BTS became the first group ever to hit 10 billion Spotify streams in a single year, their label said, after the album Arirang more than doubled last year’s total.
BigHit Music said Friday that the South Korean superband crossed the mark on Spotify, a threshold previously reached only by solo stars Taylor Swift, Ariana Grande, and Bad Bunny, UPI reported from Yonhap.
The jump was not gradual. BTS logged 4.5 billion Spotify streams last year. This year’s total more than doubled that figure, powered by the group’s fifth studio album.
That album, “Arirang,” arrived after nearly four years without a full-group project. All of the members had finished mandatory military service and reunited before the release.
“Arirang” landed on March 20 and cleared more than 110 million streams that same day. Since release, the album has topped 5 billion streams on Spotify and ranks as the most-streamed album among titles issued this year on the platform.
Chart success followed the streaming wave. “Arirang” became the first album by a group to lead the Billboard 200 for three straight weeks since Mumford & Sons’ “Babel” did it in 2012.
For a group coming off a long service-related pause, the commercial rebound was immediate. The label’s claim puts BTS alone among bands at the 10 billion single-year Spotify mark, while the biggest names ahead of them remain solo acts.
Spotify’s raw totals and the Billboard run both point the same direction: the reunion album did not soft-launch. It dominated its release window and kept converting listens into a full-year record no other group has touched.
Finish the obligation, drop the work, and let listeners decide. The stream count did the rest.
