Dancing With the Stars Season 35 turns its September 22 episode into Viral Hits Night, with 14 couples performing to songs that found a second life through clips, memes and online trends. The show airs at 8 p.m. ET on ABC and streams live on Disney+.
The theme gives the dancers recognizable hooks, but the couples still have to make those short, familiar moments work across a full ballroom routine. Cha-chas and tangos dominate the card, while several pairs use contemporary or jazz to build a more emotional performance.
- Episode date: September 22, 2026
- Season: 35
- Theme: Viral Hits Night
- Couples: 14
- Watch on: ABC and Disney+
Current hits meet familiar viral favorites
Tatyana Ali and Brandon Armstrong dance to “Anxiety,” while Tyler Cameron and Jenna Johnson take on “Ordinary.” Giada De Laurentiis and Pasha Pashkov use “Messy,” and Jenna Davis with Ezra Sosa perform to “Abracadabra.” Amber Riley and Alan Bersten get “APT.,” giving the lineup a strong pop center.
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Taylor Frankie Paul and Val Chmerkovskiy dance to “Sports Car.” Maura Higgins and Gleb Savchenko use “Manchild,” while Ciara Miller and Daniella Karagach perform to “Illegal.” Jackson Dean and Rylee Arnold take “Back to Friends,” and Guillermo Díaz with Emma Slater get “Shake It to the Max.”
The slower choices could change the leaderboard
Harry Jowsey and Britt Stewart perform a contemporary routine to “Beautiful Things.” Julia Michaels and Paul Karmiryan dance to “Golden,” while Connor Wood and Witney Carson use “Die With a Smile.” These tracks offer room for storytelling, but exposed timing and transitions can become more obvious without a fast party rhythm.
The different styles also make raw scores an incomplete comparison. A technically controlled tango may look less immediately viral than a comic jazz routine, yet it can earn stronger marks from the judges. Viewer voting can pull the other way when a familiar online personality has an especially engaged audience.
Fourteen couples means the competition is still crowded
The season remains early enough for a single breakthrough to change expectations. Couples who looked tentative in the premiere can use a widely recognized song to show personality, while early leaders need to prove their first result was sustainable. The double pressure is to honor the viral reference without turning the routine into a recreation of one clip.
Costume, camera direction and social recognition will shape the night as much as song choice. A viral track can earn an immediate response before the first step, yet that advantage disappears if choreography relies only on the audience remembering the original trend. The strongest couples will keep the recognizable mood while giving judges enough ballroom content to score. That balance also reveals which celebrities are learning technique and which are still depending mostly on personality.
Viral Hits Night airs at 8 p.m. ET on September 22. Which song and couple pairing looks best on paper, and whose routine surprised you most? Share your ballroom pick in the comments.
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