Set craft
Warm-up
A warm-up is the opening stretch of a night — slower, quieter, and built to leave the next DJ somewhere to go. Playing peak-time records in a warm-up is the oldest mistake in the job.
Measured in our catalog
Opening tracks in the 518 sets built here average 55 for energy against 63 in the closing third — DJs really do start low and climb.
The rise is steady rather than stepped, and it does not run to the last track: the closing track averages 62, below the third it sits in. Sets are built to peak just before they end, not at the end.
55
Opening track energy
63
Closing third energy
125
Opening median BPM
518
Sets measured
| Position | Tracks | Mean energy | Median BPM |
|---|---|---|---|
| Opening track | 518 | 55.0 | 125.0 |
| First third | 1,752 | 57.3 | 126.0 |
| Middle third | 2,472 | 60.7 | 126.0 |
| Last third | 2,105 | 63.2 | 127.0 |
| Closing track | 518 | 61.7 | 126.0 |
Measured on 11 August 2026 across tracks in 518 hand-sequenced flows of five tracks or more, both analysed; machine-generated running orders excluded. Method: the full transition dataset and its chance baseline.
Why it matters
A warm-up is judged on where it hands over, not on how it sounded at the time. The job is to fill the room and raise the floor gradually enough that the headliner still has an octave of room above you.
It is the one part of a set where restraint is the skill, and the one most often measured wrongly — by the DJ, in the moment, against an empty room.
In Mixgraph
The Flow Builder plots the energy curve of a set as you build it, so the climb is visible before you play it.
Frequently asked
What BPM should a warm-up set be?+
Below where the night is going. Opening tracks in the sets built here sit at a median of 125 BPM against 127 in the closing third — a couple of BPM, not a genre change.
How much quieter should a warm-up be?+
Measurably, but not dramatically. The gap between an opening track and the closing third here is 8.2 points on the 0–100 energy scale — a shift in gear, not a different night.
What is the biggest warm-up mistake?+
Peaking early. If the room is at full energy an hour in, the headliner has nowhere to take it, and the night flattens instead of building.
Related terms
Peak time
Peak time is the stretch of a night a set is built toward — the busiest hour, and the point of highest energy. It names a position in a night rather than a specific sound.
Energy
Energy is a 0–100 reading of how hard a track hits, taken from loudness, spectral drive and percussive weight. It is the dimension that decides where in a set a track belongs rather than what it mixes with.
BPM
BPM — beats per minute — counts how many beats land in sixty seconds. It is the first number a DJ checks, because two tracks have to agree on tempo before anything else about them matters.
Energy curve
An energy curve is the shape a set makes over time — where it starts, how steeply it climbs, where it peaks. It is the plan behind a running order, and the thing a crowd feels without being able to name.
Explore: How to plan a warm-up set · Energy arc tool · Mixing guides · All DJ terms