This Week on the ‘Spotify: For the Record’ Podcast, How K-Pop Became a Global Phenomenon

Since Spotify debuted our first K-Pop playlist in 2014, listeners have streamed more than 180 billion minutes of the genre and added K-Pop tracks to more than 120 million Spotify playlists. The share of K-Pop listening has increased by more than 2,000% in the last six years—meaning it’s growing really quickly compared to other musical genres. All this to say: K-Pop is huge on Spotify around the world.

That’s why we’re devoting this week’s episode of our new podcast Spotify: For the Record to K-Pop—and talking to some of the biggest fans and names in the business about where the genre has been and where it’s headed.

Tune in to hear from Kossy Ng, Spotify’s Head of Artist Label Partnerships in Southeast Asia, and consider the genre’s domestic origins (prior to world domination). Then, explore K-Pop’s global impact with Babi Dewet and Érica Imenes, a pair of Brazilian K-Pop fans who have founded K-Pop-themed groups, written books, and even created a K-Pop-themed podcast, Kpapo.

Keep listening to get to know Wonho Chung, a Korean actor, singer, and comedian who was born in Saudi Arabia, educated in Jordan, lives in the UAE, and witnessed the rise of K-Pop in the Middle East firsthand. Finally, bring it home with one of the top 10 most-streamed K-Pop artists of all time, Stray Kids, who share how the genre transcends the barriers of language . . . and impersonate a mosquito.

Dive into K-Pop on Spotify: For the Record: “From Seoul to São Paulo: The Global Rise of K-Pop.”