From October 26, 1974^[1] until August 28, 1976, Billboard's Disco Action section published weekly single retail sales charts from various local regions along with Top Audience Response Records in their magazine.^[2] Billboard debuted its first national chart devoted exclusively to 12-inch Singles Sales in their issue dated March 16, 1985.^[3] This record type is most commonly used in disco and dance music genres where DJs use them to play in discos or dance clubs because of the exclusive extended remixes that are often only made available on this format, but Billboard's 12-inch Single Sales chart ranks releases by artists from all styles of music that release maxi-singles.^[4]

The 50-position weekly ranking joined Billboard's established Dance/Disco Top 80 chart, reduced to the same 50 positions, both under the title Hot Dance/Disco, becoming two separate Top 50 charts: 12-Inch Singles Sales and Club Play. A coupling from MCA Records' Beverly Hills Cop soundtrack, Patti LaBelle's "New Attitude"^[5] and Harold Faltermeyer's "Axel F",^[6] held the No. 1 slot for the 12-inch Singles Sales chart's first week^[7] and was also No. 1 for the second consecutive week on the most played dance/disco chart.^[8][7]

Madonna's "Angel" 12" vinyl single from 1985 contains one of the most famous B-sides in U.S. history: "Into the Groove," featured in the film Desperately Seeking Susan.^[9] While receiving a proper release in other countries, Warner Bros. Records relegated the song to 12-inch B-side status in America despite its enormous popularity on radio and MTV, thus making it ineligible to enter the Billboard U.S. Hot 100.^[10] The dance mix edit of "Angel" is the B-side of the 7-inch single that did chart the Hot 100.^[11] "Into The Groove" has been cited by multiple publications as Madonna's best single, but only charted Billboard in the Hot Dance/Disco section as a dual sided single peaking at #1 for 7 weeks on the 12-inch Single Sales survey & #1 for 1 week on the Club Play survey^[12] and on the Hot Black Singles chart as a single track peaking at #19.^[13] Only later remixes by Shep Pettibone and Goh Hotoda^[14] are available on Madonna's albums.

The word "disco" was removed from the title of the section of both charts beginning September 19, 1987.^[15] After being temporarily renamed Hot Dance 50,^[16] Billboard retitled the section Hot Dance Music on October 24, 1987.^[17]

On the first Billboard Music Awards in 1990, Janet Jackson^[18] was awarded #1 Hot Dance 12-inch Singles Sales Artist.^[19] The 1991 winner for #1 Hot Dance 12" Singles Sales was C + C Music Factory featuring Freedom Williams' "Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)".^[20][21]

On June 20, 1992, Billboard began to also survey cassette tape and CD maxi-singles along with vinyl twelve-inch singles renaming the chart Maxi-Singles Sales.^[22] In 1993, the Billboard Music Award winner for #1 12" Dance Single was RuPaul's^[23] "Supermodel (You Better Work)".^[24][25] The Maxi-Singles Sales survey began using actual sales figures (SoundScan) to compile the chart on August 28, 1993.^[26]

On July 28, 2001, Billboard launches the 15 position Top Electronic Albums chart and reduces the Maxi-Singles Sales chart size from 50 to 25 positions, 30 positions online.^[27] Top Electronic Albums chart is expanded to 25 positions on December 2, 2001.^[28]

Billboard renamed the Maxi-Singles Sales survey to Dance Singles Sales^[29] on March 1, 2003,^[30] although the survey would continue to chart popular maxi-singles^[31] by artists from other genres of music besides dance even more frequently such as hip hop & rap artists like Public Enemy^[32] and 2Pac^[33][34] and alternative rock & industrial metal bands such as The Smiths^[35] and Ministry.^[36][37] 2006's "Every Day Is Exactly the Same" by Nine Inch Nails^[38] topped the sales chart more than any other single with 36 inconsecutive weeks, yet never appeared on the Hot Dance Club Play survey.^[39][40]

Billboard launches the 40 position Hot Dance Radio Airplay chart online August 16, 2003, ranking the songs on stations playing mainly dance music.^[41] Dance Singles Sales is retitled Hot Dance Single Sales when the top 25 Hot Dance Radio Airplay begins to appear in print on October 25 of that year.^[42] The single "Me Against The Music" by Britney Spears and Madonna won the award for "Hot Dance Singles Sales Single of the Year"^[43] at the Billboard Music Awards in 2004.^[44][45]

Beginning April 30, 2005, the Billboard Dance section started alternately printing Hot Dance Single Sales and Top Electronic Albums every other week in the magazine^[46] until Hot Dance Single Sales^[47] became only available at billboard.biz after the February 24, 2007 issue.^[48] Billboard reduces the position size of the Hot Dance Singles chart from 25 to 15 positions on March 30, 2007.^[49] Stevie Nicks' 2007 remix single of "Stand Back" debuted at #3 on the chart on September 15, 2007,^[50] peaking at #2 the following week where it stayed for two weeks.^[51]

Top Electronic Albums is renamed Top Dance/Electronic Albums by Billboard on June 20, 2009.^[52] The size of the Dance Singles Sales chart is reduced further down to 10 positions on October 3, 2009.^[53] Billboard's Dance/Electronic Digital Song Sales, a 50 position chart ranking of the most popular downloaded songs ranked by sales data as compiled by Luminate, debuts online January 23, 2010.^[54] Hot Dance Airplay is retitled Dance/Mix Show Airplay^[55][56] on November 19, 2011, and reconfigured to rank total weekly plays as monitored by Nielsen BDS from full-time dance-formatted stations, as well as plays on Mainstream Top 40 and select Rhythmic and Adult Top 40 stations that have submitted their hours of mix show programming.^[57][58]

The Hot Dance/Electronic Songs^[59] chart is launched in Billboard magazine's newly restructured Dance/Electronic music section on January 26, 2013.^[60] Similar to the Hot 100, Dance/Electronic Songs is Billboard's first-ever ranking of the nation's top dance songs combining sales (tracked by Nielsen SoundScan), radio airplay, streaming data and club play.^[61] Billboard's Dance/Electronic Streaming Songs chart debuted online April 20, 2013, ranking the week's most popular streamed dance songs (audio + video) on leading U.S. digital music services.^[62]

After years of falling record sales,^[63] Billboard discontinued their weekly Dance Singles Sales survey later that year.^[64] The last chart of the nearly 29 year old national survey was published online November 30, 2013.^[65] On June 1, 2019, Billboard introduced their weeekly Dance/Electronic Producers^[66] and Songwriters^[67] surveys. After almost 45 years of continuous weekly national charts, Billboard's Dance Club Songs survey has been suspended since March 28, 2020,^[68] due to widespread social distancing being practiced in reaction to the COVID-19 pandemic.^[69][70]

The following are the top charting singles for each year of the duration of the Hot Dance Singles Sales survey.^[71]

The following singles peaked at #1 for more than 12 weeks on the Hot Dance Singles Sales survey.

The following #1 singles charted over 100 total weeks each on the Hot Dance Singles Sales survey.^[132]

The following artists charted 5 or more #1 singles on the Hot Dance Singles Sales survey between 1985 and 2013.