Physical or Digital Fame; Which Is More Important in K-Pop?

In a day and age where we rarely see and hear the word “CD”, the South Korean music industry changes the game with its high sales.

While the rest of the world has moved on from using compact disks aka CDs, South Korea has not! According to the “Hanteo Global K-Pop Report: 2021 Semi-annual Summary” released in July 2021 by Hanteo Global, which runs the album sales tracker Hanteo Chart, CD sales in the country increased 34.25 percent during the first half of 2021 compared to the same period in 2020, also the booming sales of physical copies are attributed to the huge fandoms of K-Pop according to an article published by Korea JooAng Daily.

Koreans do listen to their favorite music on streaming music platforms just like the norm in other countries but thanks to the fandom culture people dive in. According to the fans only a ‘true fan’ buy the physical CD they do this to help its success by purchasing physical copies to make it reach No.1 on music charts.

In general, album sales represent the size and loyalty of the fanbase. And male idol groups dominate hard copy sales, whereas females lead digital sales. This shows that having a strong digital presence implies that the public recognizes the artists better and builds a strong presence around casual listeners. BTS and BIGBANG, despite being boy groups, are known to be digital monsters. BLACKPINK, aespa, IVE, Girls’ Generation, and TWICE all have enormous fan bases, leading to high physical copy sales. Currently, the largest music streaming site in Korea features all female musicians in their daily top 10, while the physical copies have all male.

According to fans, having a big number of physical record sales generates more revenue for the company and enables the artist’s career to last longer, however with digital, it becomes a measure of how popular an artist is among the general public. More public exposure will soon convert to endorsements and such, but high album sales also test the fandom’s purchasing capacity; concerts and merchandising also generate good money with a stable fandom.