The most prominent is Stray Kids when they continue to affirm their position as "king of World Albums" with two albums "Do it" and "Karma" respectively maintaining the number 1 and number 2 positions.
Not only leading the specialized charts, "Do it" also had its fifth consecutive week firmly in the top 30 Billboard 200, while "Karma" marked a historic milestone when it became the group's first album to stay in the chart for 18 weeks on this prestigious chart.
Stray Kids' endurance is also clearly shown when the group simultaneously has up to six albums appearing on World Albums this week. “合 (Hop)” returned to 5th position in week 54, “Ate” ranked 14th (week 75), “★★★★★ (5-Star)” ranked 17th (week 67) and “Rock-Star” held 25th (week 53). This is proof of the ability to maintain a rare long-term attraction in the context of an increasingly crowded release market.
In the following positions, ENHYPEN attracted attention when "Desire: Unleash" rose to 4th place in the 30th week, and the 2024 release album "Romance: Untold" still stayed at 20th place after 76 weeks. Newcomer CORTIS continued to show great potential when his debut EP "Color outside the lines" maintained 6th place in the 16th week, followed by ILLIT with "Bomb" in 7th place.
BOYNEXTDOOR and TXT also made their mark when "The action" rose to 8th place, while TXT's "The star chapter: Together" climbed to 9th place. BTS closed the top 10 with the compilation album "Proof", marking the 185th week of appearance on World Albums - a rare number. In addition, the group's live album "Permission to dance on stage – Live" also unexpectedly reappeared at 22nd place.
In the new generation solo artist group, Yeonjun (TXT) with "No labels: Part 01" ranked 11th, Jimin (BTS) ranked 15th with "Muse", ZEROBASEONE jumped to 16th with "Never say never", while NewJeans continued to maintain heat with "Get up" in week 120.
The weekly chart for the first week of 2026 therefore becomes a clear testament to the sustainable vitality and increasingly widespread influence of K-pop on the world music map.
