September 2026 marks 11 years since Young Thug introduced “Best Friend,” a track that would become one of the most recognisable songs of his early career and a lasting record from Atlanta's influential 2010s trap movement.
The music video arrived on September 14, 2015, followed by the official single release on September 16. “Best Friend” was also included on Slime Season, the mixtape released during a remarkably productive period in Young Thug's career.
Produced by Ricky Racks, the song was built around an instantly memorable chorus and Young Thug's unconventional vocal style. At a time when his approach to melody, pronunciation and flow challenged traditional ideas about how a rapper should sound, “Best Friend” demonstrated exactly why his influence was growing.
The accompanying video made the record even harder to forget. Directed by Be El Be, it featured Young Thug playing multiple versions of himself in a series of surreal scenes. The unusual visual became part of the song's identity and has accumulated more than 337 million views on Young Thug's official YouTube channel.
Commercially, “Best Friend” also became an important record for Thug. The track eventually reached No. 45 on the Billboard Hot 100, becoming his highest-charting lead single at the time, and was later certified platinum in the United States.
More importantly, the song arrived during an era that helped establish Young Thug as one of his generation's most influential rappers. The vocal experimentation that once made his music sound unusual would increasingly become part of mainstream hip-hop's vocabulary.
Eleven years later, “Best Friend” still feels closely connected to that moment. It is a reminder of the period when Young Thug was not simply making successful trap records, but helping reshape how an entire generation approached rap.