Archive of Our Own

A few things before we get to it:

1. Apologies for the slight delay posting this year! At some point in the last few months, AO3 have made some changes that slow down bot traffic to the site in favour of non-bot users. While this is obviously a good idea for the site overall, it did mean that my data-scraping program took double the time I expected to amass the raw data for this project. In the end, making this list took a little over 8 days! To make up for the delay, there is a short bonus list included beneath the table.

2. After having difficulty with it over the summer, I have introduced some methods to help me detect people trying to "game the stats" by posting large amounts of low-effort spam content. As a result of this, the pairing James Potter/Lily Evans Potter has had 9135 works deducted from its "Works Gained" score. I will reiterate: please stop doing this, it makes the site worse for everyone.

3. While most people who engage with the stats are great, I've also seen or experienced some reactions lately which cross the line. I try to be open to critique, but I'm a human being who does this project unpaid in my free time. I have my limits, and on AO3 I will block commenters who engage in insults, personal attacks, threats, or harassment. If you see criticism of these stats out in the world, please take a few moments to consider the content and tone before passing it on to your followers - and if it seems designed to make you angry, the best response is often to not react at all.

Abbreviations Used:

Ambig or Amb = Ambiguous Race
Bla = Black
Gen = Platonic or Familial Relationship
MENA = Middle Eastern or North African
Poly = Polyamorous Relationship
N.H. = Non-Human Skin Tone
Whi = White

Welcome to the Year In Review edition of the AO3 Ship Stats!

This list shows the 100 pairing tags which had the greatest gain in total public fanworks posted on Archive Of Our Own during the period 1 Jan 2025 - 4 Jan 2026. There are 62 M/M pairings, 13 F/M, 8 F/F, 8 Gen, 1 F/F/F Polyamorous relationship, and 8 Other. (Please note that on AO3, ‘Name & Name’ with an ampersand indicates platonic or familial ‘Gen’ relationships, while ‘Name/Name’ with a slash is used for romantic and sexual pairings.)

Of the 202 names on the list, 35 belong to women, 1 to a non-binary character, and 7 to characters of indeterminate gender, compared with 20, 2, and 7 in last year's list. In total there are 79 entries for white characters, 68 for Asian characters, 6 for Middle Eastern or North African characters, 5 for Latino characters, 3 for Black characters, and 1 for a Roma character, as well as 23 racially ambiguous characters and 23 with non-human skin tones. There are 83 listings for Characters of Colour, up from 80 in 2024's list.

Please be aware that this is not an official AO3 account - I am an independent researcher collecting and sharing publicly visible data. If you have any questions about the AO3 Ship Stats project, please see the FAQ for this year's stats.

Happy New Year!

Edit 7 Jan 2026: Fixed race for Alastor (Hazbin Hotel) and Vox (Hazbin Hotel).

As a bonus, here's a list of the ten pairings with 1000+ works at the start of 2025 whose work counts went down by the largest amount this year (due to having more existing works deleted & privated than new works posted):

10. Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit - Dream SMP - 593 works lost - 20306 works remaining
9. Sherlock Holmes/John Watson - Sherlock (BBC TV 2010) - 613 works lost - 64020 works remaining
8. Shibasaki Aizou/Someya Yuujirou/Suzumi Hiyori - 告白実行委員会 | Confession Executive Committee - 659 works lost - 559 works remaining
7. Keith/Shiro (Voltron) - Voltron: Legendary Defender - 760 works lost - 13612 works remaining
6. Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion - Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types - 790 works lost - 18558 works remaining
5. Shibasaki Aizou/Suzumi Hiyori - 告白実行委員会 | Confession Executive Committee  - 846 works lost - 196 works remaining
4. Someya Yuujirou/Suzumi Hiyori - 告白実行委員会 | Confession Executive Committee  - 854 works lost - 186 works remaining
3. Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski - Teen Wolf (TV) - 911 works lost - 63000 works remaining
2. Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood - Shadowhunters (TV) - 937 works lost - 28742 works remaining
1. Neuvillette/Wriothesley (Genshin Impact) - 原神 | Genshin Impact (Video Game) - 1471 works lost - 5282 works remaining