Yoo Jae-suk tops Korea influence survey for 7th straight year; BTS ranks 2nd with Grammy boycott declaration

Yoo Jae-suk topped Sisajournal's annual "Who Moves Korea" broadcast and entertainment influence survey for the seventh consecutive year, pulling a 66.2% designation rate in the 2026 edition.

BTS came in second among the general public at 30.6%. The expert survey told a different story. Their designation rate climbed 9.6 percentage points year-on-year — from 23.6% in 2025 to 33.2% this year — driven by a busy first half of 2026. They released their fifth full-length album ARIRANG in March, which debuted at number one on the Billboard 200. The title track simultaneously hit number one on the Hot 100. BTS is the first group to have achieved simultaneous debuts at the top of both charts twice.

Their comeback concert at Gwanghwamun Plaza in Seoul was broadcast live worldwide via Netflix. A world tour followed, kicking off in Goyang in April. On July 29, the group declared they would not submit music to the Grammy Awards. "We hope music is heard and loved for what it is, rather than being divided by region or language," they said.

Kang Ho-dong placed third in the general public survey at 14.4%, up from 13.8%. Shin Dong-yeop came in fourth at 11.2%, up from 9.8%. Jeon Hyun-moo took fifth at 9.2%, up from 8.4%. Im Young-woong rose from 6.2% to 8.0% to place sixth. IU (6.2%) and BLACKPINK (5.4%) also landed in the top ten.

SBS variety PD Choi Bo-pil, who works with Yoo on Tteummanna-myeon (《틈만 나면,》), described him as someone who "ghostly solves the concerns of the production team — not just a player, but someone who oversees the show."

Korean Gallup conducted the survey from July 6 to July 24, 2026. The expert component covered 500 respondents across 10 fields (50 per field) via telephone. The general public component surveyed 500 respondents via online panel. Sampling error is ±4.4 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.