Charlotte de Witte Hits a Career-High No. 6 in DJ Mag's 2026 Poll, Weeks Before Headlining EDC Thailand in Phuket

David Guetta won DJ Mag's Top 100 DJs poll for a sixth time. Six places under him sits a name Southeast Asian ravers already have circled on their December calendars.

Charlotte de Witte climbed to No. 6 in the 2026 results, announced at [UNVRS] in Ibiza. It's her best finish in a poll she first entered back in 2019 at No. 74, and it beats the No. 9 she hit last year, which was already a career high at the time. Her run since reads almost suspiciously clean: 32, 23, 14, 18, 16, 9, 6. Seven years of climbing, with one small dip in 2023 that nobody much remembers.

A Sixth Crown for Guetta, and a New Top Ten

Guetta topped the list for the sixth time in the poll's history. The rest of the top of the chart moved too. Anyma rose to No. 3. Fred again.. jumped 17 spots to No. 16. Three house names, John Summit, Mau P and Chris Stassy, tied as this year's joint highest climbers, each up 22 places. Josh Baker was the highest new entry, landing at No. 40. DJ Mag says the poll pulled a record number of verified votes from 234 territories this year and raised £120,000 for Bridges for Music, a music academy in South Africa.

None of that is Southeast Asian news by itself. It belongs here because two of this year's biggest movers already have December dates in Thailand.

Both Land in Phuket This December

Dates: December 18 to 20, 2026 Venue: Rhythm Park, Laguna Phuket Tickets: General admission 3-day passes from ฿10,490 at thailand.edc.com

EDC Thailand has de Witte headlining neonGARDEN, the festival's techno stage, run by Insomniac's Factory 93 imprint. It's the kind of booking that used to go to European festivals first and Southeast Asia months later, if at all. Mau P, fresh off his own 22-place jump, plays the December 17 beach pre-party at XANA Beach Club alongside Loco Dice, FIFI and Baggi, a full day before the main festival gates even open.

A Fan Vote, Not a Critic's Pick, and Worth Remembering That

DJ Mag's poll is decided by public ballot, not a panel, so the number itself deserves a little skepticism. It rewards whoever campaigns hardest on social media almost as much as whoever played the best set of the year. What it's more reliable for is momentum, and de Witte's climb from 16 to 9 to 6 across three straight years lines up with real output, not just a good publicist. Her label KNTXT keeps signing techno names like Chris Liebing. She launched a second imprint, Époque, in 2024. In September she put out a new EP with proceeds funding club culture advocacy groups, a cause this region knows plenty about.

She played a free set to 20,000 people in Genoa's Piazza Matteotti back in April. In December, Phuket gets a version of that same draw, indoors on a neon-lit techno stage with a beach pre-party attached the night before. Three-day general admission starts at ฿10,490.

Cover photo: Charlotte de Witte performing, by Alan Overbeek via wikiportret.nl, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.