No rapper has made the most of their 2026 quite like Drake. Everyone thought he was dead in the water after the ugly beef against Kendrick Lamar in 2024. Even many of his staunchest defenders would admit that it wasn’t his finest hour. In any other situation, it would mark a significant fall-off in a rapper’s career, if not the end of it entirely.
But fast forward two years later and it’s as if nothing changed at all. The Toronto MC is the biggest rapper in the world after releasing three blockbuster albums. ICEMAN was essentially Drake’s revenge game, snarling at all of his enemies, from Kendrick Lamar to Jay-Z to A$AP Rocky to LeBron James. Additionally, there was Maid of Honour, a raunchy ode to excess tailor made for the dance floor. HABIBTI was closer to his traditional R&B affair, filled with yearning and lousy love affairs.
Aside from usual haters and detractors, the trio of albums came out to a ton of praise and accolades. He became the first ever artist to notch the top three spots on the Billboard 200. Additionally, despite turning down Grammy nominations, publications and institutions are lauding his triumphant comeback. For instance, Apple Music crowned him the Best Rapper of 2026. For what it’s worth, regardless of subjective opinions, their argument was airtight.
Drake is Apple Music’s Top Rapper of 2026: Here’s Why It Makes Sense
“The MC made his loudest comeback in years with a three-album release weekend spanning hip-hop, R&B, and dance, a genre-sprawling gambit that landed as critical and commercial lightning. ICEMAN did the heaviest lifting commercially, becoming the first 2026 rap album to cross 2 billion streams and reasserting Drake’s rightful claim to hip-hop’s hitmaking throne,” they wrote.
Ultimately, I’d argue that the final results of each album were incredibly mixed to say the best. But the sheer achievement of coming back after such a brutal loss to Kendrick Lamar is an absolute miracle. It wasn’t quite the tug-of-war between rap giants the way we’d expect. It was a massacre. But through sheer stubborn will, he made it abundantly clear: he’s the only solution to hip-hop’s mainstream problem.
J. Cole is indecisive about retiring and Kendrick Lamar isn’t reliable to show up year in and year out. For better or worse, Drake keeps mainstream hip-hop alive. Whether that eventually spends the end of hip-hop’s reign as the defining cultural institution or keeps it afloat, he’s proven to be vital to the ecosystem, for better or worse. What other description fits a mainstream outlet’s Rapper of The Year?
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