Before there was Tate McRae, ultra-polished pop performer, there was Tate McRae, preteen from Calgary, Alberta, writing songs at home and uploading them to YouTube.
And while McRae’s high-caliber, intricately choreographed performances and visually striking, maximalist music videos have arguably become the focal points of her public image today (manifesting in a fierce alter ego she calls Tatiana), it’s her other side that Billboard is honoring as this year’s Women in Music Hitmaker — the one who used to take solace in crafting lyrics to sing not in front of more than 10,000 screaming fans but alone in her bedroom. The 22-year-old’s underappreciated pen is just as lethal as her performance capabilities. After a modest debut in the familiar lane of Gen Z pop melancholia — making her first Billboard Hot 100 appearance in 2020 with “You Broke Me First” — McRae enlisted fellow hit-makers Ryan Tedder and Amy Allen to help craft pristine, radio-friendly pop bangers that she could actually move to, tapping into her upbringing as a competitive dancer onstage and channeling past pop icons such as Britney Spears (to whom she’s now frequently compared).
“Tate was dedicated and disciplined to become the absolute best,” recalls renowned choreographer Sean Bankhead (Lil Nas X, Victoria Monét, Normani), whom McRae tapped specifically to help with her transformation, of first meeting her. “I have always wanted to mold the next big pop girlie who could not just write amazing songs and sing them live but of course command every stage she stepped foot on. And with Tate we accomplished that in a very quick two years.”
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With her 2023 breakthrough, Think Later, and its 2025 follow-up, the Billboard 200-topping So Close to What, McRae became a chart regular, as songs like “Greedy,” “It’s Ok I’m Ok” and her post-The Kid LAROI breakup anthem “Tit for Tat” all landed in the top 20 of the Hot 100. Last May, her Morgan Wallen collaboration “What I Want” became her first Hot 100 No. 1, and despite swerving from her now-signature pop sound, the team-up didn’t feel “out of the ordinary” for McRae. “I used to write to only guitar in the studio, so it felt natural,” she tells Billboard matter-of-factly.
Now, on a drizzly Friday afternoon in February, she’s somewhere in between the two aforementioned Tates — still in full glam from the photo shoot she just wrapped as stylists flutter around her but also chatting freely about her burgeoning love for Jersey City (near where rumored boyfriend Jack Hughes of the NHL’s New Jersey Devils and the Olympic gold medal-winning U.S. hockey team is based) and whether there’s still time to enjoy her favorite weather here in New York, where she now lives. “Is it still raining?” she asks hopefully, craning her neck to see. “I love the rain!”
Wolford bodysuit and tights. Heather Hazzan
With fame has come noisier online speculation about her politics and personal life — and she’s spoken in the past about her complicated feelings, post-proverbial “rebrand,” around the public’s way of sexualizing young female pop stars. But she says she’s combated this by ditching social media and “romanticizing” her real life instead. And with her $110.8 million-grossing (according to Billboard Boxscore) Miss Possessive arena tour in the books since November, she confirms she’s back in the studio, feeling inspired by everything from her recent travels to Paris to her newfound obsession with Scottish dream-pop legends Cocteau Twins. (She’ll return to the road this summer, with headlining turns at Montreal’s Osheaga and Chicago’s Lollapalooza.)
She has no idea where her writing will take her next — but that’s perfectly OK with her. “I’m just constantly trying to make art that feels somewhat timeless and [give] performances that feel like they can eventually stand up beside my favorite performances,” McRae says with a shrug.
“It definitely feels like the beginning,” she adds. “I feel like right now I’m looking at a blank page being like, ‘Where do I take this?’ ”
How would you define a hit song?
You have to think with the most extreme and open mind when you’re writing … [otherwise] it’s the most uninspiring work. Everything’s been done before — every key has been played, every word has been used. All you have is your own unique perspective.
Tate McRae photographed on February 20, 2026 in New York. Heather Hazzan
Which of your hits have been the most meaningful?
“Sports Car” is one of my favorite songs of mine. It was such a swing and such a fun song to write.
“Greedy” was a very meaningful song to me. When I think back to that phase of my life, I was so lost. I was 19, and this big singing career felt so daunting to me, and it felt like this was one of the first times where I had pure clarity and direction on where I wanted to go visually and sonically.
Who’s your dream collaborator?
Lana Del Rey. I listen to Lana 24/7 — I’m just the biggest fan.
Which other women in the industry do you admire?
I love Olivia Dean, Sabrina [Carpenter], Gracie [Abrams]. Olivia [Rodrigo] — I’m so excited for her to drop music again. She’s an unbelievable songwriter. She never fears brutal honesty or laying out all her insecurities or feelings on the table. She’s like that as a friend too, just the most open, honest person.
I always look to Rihanna and think she’s got the best career ever. She’s just the coolest woman alive.
People love to talk about your “rebrand,” but what steps did you take to become the performer you are today?
I had a very specific vision. I remember being like, “I want to be a pop star. I want Sean Bankhead. I want to write over this tempo. I want to do it in a hockey rink. I want this to be the aesthetic.” I could see it all in my brain.
It was about collecting the right people around me to make it a reality. Sometimes you get signs and messages on where you’re supposed to go in life, and you ignore it. And then finally, it becomes the most piercing feeling in your gut, and you wake up and you’re like, “All right. No more time to waste.”
Heather Hazzan
Heather Hazzan
Are there ways in which you’ve felt misunderstood by the public?
So many different ways. As a woman, you just have to understand that you’re constantly going to be under a microscope, and sometimes that’s a really scary and overwhelming feeling. But on the optimistic side of that, with scrutiny and opinions and people’s perceptions of you, it just leads to a lot of growth and doubling down on who you are.
I could say that people’s comments don’t affect me, but of course they do. I’m a girl. I have emotions and feelings and insecurities. It sucks to have people commenting on your body or commenting on who you are or having perceptions that are completely off.
But for me, I’m just here to make art. Trying to explain yourself is a game that I can never win.
This story appears in the April 18, 2026, issue of Billboard.
This article was first published by Billboard U.S.
