BTS's New Album Breaks Harry Styles' Stream Record

South Korean Kpop group BTS. (X/@bts_bighit)

BTS has once again proved its fangs in the global music scene with the launch of their latest studio album titled "Arirang".

After a long wait for fans, this album immediately topped the world charts and recorded fantastic listener numbers on the Spotify platform.

Launching Variety, "Arirang" managed to collect a total of 110 million streams globally on the first day of screening. This figure automatically makes it the biggest album opening of 2026 so far.

This achievement also shifted the position of Harry Styles who previously held the highest opening record through the album "Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally" with 63 million streams.

BTS' dominance doesn't stop at annual numbers. "Arirang" also broke the record for the most number of first-day streams for a K-pop album in Spotify history.

Overall in Spotify's history, the figure of 110 million places BTS in 12th place as the most successful debut album, alongside big names such as Taylor Swift, Bad Bunny, and Drake.

This success can also be seen on the Spotify Global Top 50 chart. Songs from the album "Arirang" swept the top 14 positions without interruption.

In the United States, BTS also showed its dominance by placing the songs "Swim" and "Body to Body" at the first and second place on Spotify US Top 50, while all 14 songs in the album managed to enter the top 26.

Although official reports from Billboard and Luminate regarding physical sales and radio airplay have not been released, the digital performance of "Arirang" gives a strong signal that BTS will be the record holder for the biggest release in 2026.

So far, only surprise releases from top artists such as Taylor Swift or Drake have been able to match the growth rate of HYBE's group's streaming numbers.

For comparison, some other major releases in 2026 such as J. Cole's "The Fall-Off" and A$AP Rocky's "Don't Be Dumb" only garnered around 35 million streams on the first day. Meanwhile, Bruno Mars' "The Romantic" recorded 26.44 million streams, and Blackpink through the album "Deadline" bagged 16 million streams on its debut.