerva McGonagall and a few other Harry Potter characters round out the most read characters of 2023. As a matter of fact, Harry Potter characters take up nearly all of the top 20 spots!
And now we come to my personal favorite – the free form tags! What were people looking to read in 2023? Well, Angst and Alternate Universe were three of the top five! Most of the tags listed were fandom independent, like First Time and Time Travel, but Harry Potter’s “post-Goblet of Fire” was in there – which makes sense from the most-read fandoms of 2023.
So that’s how 2023 went. We shall see how this year shakes out to be! Thanks to everyone who was part of SquidgeWorld.org and helped make these statistics come about, and thanks to everyone for being a part of Squidge.org!
