K-Pop Popular Artists: BTS Tops Chartmetric with a 98 Score

If you want the K-pop popular artists in one glance, start here. On Chartmetric's K-pop popularity ranking, BTS is No. 1 with a score of 98. BLACKPINK follows at 96.6, and CORTIS is third at 96.5. The order runs on Chartmetric's score, not on raw listener counts. So some names with huge audiences sit lower than you'd guess. Below, you'll see how to read the ranking, who else matters, and where to go once you've heard the top three.

BTS leads at 98, with BLACKPINK at 96.6 and CORTIS at 96.5

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These three names answer which K-pop singer or group is most popular on this list. BTS holds first place on its own. BLACKPINK and CORTIS sit nearly tied behind it, so second and third place are a close race.

If you are new to all this, treat the top three as your starter set. Play one song from each and you'll have a quick feel for the names people mean when they say K-pop artists. Fourth place is not covered here, but ILLIT shows up at fifth, and we'll get to it shortly.

The order follows Chartmetric score, with listener counts off to the side

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Every artist on the ranking carries a Chartmetric score, and the list is sorted by that score. Spotify monthly listeners are shown next to it as extra information. They do not decide the order.

Monthly listeners and a score are not the same thing. A monthly listener figure counts the people who played an artist on one streaming service during a month. A score is the number the list actually trusts for ranking. So when you read any popularity list, check first what it sorts by, then look at the other columns as context.

The Spotify audiences behind the top names, side by side

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BLACKPINK has 18.8M Spotify monthly listeners, and CORTIS has 11.3M. ILLIT, at fifth place, has 19.4M.

Two things jump out of the table. CORTIS has the smallest audience of the five yet holds third place. And ILLIT draws more listeners than BLACKPINK but ranks below it. If listeners set the order, those two lines would flip. They don't, which is exactly why the score matters.

EJAE's 22.4M listeners still land at 13th, so a big audience is not a high rank

The most common mistake with these lists is reading a big listener count as a high rank. EJAE shows the gap clearly. With 22.4M monthly listeners, EJAE has a larger audience than BLACKPINK, ILLIT or CORTIS. Yet EJAE sits at 13th, with a score of 94.2.

The takeaway is simple. If a friend says an artist must be top three because everybody streams them, point to the score column. Listeners show reach on one app. The ranking shows where the score puts each name.

A second mistake is treating any ranking as permanent. Agencies keep releasing new groups, and nobody can yet say whether they can fill the place a supergroup like BTS holds.

There is criticism of the biggest names too. Groups like BTS and BLACKPINK aim at overseas markets in foreign languages. That risks forgetting their roots and drifting from fans at home. The industry's mass-production mindset turns out groups that sound, look and move alike. A high score tells you about popularity, not about every opinion of the music.

The big 4 in K-pop are companies, not groups

When people say the big 4 in K-pop, they mean four companies: SM, YG, JYP and Hybe. These agencies dominate the industry, so you will keep running into their names on albums and on fan chats.

The overseas story goes back further than many newcomers expect. In the early 2000s, TVXQ and BoA found success in Japan, which helped draw attention to K-pop abroad. In 2022, the Korean Music Awards made K-pop its own genre category for the first time.

About 450 pages of K-pop singers sit in Wikipedia's category when the top few aren't enough

Wikipedia's K-pop singers category is a wide place to browse more K-pop artists beyond the top names. It holds about 450 pages, with 200 shown on each page. It also has 98 subcategories, so you can browse by group as well as by singer.

The category covers singers who make K-pop music, and they don't all have to be Korean. Not everyone in it holds Korean nationality, though most are of Korean heritage. The NCT member subcategory has 21 pages, among the largest of the group member subcategories. A separate American K-pop singers subcategory has 35 pages. They include Eric Nam, Jay Park, Jessica Jung, Krystal Jung, Tiffany Young, Hueningkai and Huh Yunjin.

This list keeps changing, so recent news may not be reflected and new names may be missing. The category page is available in 5 languages. If an artist is missing, you can add them yourself by citing a reliable source.

Many listeners begin with a handful of artists like BTS, EXO and Seventeen. From there they branch out, adding one new artist or song at a time. Even two people in one family may follow Korean music and still share almost no favorites. English also shows up in song titles. On one popular chart, English titles made up 8% of the top 50 songs in 1995 and 30% in 2000. The share was 18% in 2005 and 44% in 2010.

Start with the top three, then follow your own taste

On Chartmetric's ranking, BTS leads at 98, with BLACKPINK (96.6) and CORTIS (96.5) right behind. The order follows score, not listener counts, so EJAE draws 22.4M listeners yet sits 13th.

If there are artists among these that you like and you want to see them live too, check out Can Foreigners Go to Concerts in Korea? Use Interpark Global.