Alphadrive One, AND2BLE & Cortis take Super Rookie Award at 2026 K World Dream Awards

The KWDA turned 10 this year. It launched in 2017 as the 1st Soribada Best K-Music Awards. That milestone shaped everything about the night—the number "10" became the core motif across artwork and stage design. Broadcaster Jeon Hyun-moo and comedian Jang Do-yeon hosted for the fourth consecutive year.

AND2BLE is a five-member boy group. The lineup pulls from Zerobaseone: Zhang Hao, Ricky, Kim Gyubin, and Han Yujin. Yu Seungeun came from Even. Their May debut album cleared 730,000 copies in initial sales. In their acceptance speech, the group said, "We sincerely thank our company representative, family members, staff, and the 5 members and their families," adding that the award belonged to fans who "believed in us, loved us, and continued to support us."

Alphadrive One's run since January has been relentless. Their debut mini-album Euphoria made them a million seller on release day. Six months into their career, they wrapped their first global fan concert tour. May brought the prologue single No School Tomorrow. August saw the arrival of their new album Unbreakable : Boy Beast. At the ceremony they told fans, "We recently made a comeback, so please look forward to our new song stage."

(The performer list for the night reads like a full K-pop census: ATEEZ, P1Harmony, RIIZE, LE SSERAFIM, ILLIT, QWER, and roughly two dozen more acts took the stage.) The ceremony streams on U-NEXT in Japan and on the Fanderon platform everywhere else.