BTS

What kind of group is BTS

BTS is a seven-piece group under BIGHIT MUSIC, made up of RM, Jin, Suga, j-hope, Jimin, V and Jung Kook. Kyunghyang Shinmun gave the group’s debut date as 13 June 2013 in its tenth-anniversary piece. The fandom is called ARMY, and the official site writes the fan club as “BTS GLOBAL OFFICIAL FANCLUB ARMY MEMBERSHIP”.

From the school trilogy to WINGS

The debut single album 2 Cool 4 Skool came out on 12 June 2013 with seven tracks, and the debut song was ‘No More Dream’. In its notes for the third mini album, The Most Beautiful Moment in Life, Pt. 1, released on 29 April 2015, BIGHIT MUSIC wrote that the group, having closed its school trilogy with Skool Luv Affair, would talk about youth from this record on. The same notes say it was the first record on which the four vocal members took production and songwriting credits, in songwriting that had until then centred on the three rappers.

The second full-length album, WINGS, came out on 10 October 2016 with 15 tracks. The album notes say it was the first to carry a solo song by every one of the seven, and Billboard put it at number one in its list of the ten best K-pop albums of that year on 23 December.

What the Billboard charts kept

The Korea Herald listed the points the group has passed in a March 2026 piece on its first 13 years. It became the first K-pop group to perform at the American Music Awards in November 2017, the first K-pop act to enter the Billboard 200 at number one with Love Yourself: Tear in May 2018, and reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 with the English-language single ‘Dynamite’ in August 2020. BIGHIT MUSIC’s notes for ‘Dynamite’ call it the first song the group sang in English since its debut, and introduce ‘Butter’, released on 21 May the following year, as its second.

The same piece recorded that group activity paused in June 2022, after the anthology album Proof. According to the album notes, RM, Suga and j-hope worked on its title track, ‘Yet To Come’. ‘Take Two’, released on 9 June 2023 for the tenth anniversary, is a single BIGHIT MUSIC introduced as a song for the fans, produced by Suga with RM and j-hope on the writing.

Seven solo releases, and military service

While the group was paused, each of the seven released solo work. j-hope’s Jack In The Box came in July 2022, Jin’s ‘The Astronaut’ in October and RM’s Indigo in December; 2023 brought Jimin’s FACE in March, Suga’s D-DAY in April, V’s Layover in September and Jung Kook’s GOLDEN in November. Each member’s profile sets out their own work.

Military service ran from Jin’s enlistment in December 2022 to Suga’s discharge in June 2025. Hankook Ilbo reported that when Jimin and Jung Kook were discharged on 11 June 2025 only Suga was left, and that he finished his service on the 21st of the same month.

ARIRANG and “BTS 2.0”

The fifth full-length album, ARIRANG, arrived on 20 March 2026. Kyunghyang Shinmun reported that it carries 14 tracks and that the title track is ‘SWIM’, which it described as an alternative pop song about “a determination to swim steadily at their own pace amid the waves of life”. According to the same piece the seven worked on the music together in Los Angeles the previous summer, with Diplo, Ryan Tedder and El Guincho among the producers. The members called this era “BTS 2.0”, and how each of them explained the name is set out separately.

Billboard reported on 29 March 2026 that the album entered the Billboard 200 at number one with 641,000 equivalent album units in its first week, and wrote that this was the largest week for a group album since the chart began counting in units in December 2014. The Korea Herald reported on 6 April that the album held number one in its second week, the first time a K-pop album had spent two consecutive weeks at the top of the chart.

The title track’s summer ended up in Billboard’s own tally. In the 2026 Global Songs of the Summer, which Billboard announced on 10 September 2026, ‘SWIM’ placed second on the Global Excl. US list and sixth on the Global 200; how the tally is counted is in the story on the summer ranking. After the album came the digital single ‘Come Over’ on 12 June, produced by Suga with Cirkut and Ammo, and NORMAL on 17 July, which reissued the ninth track of ARIRANG together with a Korean version.

The tour and the World Cup final

The tour began 20 days after the album. The Korea Times reported that the ARIRANG world tour, which opened at Goyang Stadium on 9 April 2026, runs 85 shows across 34 cities, and that 46 of them had sold out by opening night. The stage is a 360-degree format with no designated front. RM said in the same piece that “the preparation wasn’t easy with a 360-degree stage, but once we get going I think it’s going to be a lot of fun”. On 13 June, the anniversary of the debut, the group played a tour date in Busan.

On 19 July 2026 the group performed at halftime of the FIFA World Cup final at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey. The Korea Herald reported that it was the first halftime show ever staged at a World Cup final, and that the group sang ‘Dynamite’ in black, red and white outfits drawn from the colours of Korea’s Red Devils supporters. The running order and who produced the show are in the story on the World Cup final halftime show, and the piece that sets it beside the 2022 opening ceremony Jung Kook played alone is Jung Kook’s two World Cup stages.

What to watch now

Title-track music videos go up on the HYBE LABELS channel, while songs a member released separately, such as Jimin’s ‘Christmas Love’ or V’s ‘Winter Bear’, had their videos posted on the group’s own BANGTANTV channel. To follow the 13 years through the records, start at 2 Cool 4 Skool and go by release date through WINGS, Love Yourself: Tear and Proof to the latest full-length album, ARIRANG.