BTS will not submit music for the 2027 Grammys: decision opens debate about the new Asian pop category
Seoul - South Korean group BTS will not submit its current album and songs for consideration at the 69th Grammy Awards, which will be held on February 7, 2027, in Los Angeles. All seven members - RM, Jin, Suga, j-hope, Jimin, V and Jung Kook - posted the same message on their social media profiles on July 29, 2026. In it, they stated that they had decided not to participate in this year's submission process and expressed hope that their music would be listened to and appreciated without divisions based on region or language. The decision was announced a little more than a month after the Recording Academy introduced a new category for Best Asian Pop Music Performance, which led BTS's move to be widely interpreted as a protest against the way Asian popular music is classified within the Grammys.
The group's message itself did not directly mention the name of the new category or use the word boycott. A BTS representative, according to an Associated Press report, did not offer any additional explanation. Nevertheless, the timing of the announcement and the wording about regional and linguistic divisions directed the discussion precisely toward the Recording Academy's decision. As a result, one of the world's most commercially successful pop groups chose to remain outside a process in which its comeback album ARIRANG was expected to be among the prominent contenders.
A joint message from all seven members
The coordinated post by all the members contained only a few sentences, but its message was unequivocal. BTS said it wanted music to be "heard and loved for what it is", instead of being divided according to geographic origin or the language of performance. At the same time, the members thanked their global fan community ARMY and everyone who supports them. The tone was not confrontational, but the decision not to submit the music at all has a considerably greater practical effect than symbolic criticism.
The Recording Academy does not automatically include all releases published during the eligibility period. According to the official rules for the 2027 Grammys, recordings must be formally submitted through an online process in order to appear on the ballots. Submissions may be made by Academy members and registered media companies, and the deadline for this year's cycle runs from July 7 to August 21, 2026. Because BTS publicly rejected submission, ARIRANG and its songs will not be eligible for nomination either in the new Asian category or in general categories such as Album, Record or Song of the Year, unless the decision is changed before the deadline expires. As of July 30, there were no public indications of such a reversal.
What the new Asian pop category covers
The Recording Academy announced five new categories for the 2027 awards in June. The official name of the disputed award is Best Asian Pop Music Performance. According to the Academy's description, the category is intended to reward artistic excellence in pop performances that originate from Asian markets or are widely recognized within them. It cites K-pop, J-pop and C-pop as examples, but emphasizes that the list is not limited solely to those industries and styles. An additional criterion is the "significant use" of one or more Asian languages, and the award is presented to the performers.
The publicly released summary of the rules does not specify the precise percentage of lyrics that must be performed in an Asian language. This differs from the new Best Latin Song category, for which the Academy determined that at least 51 percent of the lyrics must be in Spanish. The difference has raised questions about how the concept of significant language use will be interpreted in practice, especially in contemporary Asian pop, where multiple languages are often combined within the same song. The final review of eligibility and the placement of submissions is carried out by the Recording Academy's expert departments and bodies before members vote.
Alongside Asian pop and Latin song, categories for Best R&B Collaboration or Duo or Group Performance, Best Traditional Pop Vocal Performance and Best Traditional Folk Album were introduced for 2027. At the same time, the Academy changed the names and descriptions of certain existing categories and introduced the Ballot Plus elective voting model for members with verified professional experience in several related areas of music. The organization's leadership presents these changes as an attempt to adapt to the evolution of genres and the expanding international influence of music markets.
The Academy says the goal is broader recognition, not separation
Grammy CEO Harvey Mason Jr. said after BTS's announcement that the group's decision saddened him, but that he understood and respected it. In a response reported by The Guardian, he emphasized that the new category was designed to highlight the diversity, scope and growth of pop music coming from Asia. According to his interpretation, a greater number of categories means that the work of more artists can be recognized before the Recording Academy's approximately 15,000 voters. Mason also said that the intention was not to divide musicians, but to expand the circle of those whose work would receive attention.
When presenting the new rules, the Recording Academy also said that the changes had been driven by the music community, which had requested more space for different genres and new forms of creativity. Mason described Asian pop at the time as one of the most important and enduring forces in the global music industry. He stated that the Academy's members and governing bodies had concluded that the time had come for a category that would better reflect the scale, artistic value and global influence of that field. The organization also emphasizes that performers eligible for the Asian pop category may still compete in the general categories.
Critics of the new award do not necessarily dispute the need for greater representation of Asian artists. Their concern is that a separate geographic and linguistic category could become a kind of boundary beyond which Academy members place music that might otherwise compete in the most prestigious fields. The debate often compares two possible consequences: a separate category can open the door to artists who were previously overlooked, but at the same time it can make it easier to exclude the same performers from Album, Record or Song of the Year. BTS's decision has greatly intensified that dilemma because it comes from a group that has already proved it can compete on equal terms in the world's largest markets.
ARIRANG was among the expected contenders
BTS's fifth studio album was released on March 20, 2026, within the eligibility period for the 2027 Grammys, which runs from August 31, 2025, to August 28, 2026. The 14-track release marked the seven members' return to working together after an almost four-year break in full-group activities and after they completed mandatory military service in South Korea. BIGHIT MUSIC states that the title draws on "Arirang", a traditional Korean folk song, and that the album connects the group's roots with the members' experiences and feelings in 2026. It was precisely this emphasized connection to the Korean language and cultural heritage that made the album an obvious potential contender for the new award.
Commercial results further raised expectations ahead of Grammy season. Billboard, citing Spotify's announcement immediately after the release, reported that ARIRANG had then become the most-streamed K-pop album in a single day in the platform's history and the most-streamed album in a single day during 2026 up to that point. Before its release, the album accumulated more than five million saves on Spotify's Countdown Page. Those figures do not determine nominations by themselves, because the Grammys are chosen by professional voters, but they demonstrate the level of international attention that a BTS submission would have brought to the entire voting cycle.
The decision therefore does not merely mean giving up a possible victory in the new category. It removes one of the year's most visible releases from all Grammy consideration and reduces the possibility that the debate about Asian pop will be conducted through the nominations themselves. At the same time, the move allows the group to shift the discussion from whether it will win an award to how institutions should classify music that simultaneously has local cultural roots and a global audience.
BTS's long and complex relationship with the Grammys
According to the Recording Academy's official records, BTS has received five nominations to date but has not won a Grammy. In 2021, the group became the first K-pop act nominated for the award when the song Dynamite entered the Best Pop Duo or Group Performance category. Nominations followed for Butter and for the collaboration with Coldplay on the song My Universe. The video for Yet to Come was nominated for Best Music Video, while BTS members were among the credited contributors to Coldplay's album Music of the Spheres, which was nominated for Album of the Year.
Despite the absence of a victory, BTS's performances and nominations played an important symbolic role in bringing K-pop closer to the American music industry. The Associated Press states that no K-pop act won a Grammy until the 2026 ceremony, when the song Golden from the animated film KPop Demon Hunters won in the Best Song Written for Visual Media category. K-pop performers were also present in the most prominent categories at the same ceremony, showing that the genre was gradually breaking beyond specialized fields. That is precisely why one part of the public sees the new Asian category as overdue recognition, while another views it as a step backward toward separation.
Grammy history includes other cases in which major artists refused to submit music or withdrew from campaigns because of disagreements with the process. Such decisions do not change the formal rules, but they can affect the award's public reputation and encourage organizers to provide additional explanations. In BTS's case, the effect is particularly strong because of the size of the group's global audience and because the issue is directly connected to the long-standing question of equal recognition for music in languages other than English.
The debate about language, geography and the major awards
The central question is no longer merely whether Asian pop should have its own Grammy category, but which criterion should determine the "Asianness" of a pop performance at all. The official description simultaneously relies on the market of origin, recognition in Asian markets, affiliation with industries such as K-pop, J-pop and C-pop, and the use of Asian languages. Those elements do not always overlap. A performer may come from Asia, create for the global market, sing primarily in English and work with producers from several countries, while an artist from outside Asia may operate extensively within the Asian pop scene.
Supporters of a separate category argue that the general pop categories have for years failed to reflect the real commercial and cultural reach of music from Asia. According to that argument, the new award creates an additional place where professional voters will have to listen to and evaluate releases that might otherwise remain at the margins of their ballots. Opponents respond that a geographic label can conceal enormous stylistic diversity and group together industries, languages and musical traditions that do not share enough characteristics to form a single category. They also warn that the Grammys already have general and genre categories in which the quality of a performance should matter more than the performer's origin.
BTS's position summarizes precisely that second objection, but it does not offer a detailed proposal for a different model. The group did not request the abolition of the category, a change to the criteria or the introduction of additional awards for individual Asian industries. Its decision functions above all as a statement of principle that regional and linguistic classification should not determine the value of music. The Recording Academy, on the other hand, maintains that a separate award increases rather than reduces the opportunities for recognition. For now, those two positions remain far apart.
What comes next before the ceremony on February 7, 2027
The deadline for submitting releases ends on August 21, 2026, after which eligibility reviews and the first round of voting by Recording Academy members will follow. Nominations for the 69th Grammy Awards are expected to be announced on November 16, 2026, and the winners will be revealed at the ceremony on February 7, 2027, in Los Angeles. Only the list of submitted and later nominated performers will show what the new category will look like in its first year and whether it will attract the biggest names in K-pop, J-pop, C-pop and other Asian scenes.
For BTS, the decision does not mean the end of its relationship with the Grammys, nor does it rule out future participation. The message refers to the current cycle and releases eligible for the 2027 awards. The group is continuing the world tour connected with the album ARIRANG, while the debate about its move will probably accompany the rest of the Grammy season. Regardless of the final lineup of nominees, the decision by the seven members has already transformed the new category from an administrative rule change into an international debate about where recognition of cultural distinctiveness ends and the restriction of global music by geographic labels begins.
Sources:
- Associated Press - confirmation of the joint decision by all seven members, the content of the message, previous nominations and the context of K-pop at the Grammys (link)
- Recording Academy - official description of the five new categories and the criteria for Best Asian Pop Music Performance (link)
- Recording Academy - deadlines, eligibility period and submission rules for the 2027 Grammys (link)
- Recording Academy - Harvey Mason Jr.'s explanation of the new categories and the Academy's goals (link)
- Recording Academy - official record of BTS's nominations to date (link)
- BIGHIT MUSIC - official information about the album ARIRANG, its concept and number of tracks (link)
- Billboard - the album's release date and information about its Spotify results after release (link)
- The Guardian - Harvey Mason Jr.'s response and the broader context of the debate about the new category (link)
- BIGHIT MUSIC - official schedule for the BTS WORLD TOUR ARIRANG (link)