Most Popular Carols

It’s hard to get exact numbers on how popular carols are. We have several sources we could use and all will provide different answers to the question. For instance opinion polls taken tend to ask the question of favourite carol, which differs from popularity even if often the two factors will go together. For our table below we’ve used a simple measure which nevertheless has its downsides. This is how many people search for the carol each year in Google with figures that are rounded up or down. This way of measuring popularity does have potential pitfalls – searches for a carol might represent confusion over the lyrics rather than popularity for instance – and also a carol might be more popular among those who don’t tend to use the internet and therefore might be underrepresented. There’s other issues too when Carol names have other meanings – for instance Silent Night is also a bed company while We Three Kings is also a film, so the figures are distorted upwards by these other meanings. Nevertheless this seems the best data to go on for carol popularity.

CarolGlobal SearchesAmerican SearchesBritish SearchesCanadian SearchesAustralian Searches
Carol of the Bells39720021720019200192004680
Away in a Manger21720064800648001200010560
O Come All Ye Faithful118800432001920057604680
We Three Kings79200348001200057603120
Silent Night594000145200972002280010560
Angels from the Realms of Glory228001056038401092876
Hark the Herald Angels Sing2172009720028800120008640
Good King Wenceslas97200432002280086403840
The First Noel145200528001200070805760
Go Tell it on the Mountain11880064800708070801680
Deck the Halls325200118800288002880012000
12 Days of Christmas10860005940002172006480052800
We Wish You A Merry Christmas5940007920034800156008640
White Christmas726000266400648003480022800
Jingle Bells2412000266400972006480034800