How Sandalwood Buzz ranks upcoming Kannada films
Every number on the chart is one we measured: YouTube's public view counts as our poller read them, news articles our desk filed with their sources, and posts on our own network measured from the Meta API. Here is exactly how they become a score.
What is ranked
Kannada films that have not been released by the chart's date: Kannada originals and bilingual films, not Kannada-dubbed releases of other-language films. A film needs a page on our site, so that every row links somewhere, and it must have moved on at least one of the four signals in the week. The week is the seven days to our newest YouTube reading, which is shown on every chart.
The four signals
| Signal | What we measure | Points |
|---|---|---|
| YouTube views | Views gained in the week on the film's official trailers, teasers, first looks and songs, on the official YouTube channels we have verified. Our news desk's poller reads each channel's public feed on a fixed schedule (twice a day since 1 Nov 2026). A promo uploaded during the week counts all its views; for an older one we subtract our reading nearest the start of the week (within 36 hours either side). If our first reading of it came later in the week, only the views after that reading count, and the number is marked as a floor. | 35 |
| Lift over the channel's usual | How the film's best promo did in the week against its channel's usual: the views it gained in the week, divided by the views a typical promo on the same channel has at the same age, up to its first seven days. "Typical" is the median of that channel's promos for other films, each read at a similar age (between two-thirds and one and a half times it). So a promo launched this week is compared with other promos of its own age, and an older one's week with a typical promo's whole first week. It needs at least 3 such uploads; until a channel has them we compare with every channel we track and say so. A baseline of fewer than 5 uploads is marked as a small sample. This is what stops a big music label's channel from winning on its size alone. | 25 |
| News outlets | The number of different news outlets cited in our news desk's sourced articles about the film published in the week. Our desk files release-window stories it can confirm, so this counts coverage we confirmed, not every mention anywhere. | 25 |
| Our network | The audience (views, or accounts reached where that is the larger figure the film's dashboard shows) on posts about the film that our Namma Sandalwood network published in the week, as measured from the Meta API so far. Films we market get more of these posts, so this signal carries the fewest points and those films are marked “Client campaign”. | 15 |
From signals to a score
On each signal, the films with a value above zero are lined up from lowest to highest. A film's points on that signal are the signal's points multiplied by its position in the line and divided by the number of films in it, so the film with the most gets all of them, and films with equal values share the average position. A film with nothing measured on a signal scores zero on it. The score is the sum of the four, out of 100, to one decimal place. Films are ranked by score; equal scores share a rank and are marked as a tie. Positions rather than raw numbers keep one very large upload from flattening everyone else, and every number behind a position is shown on the chart.
What is not counted, and why
We never estimate a number we did not measure. A promo on a channel we have not verified, views on other platforms, ticket sales and interest, and posts outside our own network are not counted, so a film can rank below its real buzz. Ticketing figures will be used only from an official platform or partner count; there is none yet. Our poller keeps the first, roughly 24-hour, roughly 7-day and latest readings of each upload, and each frozen week stores every count it used, so a week can always be checked. YouTube can revise its counts later; we show them as read.
Weekly charts and movement
The chart on the Sandalwood Buzz page is rebuilt on every site update, for the seven days to our newest reading. On the first update of each week (Monday to Sunday, India time), the week that just ended is frozen as that week's chart at its own address, and it never changes afterwards. Movement (up, down, new) on a chart is against the frozen week before it.
A worked example
In the chart for 25 Oct 18:30 – 1 Nov 2026 18:30 IST, Satya S/O Harishchandra ranked 1 of 12 with 57.5 points:
| Signal | Measured | Points | Out of |
|---|---|---|---|
| YouTube views | 11.6 lakh views gained on 1 official promo | 35 | 35 |
| Lift over the channel's usual | 69× vs every tracked channel, 22 uploads (too few comparable from Lahari Music yet) | 22.5 | 25 |
| News outlets | none in the week | 0 | 25 |
| Our network | no posts in the week | 0 | 15 |
Version
Method version 1, published 1 Nov 2026. A change to the method gets a new version number here, and each frozen week names the version it used. Corrections and questions: contact@southsidestudio.in.
Promoting a Kannada film? Work with Sandalwood's film marketing agency.
SouthSide Studio operates the Namma Sandalwood Kannada film and meme network with 650+ public campaign dashboards. Explore our client collaborations and our pages' own film coverage, with post-by-post results.