Songfacts®:

• Here, The Weeknd croons about letting go of someone for whom he maintains a great deal of love. Though they are ending their relationship, the singer would still do anything, even die for her.
• The Weeknd wrote "Die For You" for Starboy, only completing it a week before the album's release.
• Many fans speculated Abel Tesfaye wrote "Die For You" about his breakup with the supermodel Bella Hadid. The pair ended their relationship close to Starboy's official release because of their scheduling conflicts and the thousands of miles between them. The Weeknd hints at this when he sings of "the distance and the time between us."
  
  After breaking up with Bella Hadid in November 2016 and dating Selena Gomez, Abel reconnected with the supermodel. They broke up for good in 2019.
• "Die for You" featured in the second season of the HBO comedy-drama television series Insecure.
• After a resurgence in popularity because of TikTok in September 2021, the Weeknd released a video for the track directed by Christian Breslauer. The clip pays homage to the 1982 science fiction film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial and the Netflix show Stranger Things.
• The Weeknd released the Ariana Grande-featuring remix on February 24, 2023. He co-produced the new version with Cirkut, Doc McKinney, Cashmere Cat, and Prince85.
• The remixed edition remains faithful to the original song, bar supplementary synthesizers in the chorus and Ariana Grande's harmonies and vocal runs. Grande's heartfelt second verse parallels The Weeknd's feelings in the original.
• According to Grande, she wrote and recorded a verse for her friend's remix after a 14-hour day on the film set of Wicked. "This certain exception had to be made," she said.
• "Die For You (Remix)" is the fourth collaboration between The Weeknd and Frande, following "Love Me Harder" from Grande's 2014 album My Everything, "Off the Table" from her 2020 Positions record, and the remix of The Weeknd's 2020 After Hours track "Save Your Tears."
• "Die for You" leapt from #6 to #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 the week after Grande came on board for its remix. Its span of six years, two months, and three weeks from its Hot 100 debut to topping the chart in March 2023 set the record for the longest run to #1 among non-holiday songs.