BTS 'IDOL' Just Hit 1.4 Billion YouTube Views: Their 5th Video to Do It

BTS's IDOL music video cleared 1.4 billion YouTube views at approximately 9:20 p.m. KST on Tuesday, Big Hit Music confirmed. That puts it fifth on the group's all-time list, behind Dynamite, Boy With Luv, DNA, and the MIC DROP remix.

IDOL was the title track of BTS's 2018 repackaged album LOVE YOURSELF 結 Answer, released in August of that year. At the time, critics tagged it "Joseon EDM", a shorthand for how aggressively the song fused South African rhythmic production with Korean traditional percussion and vocal exclamations. The combination of African dance music and gugak sensibilities read as deliberately jarring, and it mostly worked: the song landed as both distinctly Korean and globally accessible in a way that few K-pop tracks had managed before it.

The music video leans into that collision hard. The visual palette pulls from tropical savanna landscapes, the Bukchong Lion Dance, and sets that mix Euro-Asian architecture with Korean traditional design motifs. The choreography does the same thing, threading guaraguara African dance moves alongside Korean traditional movement. It won Music Video of the Year at the 2018 E! People's Choice Awards in November of that year.

IDOL is currently on the setlist for BTS's ARIRANG world tour, which launched in April and is billed as the largest K-pop world tour to date. The milestone lands with the group back in full touring mode, which probably isn't hurting the view count.