"Breakaway" is a 2004 song co-written by Avril Lavigne, Bridget Benenate and Matthew Gerrard, produced by John Shanks and recorded by pop rock singer Kelly Clarkson. It was the first single in North America, Latin America and Australia, and the fifth single in Europe and Indonesia, from Clarkson's second album, Breakaway.

 

The song was released as a single in the U.S. in July 2004. After two underperforming singles, "Low" and "The Trouble with Love Is", a few critics had written off Clarkson as an American Idol has-been, and neither they nor Clarkson's management team expected the song to be very successful. Clarkson stated that she recorded the song "Breakaway" to tide fans over until September of that year, when her team had been planning the release of the first single from her second album.

 

The situation changed in August 2004, when "Breakaway" entered the Billboard Hot 100 and slowly began to climb it. It gradually became one of the biggest hits of late 2004, peaking at number six on the Hot 100 in November, becoming Clarkson's first top ten single since "Miss Independent" in 2003. Because of the slow-burning success of "Breakaway", RCA Records pushed back the release of Clarkson's next single, moved the release of the album to November and titled it Breakaway to attract fans of the song.

 

"Breakaway" is one of the songs with the most longevity on the Hot 100, not leaving until July 2005; this can be partly attributed to its steady digital download sales, which have gained the single a RIAA gold certification.

 

"Breakaway" spent a record twenty consecutive weeks at number one on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart. The song also shares the record for the longest run at number one for a female artist — twenty-one weeks — with Céline Dion's "A New Day Has Come". "Breakaway" is the longest running number-one on the chart from a film soundtrack.

In Australia, "Breakaway" debuted and peaked at number ten and was later certified gold.

 

The song was extremely popular in Canada and reached number three. It was the fifth single from the album in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, with a UK release date of June 26, 2006.[3] The song became Clarkson's eighth top forty hit in the UK, peaking at number twenty-two.