As the superstar K-pop boyband prepare for their first album in three years – after its members completed their military service – we count down the best of their toothsome pop

At the start of their career, BTS were marketed as a cross between a Korean idol band and a blinged-out rap act: “Our life is hip-hop,” offered band member Suga early on. No More Dream is actually far tougher-sounding than you might expect: the vocals growl, the backing blares, the double-bass sample that drives the intro is great.

The top categories are stacked with quality, from Bad Bunny to Kendrick Lamar, Chappell Roan and K-pop hits – but here are the artists who most deserve to triumph

Bad Bunny – DTMF
Sabrina Carpenter – Manchild
Doechii – Anxiety
Billie Eilish – Wildflower
Kendrick Lamar & SZA – Luther
Lady Gaga – Abracadabra
Chappell Roan – The Subway
Rosé & Bruno Mars – APT.

Claudia Sheinbaum sent a diplomatic letter requesting more shows, after a worldwide scramble for tickets

Huge demand to see K-pop septet BTS has led the Mexican president, Claudia Sheinbaum, to formally request of her counterpart, the South Korean president, Lee Jae Myung, that he help arrange more concerts in Mexico.

“Everyone wants to go,” Sheinbaum said at her daily morning press conference on Monday, adding she had sent a diplomatic letter to South Korea’s Lee seeking more concerts.

As the band prepares to tour, economists say pent-up global demand could reshape how concerts boost city economies

Move over, Taylor Swift. Her Eras tour was the highest grossing in history, sparking an estimated $5bn in direct consumer spending across the US. But now another musical phenomenon is preparing to sweep through North America – and economists expect it will generate tens of billions of dollars in economic activity along the way.

K-pop sensation BTS will embark this year on their largest tour yet, spanning 34 regions across five continents, ending a hiatus due to mandatory military service that lasted almost four years.

The title is loaded with meaning for all Koreans, and will give fans globally an insight into the folksong culture that shaped the world’s biggest K-pop group

BTS announced their long-awaited comeback and world tour this week, with their first full-length album in nearly four years set for release on 20 March.

On Friday, the K-pop group revealed its title – Arirang – a choice that carries profound emotional weight for Koreans. So what does it mean, what is its significance for the Koreas, and why did BTS choose it?

South Korean president Lee Jae Myung had his work cut out, picking up his drumsticks alongside Japanese PM Sanae Takaichi, a former heavy metal drummer

If international diplomacy is as much about tone as substance, the leaders of South Korea and Japan seem to have nailed it.

In a scene few anticipated, South Korean president Lee Jae Myung and Japanese prime minister Sanae Takaichi spent the last moments of a crucial summit seated behind matching drum kits in matching blue uniforms as they bashed out hit song Golden from Netflix’s K-Pop Demon Hunters and BTS’s Dynamite.

Both industries dominate the world but now face fundamental transformation and uncertainty at home

South Korea’s entertainment dominance appears unshakeable. From BTS conquering global charts to Parasite sweeping the Oscars in 2020 and Korean dramas topping Netflix, Korean popular culture has never been more visible. Exports driven by the country’s arts hit a record $15.18bn (£11bn) in 2024, cementing the country’s reputation as a cultural superpower.

But inside South Korea, the two industries that helped build the Korean Wave – cinema and K-pop – are now experiencing fundamental transformations, with their survival strategies potentially undermining the creative foundations of their success.

Big K-pop stars and a teen-skewed subtext aims this squarely at a particular audience but this fantasy never really levels up

Starring the actor (Ahn Hyo-seop) who voiced the lead boy-band bad guy in KPop Demon Hunters, and one of the singers (Kim Ji-soo, also known mononymically as Jisoo) from real-world girl-band Blackpink, this Korean sci-fi-fantasy feature feels very skewed towards the young on all counts. Superficially, it appears to be about a guy named Kim Dok-ja (Ahn) who finds that the web novel he’s been following for years is turning into reality. That means the whole world becomes gamified, as if everyone has been turned into players compelled to kill to survive, while plagued by CGI monsters and puckish digital dokkaebi (demons) which explain things when the rules change.

But under the surface, this film is really about being popular, coping with traumatic childhood experiences such as being forced to beat up your best friend, getting a pimple, and building up enough gumption to tell authority figures – older people, your boss, the author of the book you’ve been a fan of for ages – that they suck.