For two years running, a Nigerian name sat on the shortlist for Crossover Artist of the Year at the Billboard Latin Music Awards and went home without the trophy. Rema lost the category to ATL Jacob in 2024, and Ayra Starr lost it to benny blanco in 2025. On Thursday night in Miami, Burna Boy took it.
He won from a field of Bruno Mars, DJ Snake, Shenseea and Steve Aoki at the James L. Knight Center, on a night Telemundo and Peacock carried live and Fuerza Regida ran away with eight awards, while Bad Bunny took Artist of the Year. The category rewards acts from outside Latin music who land on its charts, and its recent winners lean toward producers and pop hitmakers, from Marshmello in 2023 to the two men who beat Rema and Ayra. Burna got in with a single song.
That song is “Dai Dai,” the official FIFA World Cup 2026 anthem he made with Shakira. It came out on May 15, opened the tournament at the ceremony in Mexico City on June 11 and came back for the first halftime show in World Cup final history on July 19. Along the way it reached No. 1 on Billboard’s Latin Airplay chart dated July 25, Shakira’s 25th leader there and, as Billboard noted, Burna’s first appearance on any Latin chart. It also spent seven weeks atop the Billboard Global 200 and peaked at No. 17 on the Hot 100, the highest any World Cup anthem has climbed on that chart. Earlier this month, the RIAA certified it 19x Platinum (Latin).
Billboard heard a blend of Afrobeats, dance-pop and reggaetón on the A.C.-produced record, with Burna chanting “Go follow your desire / Where there’s a will, there’s a way.”
His first Billboard Music Award, Top Afrobeats Artist in 2023, came in a category Billboard created that year for acts like him. Writing about the 2024 Grammys, The NATIVE saw a sign that African artists can make music that will “simply not be shunted to ‘Global’ and ‘African’ sides.” Miami handed Burna a trophy in a lane nobody built with him in mind.
It comes in a year he has topped Billboard airplay charts twice as a guest, first on Gunna’s “wgft,” which led Rhythmic Airplay for four weeks in January, then on “Dai Dai.” Both times the lead credit belonged to someone else. The Crossover trophy carries his name alone.