"Never Again" is a song written by American pop rock singer Kelly Clarkson and Jimmy Messer, and is the first single from her third studio album, My December (2007).

 

As of April, 2008, the single has logged a number of 953,000 digital downloads. The song was nominated for Payback Track on the 2007 Teen Choice Awards. This song was #99 on Rolling Stone's list of the 100 Best Songs of 2007. This song also ranked #63 on Hot 99.5's 100 Best Songs of 2007. The music video of Never Again has been watched over 6,100,000 times on Youtube, as of May 2008.

 

Clarkson confirmed the title and release date of the single on April 4, 2007 on her official website. "Never Again" was made available for sale on April 20, 2007 on the iTunes Store, but was removed after several hours. The single was permanently available for download on the U.S. iTunes Store by April 23, 2007, becoming the only format available in the United States. The single was later released in the United Kingdom on June 11, 2007, about one month after the major releases of the single in several countries. The single is available in digital and physical format, with the former format available for sale in the British iTunes Store.

 

"Never Again" debuted at No. 1 on the U.S. Billboard Bubbling Under Hot 100 based solely on radio airplay on April 26, 2007. The next week, the song debuted on the Billboard Hot Digital Songs chart at #4 with more than 100,000 downloads, subsequently making its Billboard Hot 100 debut at #8. The following three weeks the song fell to #17 on the Billboard Hot 100, but regained momentum, jumping from #17 to #9 after Clarkson's appearance on the American Idol season 6 finale. However, its chart strength was largely due to a high number of digital downloads. After only peaking at #47 on the Hot 100 Airplay Chart, the track was already being pulled from some stations, leading to the unusual step of releasing "Sober" as the second single, only about six weeks later and ahead of the album's release.

 

The song debuted and peaked at #9 on the UK singles chart, entering the chart after the CD single was released in June.

In Australia, the song debuted at number five on the ARIA Singles Chart, making it the song's highest debut worldwide to date. The song also showed progress in the Australian digital chart with the song leaping from #24 to #12 within a week. After her promotional tour in October, the song rose from #50 to #30 in one week. It was also a radio success, peaking at #2 in the Radio Top 100, and currently in its' fiftieth week on chart, at #98. It spent a total of 22 weeks in the ARIA Chart Top 50, making it the longest running song of Clarkson on the chart to date, and was the 40th highest selling single in Australia of 2007.

 

"Never Again" became part of the set list for the "2 Worlds, 2 Voices Tour 2008".