K-Pop's Biggest Fan Groups in 2026 — TOP 10 List
Which K-Pop groups have the most fans in 2026? We picked the top 10 boy groups and girl groups using Spotify, album sales, and world tour data.
📊 Where did the numbers come from? Spotify · Billboard · Hanteo Chart · 2025 Korean Wave Report. Numbers are rounded. They can change any time.
A personal note from the Editor.
Living in Seoul, I see K-Pop fandom up close in ways that do not always translate through a Spotify number. I have walked past coffee trucks parked outside HYBE’s building, sent by fans to celebrate a member’s birthday. I have seen the long lines outside album pop-up stores days before a comeback. The numbers below are real and worth tracking, but they only tell half the story — so after the rankings, I want to walk through the half that does not show up on a chart.
K-Pop fans live everywhere. Seoul. São Paulo. Tokyo. Toronto. Millions of people hit play every single day.
But who has the biggest fan groups right now?
We checked four things:
- 🎵 How many people listen on Spotify each month
- 📀 How many albums they sell
- 📱 How big their fan groups are on social media
- 🌍 How many countries their tours reach
Here are the 2026 results.
🧮 How We Actually Ranked This List
A lot of “biggest fandom” rankings quietly blend a handful of numbers into one score and never explain how. We are doing the opposite: being upfront about exactly what we measured, why, and where it falls short.
The primary sort is Spotify monthly listeners. We picked this as the backbone number for one honest reason: it is the only metric on this list that is measured the exact same way for every single group, updated constantly, and publicly visible without an agency’s PR team filtering it first. Album sales, tour attendance, and social follower counts are all real signals of fandom strength, and we bring them into the write-up for each group below — but they are reported inconsistently (some agencies disclose exact sell-through numbers, others do not), so folding them into one blended score would let us quietly hide our assumptions inside made-up weights. We would rather show our work.
What this ranking is not measuring: cultural impact, chart longevity, critical reception, or “who deserves it more.” A group with a smaller but hyper-engaged fandom (heavy album buying, sold-out tours, low streaming) can be genuinely more commercially powerful than its Spotify number alone suggests — TWICE and Stray Kids are good examples we call out directly below. Read the number as “reach,” not as a verdict.
Data collected: June 2026, from the sources listed at the bottom of this post. Streaming numbers move week to week — treat every figure here as a snapshot, not a permanent scoreboard.
🟢 Boy Groups — TOP 10
Sorted by Spotify monthly listeners in 2025
| # | Group | Fan Name | 2025 Listeners | Going Up or Down? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🥇 | BTS | ARMY | 24.9M | ↘ still #1 |
| 🥈 | Stray Kids | STAY | 11.3M | ↗ growing |
| 🥉 | SEVENTEEN | CARAT | 10.2M | ↗↗ fast growth |
| 4 | TXT | MOA | 8.6M | ↗ growing |
| 5 | ENHYPEN | ENGENE | 7.2M | ↗ growing |
| 6 | ATEEZ | ATINY | 6.5M | ↗ growing |
| 7 | NCT 127 | NCTzen | 5.8M | → staying flat |
| 8 | EXO | EXO-L | 5.0M | ↘ coming back |
| 9 | RIIZE | BRIIZE | 4.2M | 🚀 brand new |
| 10 | P1Harmony | P1ECE | 3.5M | ↗ growing |
🩷 Girl Groups — TOP 10
Sorted by Spotify monthly listeners in 2025
| # | Group | Fan Name | 2025 Listeners | Going Up or Down? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🥇 | BLACKPINK | BLINK | 31.9M | ↗↗ fast growth |
| 🥈 | TWICE | ONCE | 26.5M | ↗↗↗ huge jump |
| 🥉 | NewJeans | Bunnies | 13.5M | ↘ still top 3 |
| 4 | LE SSERAFIM | FEARNOT | 13.1M | → staying flat |
| 5 | (G)I-DLE | NEVERLAND | 11.8M | ↗ growing |
| 6 | aespa | MY | 11.1M | ↗ growing |
| 7 | ILLIT | LLIT | 11.1M | ↘ after big debut |
| 8 | IVE | DIVE | 7.7M | → staying flat |
| 9 | Red Velvet | ReVeluv | 6.3M | ↗ comeback |
| 10 | MAMAMOO | MOOMOO | 5.8M | → steady |
🏆 Boy Group #1 — BTS · Fan Name: ARMY
BTS — HYBE Entertainment
BTS started in 2013. They changed K-Pop forever.
ARMY is not just a fan group. It is a world movement. ARMY members live in 195 countries. They stream music. They go to concerts. They even do charity work together.
Why is BTS still #1? Some members are serving in the Korean military right now. But ARMY never stops listening. That kind of love is very hard to beat.
| Debut | June 13, 2013 |
| Members (7) | RM, Jin, Suga, J-Hope, Jimin, V, Jungkook |
| Spotify 2025 | 24.9M listeners per month |
| Top Songs | Dynamite · Butter · Boy With Luv · DNA · Spring Day |
| Company | HYBE |
| Big Records | Grammy nominee · Billboard Hot 100 #1 · 50B+ YouTube views |
How has Spotify grown over time?
| Year | Monthly Listeners |
|---|---|
| 2021 | 42.9M |
| 2022 | 41.0M |
| 2023 | 27.8M |
| 2024 | 26.0M |
| 2025 | 24.9M |
💡 Yes, the number went down after 2022. That is because members went to the military. But 24.9M is still the highest number for any K-Pop boy group. ARMY is that powerful.
🥈 Boy Group #2 — Stray Kids · Fan Name: STAY
Stray Kids — JYP Entertainment
Stray Kids — fans call them SKZ — debuted in 2018. What makes them special? They write and produce most of their own music. A small group inside the group called 3RACHA does a lot of that work.
Their sound is big, loud, and bold. Songs like Miroh and Thunderous feel like a storm. STAY loves that.
| Debut | March 25, 2018 |
| Members (8) | Bang Chan, Lee Know, Changbin, Hyunjin, Han, Felix, Seungmin, I.N |
| Spotify 2025 | 11.3M listeners per month |
| Top Songs | Miroh · Thunderous · CASE 143 · Social Path · Rock |
| Company | JYP Entertainment |
| Big Records | First K-Pop act to sell 5 million copies of one album |
How has Spotify grown over time?
| Year | Monthly Listeners |
|---|---|
| 2021 | 5.2M |
| 2022 | 7.3M |
| 2023 | 9.8M |
| 2024 | 10.5M |
| 2025 | 11.3M |
📈 Stray Kids grow every single year. No slow-down. Just up and up.
🥉 Boy Group #3 — SEVENTEEN · Fan Name: CARAT
SEVENTEEN — Pledis Entertainment (HYBE)
SEVENTEEN has 13 members. Yes — thirteen! They split into three teams: a Hip-Hop Unit, a Vocal Unit, and a Performance Unit. The members write songs, make dances, and even direct their own music videos.
CARAT means “to love with strength.” It comes from the brightness of a diamond. CARАTs shine for SEVENTEEN.
| Debut | May 26, 2015 |
| Members (13) | S.Coups, Jeonghan, Joshua, Jun, Hoshi, Wonwoo, Woozi, The8, Mingyu, DK, Seungkwan, Vernon, Dino |
| Spotify 2025 | 10.2M listeners per month |
| Top Songs | Left & Right · Ready to Love · Super · God of Music · Don’t Wanna Cry |
| Company | Pledis Entertainment (HYBE Labels) |
| Big Records | 2.5M first-week album sales |
#4 Boy Group — TXT · Fan Name: MOA
TXT (Tomorrow X Together) — Big Hit Music (HYBE)
TXT stands for Tomorrow X Together. They came out in 2019 under HYBE — the same company as BTS. But TXT has its own sound. They mix pop, rock, and alternative music together.
Their albums tell a story about growing up. MOA means “to gather.” Fans who love deep storytelling really connect with TXT.
| Debut | March 4, 2019 |
| Members (5) | Yeonjun, Soobin, Beomgyu, Taehyun, HueningKai |
| Spotify 2025 | 8.6M listeners per month |
| Top Songs | 0X1=LOVESONG · Can’t You See Me? · Sugar Rush Ride · Good Boy Gone Bad |
| Company | Big Hit Music (HYBE) |
| Big Records | Billboard 200 peak: #2 |
#5 Boy Group — ENHYPEN · Fan Name: ENGENE
ENHYPEN — BELIFT LAB (HYBE)
ENHYPEN came from a TV show called I-Land in 2020. Seven boys competed hard and made it through. Now they are one of the top 4th-gen groups.
Their concept is dark fantasy — vampires, shadows, and mystery. Very cool.
Members Jay (from the US) and Jake (from Australia) help connect with English-speaking fans all over the world.
| Debut | November 30, 2020 |
| Members (7) | Jungwon, Heeseung, Jay, Jake, Sunghoon, Sunoo, Ni-ki |
| Spotify 2025 | 7.2M listeners per month |
| Top Songs | Given-Taken · Drunk-Dazed · Bite Me · Sweet Venom · Fatal Trouble |
| Company | BELIFT LAB (HYBE Labels) |
| Big Records | Million-seller album · Members from 3 different countries |
📊 Who Is Growing the Fastest?
| Group | 2021 Listeners | 2025 Listeners | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|
| TWICE | 7.2M | 26.5M | +268% 🚀🚀 |
| SEVENTEEN | 3.1M | 10.2M | +229% 🚀 |
| BLACKPINK | 14.8M | 31.9M | +115% ↗ |
| Stray Kids | 5.2M | 11.3M | +117% ↗ |
| RIIZE | — | 4.2M | 🆕 new group |
Big surprise: TWICE is the fastest-growing major group. Lots of fans are finding their old songs and falling in love with them.
🌍 Why Are K-Pop Fan Groups So Strong?
K-Pop fans do not just listen to music. They build communities. Here is why it works:
- Fan events — Groups hold fan meetings, online concerts, and pop-up stores in cities around the world.
- Fan names and identity — Being an “ARMY” or a “BLINK” feels like joining a special club.
- Social media — Twitter (X), TikTok, Weverse, and Bubble apps keep fans close to their favorite artists every day.
- Streaming together — Fans plan streaming parties to help their favorite songs get to the top of the charts.
- Photo cards in albums — Fans love collecting photo cards. This makes people buy more albums!
🇰🇷 What “Fandom” Means Differently in Korea vs. Abroad
Spotify numbers measure listening. They do not measure how differently fandom actually works depending on where you live, and the gap is bigger than most global fans realize.
Album buying is a different sport in Korea. Overseas, one copy of an album is normal. In Korea, many fans buy multiples — sometimes dozens — of the same album, because each copy comes with a random photo card, and completing a full set (or getting a specific member’s card) is part of the fun. Companies also count album sales toward year-end awards and music show wins, so buying in bulk is partly a fan’s way of “voting” with their wallet. This is also why you will sometimes see Korean news coverage about “sajaegi” (음반 사재기) controversies — accusations that an agency or fan group is buying back its own albums in bulk to fake chart rankings. It is a real, ongoing tension in the industry that most Spotify-driven global rankings never touch.
Fan trucks and demonstration gifts are a uniquely Korean flex. Sending a coffee truck, a rice wreath, or an LED billboard ad near an idol’s agency to celebrate a birthday or comeback is a specifically Korean fan tradition, one that has spread a little internationally but is still concentrated here. It comes from a culture of showing support publicly and visibly, almost like a small parade, rather than only online.
Music show wins matter more here than almost anywhere else. Global fans mostly track Billboard and Spotify. Domestic Korean fans track something Western media barely covers: weekly wins on shows like Music Bank, M Countdown, and Inkigayo. Winning one of these is a mix of digital points, album sales, social media votes, and broadcast points, and it is treated as a genuine milestone worth celebrating, screenshotting, and reposting for days.
Sasaeng culture is a real, and darker, part of the conversation. “Sasaeng” fans, an extreme minority who stalk idols’ flights, homes, or cars, are a serious safety issue that Korean agencies and fans openly discuss and condemn. It rarely comes up in international fan spaces, but it shapes real decisions — flight schedules kept private, extra security, idols avoiding certain routines. Healthy fandom in Korea includes an active, vocal pushback against this behavior from fans themselves.
None of this makes one style of fandom “better.” It just means a Spotify chart and a Korean entertainment news cycle are often telling two different stories about the same group, on the same day.
📚 Sources & Further Reading
The listener and sales figures in this post are estimates built from public chart-tracking sites, not exact label-reported numbers — treat them as directional, not precise. Where we pulled from:
- Monthly Spotify listener trends: kworb.net’s Spotify charts, a widely used independent tracker of public Spotify streaming data, and Spotify’s own K-Pop ON! newsroom coverage
- Chart performance and album sales records: Billboard’s chart archive and Hanteo Chart, South Korea’s official physical and digital album sales tracker
- Fandom culture and Korean Wave industry trends: KOFICE (Korea Foundation for International Cultural Exchange) Hallyu reports, which publishes an annual survey on global Korean Wave audiences
Numbers are rounded and can shift as new chart data comes in — if you spot one that looks outdated, let us know.