In “Opalite” Taylor Swift turns an artificial gemstone into an irresistible trustworthy love tune.
There’s one thing splendidly becoming about Taylor Swift naming a tune after a pretend stone. Not pretend in a derogatory sense, thoughts you, however manufactured: intentionally created moderately than found.
On “Opalite,” the third observe from her October 2025 album The Lifetime of a Showgirl, Swift makes use of the man-made opal simulant as a metaphor for the type of happiness you must construct your self.
It’s a intelligent little bit of songwriting, the kind of factor that makes you suppose Swift’s been jotting down phrases and phrases each time inspiration strikes. Which, because it seems, is strictly what she does.
Swift revealed on Capital FM that she’d been stockpiling the phrase “opalite” in her infinite lyric information after studying it was artificial, similar to diamonds will be.
The connection to her fiancé Travis Kelce was quick. Opal is the birthstone for October, when Kelce celebrates his birthday on the fifth, simply two days after the album dropped.
“Travis’s birthstone is an opal. So I’ve all the time fixated on that. I’ve all the time beloved that stone, and I believed it was a cool metaphor, that it’s a man-made opal and happiness will also be man-made, too. In order that’s what the tune is about, that juxtaposition of these two,” Swift defined in the course of the interview.
However Swift’s love affair with opals stretches again additional than her relationship with the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs tight finish.
In a 2017 interview with Us Weekly, she shared a touching reminiscence: “My favourite stone is an opal as a result of once I was bullied at school, my mother used to take me to T.J. Maxx after faculty to take a look at the opal jewellery. I believed opals had been so stunning, and someway it made me really feel higher. We by no means purchased them, simply appeared.”
That element provides extra depth when you think about the tune’s central thesis. Generally simply one thing stunning is sufficient to change your day.
Reuniting with Swedish manufacturing duo Max Martin and Shellback, “Opalite” is an upbeat pop rock tune with Europop influences. It’s the primary time the trio labored collectively since Swift’s Repute period in 2017, and you’ll hear why she needed them again.
Swift informed TIME in 2014 that she selected Martin as a result of he might assist create “sonically cohesive” albums, and “Opalite” proves that chemistry hasn’t pale.
The manufacturing with the drums, guitars, omnichord tones, and people infectious hooks that Martin and Shellback have constructed total careers on sparkle, harking back to their work on Swift’s 1989 period.
The observe is cheerful and hooky, with Swift’s vocals completely capturing the stress between previous heartbreak and cautious optimism. It’s not revolutionary; nevertheless, it makes you need to dance in your kitchen.
The tune opens with Swift admitting to a foul behavior of dwelling on previous relationships. Her brother apparently referred to as this “consuming out of the trash,” which is each hilarious and brutally correct.
She sings about residing with ghosts and listening to excellent {couples} spout platitudes like “when you understand, you understand.”
Then comes the shift. Her mum’s reassurance that issues will get higher, that she was “dancing by way of the lightning strikes, sleepless within the onyx evening, however now the sky is opalite.”
The imagery is inescapable. Onyx is darkish and strong, while opalite catches mild, shifts color, gleams with chance.
The second verse seems to reference Kelce’s previous relationships, concerning feeling alone even whenever you’re with somebody who’s extra focused on their telephone than you.
The road “you had been in it for actual, she was in her telephone” has sparked fan hypothesis about Kelce’s ex-girlfriend, sports activities journalist Kayla Nicole, whom he dated on and off for 5 years earlier than their remaining cut up in Might 2022.
Whether or not intentional or not, Swift consists of references to former relationships of each herself and Kelce all through the tune, portray an image of two individuals who needed to study what they didn’t need earlier than discovering what they did.
The bridge affords what is perhaps the tune’s thesis assertion: “That is only a storm inside a teacup, however shelter right here with me, my love. Thunder like a drum, this life will beat you up. That is only a short-term velocity bump, however failure brings you freedom, and I can deliver you’re keen on.”
It’s reassurance with out attending to soppy, hanging on to hope whereas acknowledging that issues will be tough. The kind of sentiment that solely works whenever you’ve been by way of sufficient relationship turbulence to know the distinction between real connection and simply going by way of the motions.
“Opalite” has been famous as one in every of Swift’s first songs to explain an actual, present relationship moderately than an summary one.
That grounding in actuality provides the observe an anchor that a few of her extra conceptual love songs lack. Kelce himself referred to as it his favorite observe from the album, saying “He loves that one” when Swift talked about it throughout an interview.
There’s additionally one thing refreshing about Swift writing from a spot of contentment moderately than chaos. The tune offers with forgiving your self for relationships that didn’t work out and giving your self permission to not have every thing discovered. After the emotional marathon of The Tortured Poets Division, “Opalite” seems like developing for air.
Regardless of not being launched as a single, “Opalite” has carried out remarkably nicely. The tune ranked #2 on Reddit’s PopHeads Weekly Scorching 50 chart for October 20, 2025, with 258 factors and 1,283 listeners.
It reached the highest ten in a number of nations together with Australia, Vietnam, Switzerland, the Philippines, Denmark, the UK, Malaysia, Norway, Hong Kong, the Netherlands, and Singapore.
Within the UK, “Opalite” took the second spot on the Official Charts in the course of the album’s launch week, while “The Destiny of Ophelia” topped the chart and “Elizabeth Taylor” got here third. This marked the primary time Swift occupied the highest three positions concurrently.
“Opalite” works as a result of it understands one thing important about fashionable relationships and happiness. Generally probably the most genuine factor is what you consciously select to construct.
The artificial stone turns into extra significant than a pure one exactly as a result of it represents intention and energy.
Swift described the metaphor as exploring how happiness will be created voluntarily, which feels significantly resonant in an period the place we’re always informed to “discover ourselves” or watch for the universe to ship what we’d like.
“Opalite” means that perhaps you may simply resolve to make your individual mild, craft your individual pleasure, select to be joyful even when the world’s telling you it needs to be extra sophisticated than that.
It’s a pop tune, positive, nevertheless it’s additionally a philosophy wrapped in a three-minute-fifty-five-second package deal. The truth that it’s a couple of man-made stone celebrating a really actual relationship is simply the kind of paradox that makes nice songwriting.
