South Korea’s four largest entertainment companies—HYBE, SM Entertainment, JYP Entertainment and YG Entertainment—have reportedly chosen not to submit their artists’ work for the Grammy Awards’ newly introduced Best Asian Pop Music Performance category. Edaily reported on October 22 that artists affiliated with the four agencies had not entered the category for the 69th Grammy Awards, scheduled for February 2027. The decision is notable because Grammy submissions are normally viewed as one route for international artists seeking recognition from the U.S. recording industry. The new category could offer K-pop performers a clearer path to a Grammy nomination, but the agencies’ reported refusal suggests that some of Korea’s most influential music companies do not want K-pop to be separated into a regional category. According to the report, HYBE artists were aligned with concerns previously raised by BTS, while SM, JYP and YG also had no artists listed as entrants in the category at the time of reporting.
Entertainment companies rarely disclose every submission before the Recording Academy announces its nominees, so the full picture may not be known until the official nominations are released. The debate reflects a broader question about how global pop music should be evaluated. K-pop is now marketed and consumed across national borders, and major Korean acts regularly release music for audiences in North America, Europe and Asia. A category defined by region may create more opportunities for recognition, but critics argue that it can also reinforce the idea that Asian artists belong outside the Grammy Awards’ main competitive fields. The Recording Academy’s awards are organized around recordings, performances and songwriting rather than national music industries.
For Korean agencies, declining the new category may therefore be a way to signal that K-pop should compete directly in major genre and general-field categories when its work meets the relevant criteria. The report also noted that “Golden,” a song from the Netflix animated film KPop Demon Hunters, remains the only K-pop-related recording cited as having won a Grammy so far. Whether the boycott-like stance changes the Academy’s approach remains uncertain. The category’s eventual nominees and the agencies’ future submission strategies will show whether the move becomes a sustained industry position or a one-year response to the way the new award was structured.