The duration of a song is often dictated by the musical style one is making and whether the intention is solely for commercial purposes or not e.g. bubblegum music.
Some genres of music are expected to have a long duration and be evolving e.g. Ambient, etc. whilst other genres of music especially mainstream songs are heavily anticipated to be short and do formulaic (e.g. mainstream Pop, Rock, EDM, Hip Hop, Dancehall music, etc).
Generally speaking, popular music has an average duration of "3 minutes and 30 seconds". And that's mainly because most listeners have a short attention span. But it doesn't mean all songs you make should not exceed 3 minutes and 30 seconds.
At the end of the day, the need for making longer songs should be done with discretion to make sure an average listener remains captivated by the music composition itself without easily feeling an urge to skip the song altogether to the next one in a playlist.
Some genres of music are expected to have a long duration and be evolving e.g. Ambient, etc. whilst other genres of music especially mainstream songs are heavily anticipated to be short and do formulaic (e.g. mainstream Pop, Rock, EDM, Hip Hop, Dancehall music, etc).
Generally speaking, popular music has an average duration of "3 minutes and 30 seconds". And that's mainly because most listeners have a short attention span. But it doesn't mean all songs you make should not exceed 3 minutes and 30 seconds.
At the end of the day, the need for making longer songs should be done with discretion to make sure an average listener remains captivated by the music composition itself without easily feeling an urge to skip the song altogether to the next one in a playlist.
