Playing with 2022 AO3 Ship Stats

[melannen]

I have been in the mood for spreadsheets the last week or so, so when I saw centreoftheselights's 2022 AO3 Ship Stats post being linked around, I was tempted into doing one of my own, on a slightly different data set.

OK actually I'm still neck-deep in MCYT fandom, so when I saw that Phil/Kristin was on that list, I knew something was odd. Phil/Kristin is a background canon rpf het ship, and ain't nobody writing shipfic for it, I think in all my time obsessing over MCYT fic I've read maybe two fics that actually focused on Phil/Kristin, and they were both set in the version of the IC lore where Kristin is a personification of Death and were mostly about c!Phil coming to terms with some of his self-destructive tendencies.

Then I realized that over 15% of that 100 was MCYT gen ships, and I realized what was going on. You see, for reasons that don't need exploring at this juncture, MCYT tends to load up their fics with gen ship tags. The average MCYT ship probably has 5-10 times the number of ship tags as the average MDZS fic. So yes, there are a lot of MCYT ships that are tagged a lot, but they are probably nearly all being tagged as background ships on the same couple thousand fics that tagged every MCYT friendship.

So in an attempt to factor that out, I pulled a set of top 100 ships of AO3 works updated in 2022 with the "OTP:true" filter on (also I did it in a logged-in account, so it includes locked fics, unlike the original dataset.) This is counting only fics where the tagged ship is the only tagged ship - so while it'll undercount in fandoms that tend to overtag, it will also not count ships that are almost always tagged as background. (The real most-popular ships list is probably halfway between this dataset and centreoftheselights's.)

I was going to do a more in-depth comparison of the two, but as I looked deeper, I can't really figure out exactly how centreoftheselights made their list. In particular, there are a few ships that really seem like they should be on that list too - the Kinnporsche guys and the Heartstopper guys stand out as ships that should be near the top for 2022, regardless of how you count - so since I'm not really sure what's going on there, I'm going to limit direct comparisons and just give some basic stats.

Other things that make this data error-prone

• it counts by date updated, not date posted, so fics that updated already in 2023 are excluded (the numbers are as of 01/07)
  
• –I excluded OC/OC and No Relationships. OMC/OMC, OFC/OMC and OFC/OFC are still in, because that did feel like interesting data, but leaving in OC/OC too felt like double-counting (It would be #1 otherwise.) No Relationships would have just been really hard to pull accurately because of the way AO3 does it.
  
• I got the data by using the exclude filters to count through the most popular ships, but if you get deep enough in the exclude filters, the counts get a bit wonky. I think I gathered enough extra data that I didn't miss anyone that should have been in the top 100, and the actual counts are not based on the filter ranks, but I might have missed something lower on the list because of that.
  
• The numbers far down on the list are low enough that some of these might be on the list because of one very prolific writer. Yes, there was a pairing that very nearly made it on because one writer posted 2-3 ficlets for it, every day, all year. It ended up being just under the threshhold but I didn't check to make sure there weren't others. This should probably really be only a top 50 list, given the sample sizes.
  
• It's also possible some of the older ships are on here due to open doors imports or people uploading their own back catalog. Most open doors imports try to be accurate with dates, and I spot-checked a couple of the more surprising winners and there was nothing obvious, but it's possible. (Meanswhile, I decided if people still care enough to upload their old fics for a pairing it counts as shipping it anyway.) I think the old ships just, still have fans. (And also people in older fandoms are less likely to tag lots of ships, so they get a bit overrepresented in OTP search.)
  
• I probably made a mistake on the spreadsheet somewhere.

Here's the list:

Top 100 AO3 ships of 2022, by OTP

1. Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson
2. Blackbeard | Edward Teach/Stede Bonnet
3. Lán Zhàn | Lán Wàngjī/Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn
4. Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
5. Castiel/Dean Winchester
6. Bakugou Katsuki/Midoriya Izuku
7. Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy
8. Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV)
9. Jeon Jungkook/Kim Taehyung | V
10. Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
11. Clay | Dream/GeorgeNotFound (Video Blogging RPF)
12. Dazai Osamu/Nakahara Chuuya (Bungou Stray Dogs)
13. Tartaglia | Childe/Zhongli (Genshin Impact)
14. Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson
15. James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
16. Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
17. Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
18. Original Female Character(s)/Original Male Character(s)
19. Original Male Character/Original Male Character
20. Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
21. Jeon Jungkook/Park Jimin
22. Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
23. Will Byers/Mike Wheeler
24. Caitlyn/Vi (League of Legends)
25. Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
26. Bakugou Katsuki/Kirishima Eijirou
27. Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
28. Miya Atsumu/Sakusa Kiyoomi
29. Yuzuru Hanyu/Boyang Jin
30. Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
31. Han Jisung | Han/Lee Minho | Lee Know
32. Min Yoongi | Suga/Park Jimin
33. Levi Ackerman/Erwin Smith
34. Olivia Benson/Elliot Stabler
35. Lo Hon-ting | Anson Lo/Lui Cheuk-on | Edan Lui
36. Diluc/Kaeya (Genshin Impact)
37. Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
38. Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
39. Original Female Character(s)/Original Female Character(s)
40. Nicholas "Nick" Nelson/Charles "Charlie" Spring
41. Huā Chéng/Xiè Lián (Tiān Guān Cì Fú)
42. Carlos Reyes/TK Strand
43. Getou Suguru/Gojo Satoru
44. Wang Yi Bo/Xiao Zhan | Sean
45. Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington
46. Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor
47. Pete Phongsakorn Saengtham/Vegas Kornwit Theerapanyakun
48. Uchiha Sasuke/Uzumaki Naruto
49. Sans/Sans (Undertale)
50. Levi Ackerman/Eren Yeager
51. Bakugou Katsuki/Todoroki Shouto
52. Obi-Wan Kenobi/Anakin Skywalker
53. Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard
54. Dabi | Todoroki Touya/Takami Keigo | Hawks
55. Fox Mulder/Dana Scully
56. Dean Winchester/Sam Winchester
57. Robin Buckley/Nancy Wheeler
58. The Darkling | Aleksander Morozova/Alina Starkov
59. Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood
60. Amity Blight/Luz Noceda
61. Hinata Shouyou/Kageyama Tobio
62. Chrissy Cunningham/Eddie Munson
63. Anthony Bridgerton/Kate Sheffield | Kate Sharma
64. Roronoa Zoro/Vinsmoke Sanji
65. Jeon Jungkook/Min Yoongi | Suga
66. Harry Potter/Severus Snape
67. John "Soap" MacTavish/Simon "Ghost" Riley
68. James "Bucky" Barnes/Sam Wilson
69. CC-2224 | Cody/Obi-Wan Kenobi
70. Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
71. Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
72. Wen Kexing/Zhou Zishu
73. Nanjo Kojiro | Joe/Sakurayashiki Kaoru | Cherry Blossom
74. Akaashi Keiji/Bokuto Koutarou
75. James "Bucky" Barnes/Reader
76. Mitsurugi Reiji | Miles Edgeworth/Naruhodou Ryuuichi | Phoenix Wright
77. Evil Queen | Regina Mills/Emma Swan
78. Kamisato Ayato/Thoma
79. Wednesday Addams/Enid Sinclair
80. Choi Soobin/Choi Yeonjun
81. Porsche Pachara Kittisawat/Kinn Anakinn Theerapanyakun
82. Jayce/Viktor (League of Legends)
83. Eve Polastri/Villanelle | Oksana Astankova
84. Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne
85. Alex | S Tier/Morgan | D Tier
86. Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
87. Hwang Hyunjin/Lee Felix
88. James T. Kirk/Spock
89. Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
90. Kim Dokja/Yoo Joonghyuk
91. Keith/Lance (Voltron)
92. Jung Hoseok | J-Hope/Min Yoongi | Suga
93. Patrick Brewer/David Rose
94. Ian Gallagher/Mickey Milkovich
95. Hasegawa Langa/Kyan Reki
96. Hermione Granger/Severus Snape
97. Frank Iero/Gerard Way
98. Regulus Black/James Potter
99. Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Mark Lee
100. Kim Taehyung | V/Park Jimin

(also here's my extremely messy google sheet with the raw data I used, if you would like to try to figure it out.)


Some interesting stats pulled from the extended data :

• There are 69 fandoms represented (more or less, depending on how you split things up, but 69 seems like a good number for some reason...)
  
• This is 21 more fandoms than in the non-OTP data! This is due largely to the fact that the number of MCYT ships dropped from 15 to 1, although a few others also dropped considerably. (BTS, on the other hand, gained considerably.) This makes me feel very justified in my original hypothesis!
  
• There are 77 M/M ships, 10 F/M ships, 8 F/F ships, 1 Gen ship, and 2 Other ships (both Other are characters of unrevealed gender.) The difference between this and centreoftheselights' stats is probably almost entirely down to the loss of those 15 Minecraft gen ships (as well as mostly-background gen ships from a few other fandoms.) The fact that the difference was almost entirely made of of M/M probably both says something about the fic fandom writes (even popular non-M/M ships are more likely to be background) and about how different fandoms tag (fandoms with M/M juggernaut ships are often less likely to tag for a lot of background ships.)
  
• For race, I used centreoftheselights's categories where they were there, and did my best to use their criteria where they weren't. There were 96 White characters, 72 Asian characters, 26 racially ambiguous characters, 2 Latino characters, 3 Indigenous characters, 1 Black character, and 1 Afro Latino character. This is a drop in White vs non-White compared to the original list, but again this is probably almost entirely down to all the MCYT gen ships dropping off (and many of them being replaced by kpop or jpop ships.) There were 81 ships where both characters were the same race (by those criteria) and 19 where they were not. There were 38 White/White pairings and 33 Asian/Asian pairings and 9 Ambiguous/Ambiguous pairings. All mixed-race pairings had at least one White character in them.
  
• There were no ships with more than two people (the only one on the original list was a background MCYT canon ship that dropped off the list.)
  
• This has a lot more of what I'd consider "old classic" ships than the original list. That might be partly down to people uploading old fic being less likely to include a lot of extra tags (or down to people still writing in older fandoms being less likely to use a lot of tags!) (Mulder/Scully is still on the top 100? I triple-checked that one!)

But, of course, both that list and centreoftheselights's use "number of fics posted" to mean "Top" and that's not entirely true - it means "most written". What people write most is not necessarily what people read most!

So just to cap this off here's my list of the top 45 pairings of 2022 among fics that had more than 5000 kudos:

1. Aizawa Shouta | Eraserhead & Midoriya Izuku
2. Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson
3. Wilbur Soot & Technoblade & TommyInnit & Phil Watson
4. Aizawa Shouta | Eraserhead/Yamada Hizashi | Present Mic
5. Harry Potter/Tom Riddle
6. Midoriya Izuku & Shinsou Hitoshi
7. Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
8. Technoblade & TommyInnit
9. Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
10. Lán Zhàn | Lán Wàngjī/Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn
11. Bakugou Katsuki & Midoriya Izuku
12. Harry Potter/Voldemort
13. Pepper Potts/Tony Stark
14. Blackbeard | Edward Teach/Stede Bonnet
15. Toby Smith | Tubbo & TommyInnit
16. Harry Potter/Tom Riddle | Voldemort
17. Harry Potter & Severus Snape
18. Peter Parker & Tony Stark
19. Harry Potter/Severus Snape
20. Class 1-A & Midoriya Izuku
21. Bakugou Katsuki/Midoriya Izuku
22. Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy
23. Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
24. Luò Bīnghé/Shěn Yuán | Shěn Qīngqiū
25. Tartaglia | Childe/Zhongli
26. Tim Drake & Bruce Wayne
27. Jeon Jungkook/Everyone
28. Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley
29. Jango Fett/Obi-Wan Kenobi
30. Wednesday Addams/Enid Sinclair
31. Steve Harrington & Dustin Henderson
32. Clay | Dream/GeorgeNotFound
33. Tim Drake & Jason Todd
34. Dream of the Endless/Hob Gadling
35. James Potter/Lily Evans Potter
36. Jason Todd & Bruce Wayne
37. Tim Drake & Dick Grayson
38. Kim Dokja/Yoo Joonghyuk
39. Jeon Jungkook/Park Jimin
40. Midoriya Izuku/Todoroki Shouto
41. Midoriya Izuku & Sensei | All For One
42. Alya Césaire/Nino Lahiffe
43. Regulus Black/James Potter
44. Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor
45. Midoriya Izuku & Nedzu