BTS Rewrites Billboard History

BTS's album 'ARIRANG' has remained at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 for a third consecutive week. Billboard confirmed the chart position on April 12 local time, marking yet another milestone for a Korean act in the U.S. music market.

A Record Built on Records

'ARIRANG' had already become the first album by a Korean artist to spend more than one week atop the Billboard 200. Three straight weeks at No. 1 extends that lead further.

For a group album, the feat hasn't been achieved in over a decade. The last group to accomplish it was Mumford & Sons, whose album 'Babel' topped the chart for five non-consecutive weeks in 2012 and 2013. 'ARIRANG' is also the first album by any artist to top the chart for its first three weeks since Taylor Swift's 'The Life of a Showgirl' last year.

The Numbers Behind the Reign

According to Luminate, 'ARIRANG' earned 124,000 equivalent album units in the week ending April 9. That total comprised 71,000 traditional album sales, 3,000 track equivalent album (TEA) units, and 50,000 streaming equivalent album (SEA) units — the equivalent of 52.44 million on-demand audio streams for the week.

The album also held firm at No. 1 on Billboard's Top Album Sales chart for a third straight week, confirming its dominance in physical sales as well.

K-Pop's Expanding Footprint

The sustained chart performance of 'ARIRANG' reflects how deeply K-pop has embedded itself in the mainstream U.S. music market. A decade ago, a Korean act even appearing in the upper reaches of the Billboard 200 was considered extraordinary. Today, BTS stands alongside Mumford & Sons — a benchmark from the pre-streaming era — as evidence that genre and language barriers in global pop have all but collapsed.

Industry reports this week show fellow K-pop acts ENHYPEN, P1Harmony, Stray Kids, ATEEZ, NewJeans, and IVE also dominating the Billboard World Albums chart, underscoring that 'ARIRANG's' success is part of a broader K-pop surge in the American market.