Every Sabrina Carpenter Music Video Ranked
Sabrina Carpenter is on top of the world, and her success has been a long time in the making.
Her first claim to fame was acting on Disney Channel and releasing four studio albums with Disney’s record label, Hollywood Records. Now, she performs in sold-out arenas across the globe, singing about more mature themes to an audience that has grown up with her. From her Girl Meets World days to her Grammy-winning nights, Carpenter has always been a star actress, performer, and storyteller in front of the camera—and her decade worth of music videos proves it. For a trip through the time capsule of the Sabrina Carpenter cinematic universe, here’s every one of her music videos, ranked.
25. The Middle of Starting Over
The Middle of Starting Over was Carpenter’s second-ever single, released in 2014 from her debut EP, Can’t Blame a Girl For Trying. Complete with bright colours, pop art, and a green screen galaxy background, this video instantly transports viewers to Carpenter’s Disney Channel days and simpler times. It captures the theme of the song well: Carpenter sings about not taking life too seriously, and that it’s okay to start over after making mistakes. In the video, she dances around with friends, laughs off her mistakes, and never loses her smile. While it isn’t her strongest music video, it serves as a sweet testament to how far Carpenter has come since her debut.
24. Eyes Wide Open
Eyes Wide Open was the second single from her debut album of the same name, released in 2015. She describes embracing her youth as an opportunity to make her place in the world. It’s a quintessential debut album anthem about craving adventure instead of running from it. The music video is Carpenter’s take on a pop star classic: Carpenter performs the song backed by a full band, as if on stage and playing for an audience. It ends with a scene of her climbing to the roof of the building and looking out at the horizon, symbolising the endless possibilities ahead of her.
23. In My Bed
“Something chemical inside me messing with my head,” Carpenter admits on In My Bed, released in 2019 on her fourth album, Singular (Act II). In this deeply confessional track, she discusses her mental health struggles and how she worsens them herself by ruminating in bed instead of working to get better. Despite the emotional lyrics, the music video is brightly coloured and quirky, showcasing the developmental stages of Carpenter’s cinematic humour as we know it today. In one scene, she lingers around in her disastrously messy hot pink bedroom; in another, she performs an awkward dance routine with a group of older men in suits as backup dancers.
22. Smoke and Fire
Smoke and Fire is a standalone single released in 2016 that describes a catastrophic breakup set in a small town of gossipers—a metaphor for a breakup as a celebrity under the spotlight. The music video follows two timelines: In the first, Carpenter is shown happily getting along with her boyfriend; in the second, an older and wiser Carpenter looks back at those memories scornfully. The first timeline is particularly visual, showing Carpenter sneaking away from a ballet class to be with her boyfriend. This video contains the best storytelling of Carpenter’s earliest music videos and lays the groundwork for the comparable concepts of Skin and santa doesn’t know you like i do.
21. Can’t Blame a Girl For Trying
Can’t Blame a Girl For Trying was released in 2014 as Carpenter’s debut single, and its music video is nostalgia in a bottle. Early Carpenter fans will recognise it as a frequent play between commercials on Disney Channel, and a sweet tune that held us over until the show resumed. It’s memorable for its pastel colour palette, feminine slumber party feel, and fun shots of Carpenter messing around—like when she strums a tennis racket in place of a guitar. This video highlights her early acting skills and unlocks fond memories of her TV show days.
20. Alien
Alien was a standalone single released in 2018 in collaboration with producer Jonas Blue. The song describes uncertainty in a potential new relationship as Carpenter begs her love interest to express their feelings for her outright. In the music video, Carpenter and Blue portray a couple who struggle to get through to each other emotionally and physically, as they are trapped and separated and cannot find their way back to each other. The artistic camerawork and emotion in Carpenter’s acting successfully work together to make viewers feel claustrophobic, dizzy, and desperate in all the right places, as if they are experiencing the romantic turmoil of the music video themselves.
19. Please Please Please ft. Dolly Parton
Please Please Please ft. Dolly Parton, released in 2025, picks up where the original Please Please Please video left off, though that isn’t clear at first. It begins with Carpenter and Parton on a serene drive, singing along to the song together. It isn’t until police sirens sound in the distance and Carpenter grows a worried look on her face that the truth is made clear: They’re taking turns driving a getaway car. The song’s bridge takes us to a shot of the back of their truck, where Carpenter’s boyfriend, as seen in the original Please Please Please video, lies tied up. The video ends leaning into classic Carpenter music video humour as the police cars divert their route and Carpenter gives Parton a relieved shrug, ignoring the muffled sounds of her ex-boyfriend’s screams.
18. Thumbs
“That’s just the way of the world,” Carpenter sings on her 2016 single, Thumbs, from her sophomore album, EVOLution. Thumbs describes how people move through life on autopilot and copy the actions of others. Carpenter advises against it, advocating for individuality and expression, even at the expense of sticking out uncomfortably from the crowd. The music video is impressively filmed in one continuous shot on a subway, where Carpenter and other passengers break free from their shells to dance around. The video begins and ends with the same frame of her sitting alone on the subway, suggesting that even after a brief moment of expression, the world will go on just as it was.
17. Exhale
Exhale was released as the second single from Singular (Act II). A deeply emotional and honest track, it explores Carpenter’s experiences with anxiety and the pressure from her family and label to keep herself together despite life’s difficulties. She repeatedly asks, “Can I breathe for just one second?” In perfect alignment with the song’s theme, the music video is a break from Carpenter’s action-packed, stunt-filled, choreographed music videos. It features beautiful shots of Carpenter wandering around outside alone, looking off into the distance and singing to herself.
16. Almost Love
Almost Love was the lead single from Carpenter’s third album, Singular (Act I), released in 2018. In the lyrics, she describes wanting to take a casual fling with someone to the next level after growing surprisingly attached to them. In the music video, Carpenter struts around a mansion and performs dance routines with a confident all-female squad. Though the lyrics discuss romance and the girl group messes around with boys throughout the video, the women are always the main focus, and such is true about all of Carpenter’s music videos. She consistently highlights women’s experiences and empowerment, which is what makes Almost Love work so well.
15. We’ll Be the Stars
Released in 2015, We’ll Be the Stars was the lead single from Eyes Wide Open. Through the eyes of innocent optimism, the lyrics depict feeling invincible in your youth, as if ready to take on any challenge. The music video shows the accuracy of the belief that less is more. It begins as a collection of simple scenes featuring Carpenter and friends spending time in a green field on a sunny day, whether lying in the grass or prancing around in it. It cuts to a breathtaking nighttime shot of Carpenter, surrounded by golden lights, for the bridge, followed by shots of lanterns floating into the dark sky. While Carpenter is known for leaning into action or comedy in her music videos, this one serves as a great example of her third, more underrated genre: videos that radiate pure comfort.
14. On Purpose
On Purpose was released as the lead single of Carpenter’s EVOLution in 2016. The lyrics explore the simultaneous nerves and excitement that ensue when exploring a budding relationship. The video follows a happy Carpenter around the busy streets of London and feels like a cross between a vintage movie and an influencer travel diary. Since the video accompanies a love song, it’s safe to assume it’s filmed as if Carpenter’s exciting new love is the person behind the camera. Even if that isn’t the intention, the video radiates warmth and nostalgia, making viewers feel as if it came straight from their camera rolls.
13. Paris
Paris was released as a single in 2018, in anticipation of Singular (Act I). The song describes skipping town and escaping to Paris in search of love, only for Carpenter to realise her true love was someone in her hometown who treated her right all along. The music video feels sultry and expensive and is romanticisation in its truest form. It paints romantic avoidance as something glamorous as Carpenter sits in a bath of rose petals, swims beneath the Parisian moonlight, and walks the streets in a blue fur coat. It brings every Paris-obsessed girl’s Pinterest boards to life without sacrificing the integrity of the emotional song lyrics.
12. Please Please Please
Please Please Please was released in 2024 as the second single from her sixth album, Short n’ Sweet. In the lyrics, Carpenter comedically warns her partner not to embarrass her by breaking her heart. In the video, she becomes an accomplice to her boyfriend’s crimes. To avoid the embarrassment of his shenanigans, she kidnaps him and locks him away. The video ends with Carpenter pressing a kiss to his duct-taped mouth, leaving a bright red kiss mark. This became a trademark symbol of the Short n’ Sweet era, as seen on the album cover and her outfits on the Short n’ Sweet Tour. It’s clear in her later videos that Carpenter knows how to use visuals to her advantage as she repeatedly turns something simple like a kiss mark into an impressionable icon and symbol of her brand.
11. Fast Times
Fast Times was released in 2022 as a single from Carpenter’s fifth album, emails i can’t send. The song describes moving fast in a relationship and making impulsive decisions as a symptom of youth; however, in her lovesick state, she leaves the repercussions to deal with later. The music video depicts Carpenter as a secret agent fast-paced action movie, and it’s inspired by Kill Bill and Charlie’s Angels. Packed with physical fights, laser beams, and a sultry dance break, it’s impressive how she chose to capture the theme of life moving quickly, while also steering away from the lyrics’ romantic subject.
10. santa doesn’t know you like i do
santa doesn’t know you like i do was released as part of Carpenter’s 2023 holiday EP, fruitcake, and is the only song from the EP to be accompanied by a music video. In the song, Carpenter wishes for an old love to return in time to spend Christmas together. The music video follows the recipe for a breakup video perfectly: It shows old happy memories of Carpenter and her ex-boyfriend and lets viewers sit in them long enough to forget the couple’s doomed ending. However, the video is haunted by a future Carpenter, who is shown reminiscing about these memories entirely alone. Despite its sadness, the video is complete with all the warm and fuzzy feelings you want from a Christmas-themed video, with footage of Carpenter and her boyfriend baking cookies, ice skating, and playing around by a Christmas tree.
9. Why
Opposites attract in Carpenter’s 2017 single, Why. In the lyrics, Carpenter compares and contrasts herself and her partner, showing how they are each other’s perfect opposites. The music video escalates the storytelling, following the couple through their daily lives in their New York City apartment. In just four and a half minutes, it captures the essence of a full romcom with scenes of the couple getting along just as much as they get under each other’s skin; moments like their take-away dinner date on the living room floor and their almost-break-up in a cafe are especially touching. Like any good rom-com, it makes viewers want to root for the couple until the end, despite their turbulence. Carpenter’s acting skills shine in this video, and it’s hard not to yearn for her rom-com movie leading role debut after watching it.
8. Sue Me
Sue Me was released as the second single from Singular (Act I) in 2018. It was her Feather before Feather: an upbeat pop track about regaining confidence after leaving a bad situation. Although it addresses a romantic relationship, Carpenter wrote it after being sued by her former music managers—a case she ultimately won. And what better way to show off confidence than with a stellar music video? There is never a dull moment in this video as it follows Carpenter as she relaxes at a pool party with her girls, struts fashionably late into a classroom, and dances around a courtroom in an Elle Woods-esque pink suit. This video is best described in three words: main character energy.
7. Nonsense
As one of the biggest songs from the emails i can’t send album, Nonsense took Carpenter’s humour to a much wider audience—and its music video played a huge role in this. In the video, Carpenter is seen getting ready for and attending a party, where she catches the eye of an attractive boy she aims to spend the night with. The catch? The boy is Carpenter herself, dressed in a baggy jacket, short wig, and baseball cap that reads, “Dipshit,” in reference to the album’s title track. The video is pure humour, and it’s easy to imagine how much fun Carpenter had filming scenes dressed as the boy, smoking with friends and chugging a bottle at the party. The video’s final shot is Carpenter as herself and as the boy, hanging outside by his car, with Carpenter towering over him in her heels. She may be sweet, but she isn’t so short when her only competition is herself.
6. Skin
Released as a single between Carpenter’s fourth and fifth albums, Skin is believed to be a reply to Olivia Rodrigo’s song, drivers license. The music video depicts a day in the life of Carpenter and her boyfriend, with shots of them at the dinner table, slow dancing, and lying around the house. The two make a happy couple, even as anomalies start to occur, like rain pouring down on them in the living room and an earthquake shaking the dining room. Their ability to withstand great disasters speaks to how Carpenter refuses to let outside voices taint their relationship. The greatest detail of all is how Carpenter’s boyfriend ignores the disasters like they don’t exist, while she is visibly shaken by them and chooses to carry on anyway—a testament to how women suffer the greatest from relationship criticism.
5. skinny dipping
As the lead single to emails i can’t send, the skinny dipping music video begins a new era in Carpenter’s career by making peace with old memories. The video shows Carpenter revisiting old, meaningful sites and leaving notes in a box labelled, “This too shall pass.” The notes appear on screen in her handwriting throughout the video, and they end up being sneak peeks of lyrics from other songs on emails i can’t send. The video ends with Carpenter all dressed up, frolicking barefoot down a city street at nighttime, using the box as her dance partner. This video feels like digging through a keepsake box or flipping through a photo album, and instead of cringing at the old memories, you’re glad they happened. It makes you want to get up and frolic down the street with her, toward a brand new era.
4. because i liked a boy
The because i liked a boy music video shows Carpenter’s life slowly crumbling down around her and portrays how a traumatic experience can change an optimistic young woman. In the song lyrics, Carpenter describes how her image was ruined in the eyes of the general public: “Now I’m a homewrecker, I’m a slut… Tell me who I am, guess I don’t have a choice, all because I liked a boy.” The video contrasts footage of a happy, naive Carpenter wandering around a brightly lit circus with footage of a more serious Carpenter performing in a dimly lit circus—representing her true self vs. the false image of her forced onto her by others. This music video is emotional, hard-hitting, and brings music to cinematic life like no other.
3. Espresso
Espresso is Carpenter’s biggest hit, and every hit song on the radio needs a visually pleasing and memorable music video. Set on a beach, the Espresso music video is golden and radiant, and watching it feels like sunbathing on a warm summer day. While it scores all the points for aesthetics—Carpenter’s Espresso visor, ice cream cone, and old-fashioned swimwear make it perfectly polished and cohesive—it also doesn’t lack in storytelling. At the start of the video, Carpenter rides on a boat with a date, only to steal the boat and his credit card. She then breaks into a sequence of group dancing on the beach, distracting viewers from her crime. Ultimately, the video ends with her arrest, and the iconic image of Carpenter sitting with her high heels on the dashboard of the police car.
2. Feather
Carpenter redefines unbothered in her iconic Feather music video. In the song, she describes how much better and lighter life feels since letting go of an old love, and the video depicts this at humorous heights. In one scene, Carpenter is at a boxing gym taking selfies and touching up her makeup while a handful of guys get into a physical fight behind her. She only notices the fight when blood splatters onto her cute pink boxing outfit, of course. In another scene, she’s dressed in all black for a funeral but is clearly celebrating instead of mourning as she dances around an empty church. This video speaks to how Carpenter’s personality has made her into the star she is today: She sings about hard-hitting emotions without taking herself too seriously, and knows how to act goofy and aloof, but never at the sacrifice of her intelligence. Additionally, this video is extra iconic for coining catchphrase, “Jesus was a carpenter.”
1. Taste
Carpenter said it herself best: “In the Sabrina cinematic universe, women never die.” This music video depicts Carpenter and Jenna Ortega, her talented co-star and fellow former Disney actress, on a wild chase after each other. Like the song lyrics describe, Carpenter and Ortega play the roles of two girls who share an ex-boyfriend—and when Ortega gets back together with him, jealousy ensues. They go after each other violently, with Ortega pushing Carpenter off a balcony and Carpenter trying to stab her with a knife. The video reaches its cinematic climax when Ortega shares a kiss with her boyfriend and is momentarily deluded into thinking he is Carpenter and attacks him—taking the lyric “you’ll just have to taste me when he’s kissing you” to a whole new level. It ends in good fun with Carpenter’s signature humour when the two finally bond by gossiping about him at his funeral. This video is the pinnacle of Carpenter’s music videos, combining emotional women, comedic crime, and sisterhood that survives even deadly circumstances.
From her masterful comedic timing to cathartic acting skills, Sabrina Carpenter is a force no camera can ignore. The growth in her confidence is undeniable in every music video, song, and album she releases. Carpenter’s success continues to soar as she prepares for a final round of tour dates this fall to wrap up her iconic Short n’ Sweet era. Here’s to hoping we can add a Bed Chem music video to this list before then.
