List of songs written by Harry Styles

English singer-songwriter, musician, model and actor Harry Styles has written tracks on both of his studio albums — Harry Styles (2017) and Fine Line (2019) — and an assortment of other artists. He has majority of shares in most of his songwriting credits.[1][2]

Styles performing in Nashville, Tennessee as part of Harry Styles: Live on Tour in 2018.

Styles worked with Jeff Bhasker, Mitch Rowland, Alex Salibian, Tyler Johnson, and Ryan Nasci on his first album, including the lead single "Sign of the Times", which peaked at number one on the UK Singles Chart[3] and sold over two million copies in the US.[4] Styles conceptualised the song as the situation of "a mother [giving] birth to a child and there's a complication. The mother is told, 'The child is fine, but you're not going to make it.'"—an analogy the singer uses to allude to the "fundamental" injustices present in life and modern society.[5] Styles explained the process of composing it: "The song that made the album feel like it was starting to actually be an album instead of a group of songs was Sign of the Times. I finished lunch early and went and sat at the piano for about five minutes. It was the quickest songwriting on the album. I think we'd finished it, minus the choir, in about three hours."[6] Bhasker echoed that sentiment, "Harry was playing it on the piano and we fleshed it out a little bit. Then he jumped on the mic, I played piano and we cut that whole record in three hours."[7] Bhasker also noted that Styles, "got to lead the room. He didn't have to sit there and constantly feel like he's got to defer to me. Harry was the boss."[7]

For his second studio album, Styles partnered with longtime friend and standout producer Thomas Hull, who also had a small role in his debut record, as well as former collaborators Johnson, Rowland, and Bhasker. He described the process of making this album as, "More joyous," and said that "The freeing part of making this album was redefining what success meant to me. Adopting the frame of mind that doing the type of music that makes me happy is the true marker of success, and letting go of all the strings that I'd held onto about the kind of numbers my records had to do, was very liberating."[8] Styles described the record's first single "Lights Up", which peaked at number three on the UK Singles Chart,[9] as being a "very uplifting and liberating song" and "about self-reflection, self discovery, and freedom. Things that I've been trying to process and wrestle with over the last couple of years—accepting all of those things."[10] About the writing process, he said that, "Lights Up was the most unorthodox song I've ever made. It was written via voice notes with Tyler [Johnson]. He'd send me a track and we'd send voice notes back and forth. I wrote the lyrics and we got together in the studio to record it really quickly. On the second day I decided to put the choir on, which we don't usually do so early on. Once we put the choir on, it made the song and took it to a different place. My favourite part about it is that I don't know what the song is. It doesn't necessarily make that much sense, but I think that's part of what makes me like it."[8]

After co-writing several songs on Up All Night and Take Me Home, Styles worked with Savan Kotecha and Carl Falk to write "Happily", and Gary Lightbody of Snow Patrol and Jacknife Lee to write "Something Great", both of which appeared on Midnight Memories. On this album, Styles also co-wrote the hit single Story of My Life, which peaked at number two on the UK Singles Chart,[11] and sold over three million copies in the US.[12] Styles co-wrote the song "Just a Little Bit of Your Heart" with Johan Carlsson which was included on Ariana Grande's second studio album My Everything (2014). He also co-wrote the song "I Love You" with Carlsson which was recorded by Alex & Sierra for their debut studio album. Styles co-wrote several songs on Four including "Where Do Broken Hearts Go", "Stockholm Syndrome", and hit single Night Changes. He contributed to several songs on Made in the A.M. including the second single "Perfect", which peaked at number two on the UK Singles Chart.[13] Styles co-wrote the song "Someday" with Meghan Trainor which was recorded by Trainor and Michael Bublé for the latter's ninth studio album, Nobody but Me (2016). With Jack Antonoff and Ilsey Juber, Styles co-wrote "Alfie's Song (Not So Typical Love Song)", released as a single by Bleachers, for the soundtrack of the film Love, Simon (2018).

Styles has a total of eighty-four writing credits under his name, including several unreleased tracks. Aside from the aforementioned artists, Styles has written for bands Augustana and Kodaline, as well as singer Gavin DeGraw. He's collaborated with OneRepublic lead singer Ryan Tedder, EGOT recipient John Legend, and Snow Patrol pianist Johnny McDaid. Colleagues of Styles have indicated that he's composed music with Taylor Swift,[14] Bruno Mars,[15] and Max Martin,[15] though no works have been registered as of yet.

Styles talent and proficiency in songwriting has been noted by several of his writing partners, with Tedder referring to him as a "phenomenally talented writer"[16] and Kotecha remarking that, "With Harry it was really interesting, because from [One Direction's] album two you really saw that he was a fucking good writer. We did a song together for the third album — the only thing we did for the third album — called Happily, which I'm really proud of and I think he is as well... he was really great at bringing ideas."[17] Meanwhile, Grande has praised Styles, affirming that "People know Harry, of course, first and foremost as a singer, but I think they'll be very impressed when they hear his writing skills,"[18] and that "I was more intimidated, because he recorded a demo for me so I could learn the song [Just A Little Bit of Your Heart]. I was like, 'I don't know if I wanna touch this song! It is so beautiful, the way he sang it, I don't know if I want to make it my own.'"[19] For his part, Legend commented that "I'd love to write with him again as he is a great guy and very talented. He has some really great lyrical ideas and is a very good songwriter."[20]