Three months after debut, a rookie group ended the night holding more trophies than anyone else in the room. The first-ever SPOTV K-Pop Awards handed its grand prizes to three different acts — and its loudest story to a group most casual listeners had never heard of in June.
What Happened at the 2026 SPOTV K-Pop Awards?
The 2026 SPOTV K-Pop Awards was the inaugural edition of a new South Korean music awards ceremony, held on September 6, 2026 at KINTEX in Ilsan, Goyang, Gyeonggi Province, with the show starting at 5 p.m. KST . It was co-organized by sports and entertainment broadcaster SPOTV and the global fandom platform BIGC, and aired domestically on SPOTV2 and SPOTV PLUS . Organizers positioned it as the successor to the Circle Chart Music Awards, keeping that ceremony's mix of certified industry chart data and global fan voting as the scoring base .
Quick Answer: The first SPOTV K-Pop Awards took place September 6, 2026 at KINTEX in Ilsan. Three grand prizes went three ways — KiiiKiii (Best Song), AKMU (Best Artist), BTS (Best Album, ARIRANG) — while three-month-old rookie group AND2BLE collected roughly five trophies, the night's biggest result.
The three top honors were branded as "Best ... of the Year" rather than the traditional daesang label, and they landed with three separate acts: KiiiKiii won Best Song of the Year, AKMU (Akdong Musician) won Best Artist of the Year, and BTS won Best Album of the Year for ARIRANG . For BTS it was a second album honor inside two weeks, following their Best Album Award at the 2026 K-World Dream Awards .
The result that dominated coverage, though, belonged to AND2BLE. The group debuted roughly three months before the ceremony and left with about five trophies: Best New Artist (shared with ALPHA DRIVE ONE), an Artist of the Year bonsang, and three fan-voted individual honors — Zhang Hao's Global Fan Choice OST win for "Refresh!" and Best iCONIC, plus Ricky's Best Spotlight . Their agency's co-CEO Jung Hae-chang was separately named Best Creative Producer .
A few structural details worth holding onto before the category-by-category breakdown:
- Hosts: announcer Jang Sung Kyu, Tsuki of Billlie, and Han Yujin of AND2BLE .
- Scoring: fan voting carried roughly 20% weight in most competitive categories, while the Global Fan Choice bracket was decided entirely by fan votes .
- Bonsang tier: seven Artist of the Year recipients — BTS, AKMU, KiiiKiii, AND2BLE, KISS OF LIFE, NCT WISH and ALPHA DRIVE ONE .
- Format: the ceremony ran as a concert as well, with a red carpet beforehand covered separately by Soompi .
AND2BLE's Five-Trophy Night: What They Actually Won
AND2BLE, a group that debuted roughly three months before the ceremony, left KINTEX with about five trophies spread across group and individual categories on September 6, 2026 . The haul covered Best New Artist, an Artist of the Year (Bonsang) slot, two fan-voted honors for member Zhang Hao and one for member Ricky . For a rookie act, that spread is unusual because it mixes an industry-data-weighted category with purely fan-decided ones.
Best New Artist was shared with ALPHA DRIVE ONE rather than awarded outright, so AND2BLE did not take the rookie category alone . The Bonsang tier placed the group alongside six other acts — BTS, AKMU, KiiiKiii, KISS OF LIFE, NCT WISH and ALPHA DRIVE ONE — which is where the debut-year framing becomes concrete: AND2BLE sat in the same tier as a group that took the night's Best Album of the Year prize .
The individual awards came from the BIGC-backed fan vote. Zhang Hao won Global Fan Choice OST for "Refresh!" and Best iCONIC, while Ricky won Best Spotlight . Because the Global Fan Choice bracket was decided entirely by fan votes, those three trophies read as a measure of organized international voting rather than of chart or streaming performance.
- Best New Artist — shared with ALPHA DRIVE ONE
- Artist of the Year (Bonsang) — one of seven recipients
- Global Fan Choice OST — Zhang Hao, for "Refresh!"
- Best iCONIC — Zhang Hao
- Best Spotlight — Ricky
A sixth trophy went to the group's camp rather than to the members: agency co-CEO Jung Hae-chang was named Best Creative Producer . That award is usually read as recognition of the production and concept work behind a debut rather than of the performers themselves, which is why most winners lists count it separately from the group's own tally.
"AND2BLE, BTS, AKMU and KiiiKiii win big at the 2026 SPOTV K-Pop Awards," wrote Jeff Benjamin, K-pop columnist at Forbes, in his September 6 report on the ceremony (source: Forbes, 2026-09).
One caveat is worth carrying forward: outlets do not agree on a single number. Soompi frames the night as roughly five trophies, while other coverage describes it as "two group awards plus three individual awards," and some aggregators attach sponsor prefixes such as Daum, Casanello or "BIGC X coogoong" to category names that primary reporting abbreviates . Treat the five-trophy figure as reported rather than as an official count, and the English category names above as renderings of the Korean originals.
The Three Grand Prizes: KiiiKiii, AKMU and BTS's ARIRANG
The 2026 SPOTV K-Pop Awards split its three top honors across three different acts rather than concentrating them in one winner: KiiiKiii took Best Song of the Year, AKMU (Akdong Musician) took Best Artist of the Year, and BTS took Best Album of the Year for ARIRANG . These are the ceremony's daesang-tier prizes, though SPOTV branded them as "Best … of the Year" categories instead of using the traditional daesang label . The three-way split is the clearest signal of how the show weighs song, artist and album as separate questions.
For BTS, the album prize was the second major album honor in as many weeks. The group had already received the Best Album Award at the 2026 K-World Dream Awards shortly before the SPOTV ceremony, making ARIRANG the year's most consistently recognized album across the two shows . AKMU's Best Artist of the Year win, meanwhile, placed a duo with more than a decade of releases alongside a rookie-heavy winners list, and KiiiKiii's Best Song of the Year gave a newer group the night's single-track honor . All three acts also appeared in the Artist of the Year (Bonsang) tier, which went to seven acts in total: BTS, AKMU, KiiiKiii, AND2BLE, KISS OF LIFE, NCT WISH and ALPHA DRIVE ONE .
The scoring method explains why the results look the way they do. SPOTV positioned the ceremony as the successor to the Circle Chart Music Awards, and it kept that show's approach of blending certified industry data from Circle Chart with global fan voting . In most competitive categories — including the three grand prizes — fan voting carried roughly 20% of the total score, with the remainder drawn from chart and industry data . That weighting is why long-running chart performers such as BTS and AKMU could win alongside acts with newer but highly mobilized fanbases.
The exception is the Global Fan Choice bracket, co-run with the fandom platform BIGC, where winners were determined entirely by fan votes with no chart component at all . Reading the two tiers together is the practical takeaway: a grand prize at this show is a mostly data-driven result nudged by voting, while a Global Fan Choice trophy is a pure measure of voting turnout. Forbes' coverage of the ceremony framed the night around exactly this spread of winners across AND2BLE, BTS, AKMU and KiiiKiii .
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Full 2026 SPOTV K-Pop Awards Winners List
The 2026 SPOTV K-Pop Awards handed out trophies across roughly a dozen tiers on September 6, 2026 at KINTEX in Ilsan, spanning group and solo categories, rookie and emerging-act brackets, genre-specific honors and the fully fan-voted Global Fan Choice slate . KISS OF LIFE took Best Female Group and KickFlip took Best Male Group, with KickFlip adding the SPOTV Ground Performance award for a two-trophy night .
On the solo side, Doh Kyung Soo (D.O. of EXO) won Best Male Solo Artist — carried on secondary listings with the Daum sponsor prefix — while YENA won Best Female Solo Artist, and Billlie took the Best Performer award, itself listed by some outlets under the Casanello sponsor label . Sponsor prefixes vary between aggregators, so the names below are the reported English renderings rather than verbatim official Korean category titles.
| Category | Winner(s) |
|---|---|
| Best Female Group | KISS OF LIFE |
| Best Male Group | KickFlip |
| SPOTV Ground Performance | KickFlip |
| Best Male Solo Artist (Daum) | Doh Kyung Soo (D.O.) |
| Best Female Solo Artist | YENA |
| Best Performer (Casanello) | Billlie |
| Next Generation | CLOSE YOUR EYES, IDID |
| Global New Wave | cosmosy, POW, xikers |
| Global Connect | RESCENE, MODYSSEY, 82MAJOR |
| SPOTV Ambassador | RESCENE |
| Best Genre – Rock/Indie Artist | Hanroro |
| Best Genre – Trot Female Artist | Jeon Yu Jin |
| Best Genre – Trot Male Artist | Seongri |
| Global Fan Choice – K-Pop | Nana (UNIS) |
| Global Fan Choice – Trot | Lee Chan Won |
| Global Fan Choice – Band | DAY6 |
The rookie and emerging-act tiers were the widest part of the ballot. Next Generation went to CLOSE YOUR EYES and IDID; Global New Wave went to cosmosy, POW and xikers; and Global Connect went to RESCENE, MODYSSEY and 82MAJOR, with RESCENE picking up the SPOTV Ambassador award for a second trophy . Several of those acts also performed: POW covered EXO's "MAMA," IDID performed SEVENTEEN's "Adore U," and MODYSSEY performed BTS's 2013 debut single "No More Dream" .
Genre categories widened the field beyond idol pop. Hanroro won Best Genre – Rock/Indie Artist, Jeon Yu Jin won Best Genre – Trot Female Artist, and Seongri won Best Genre – Trot Male Artist . The BIGC-backed Global Fan Choice bracket, decided entirely by international voting, went to Nana of UNIS in K-Pop, Lee Chan Won in Trot and DAY6 in Band, alongside the OST, iCONIC and Spotlight honors that went to AND2BLE members . Idols also walked a red carpet ahead of the 5 p.m. KST start, covered separately by Soompi .
How the Global Fan Choice Vote Actually Worked
The 2026 SPOTV K-Pop Awards ran on a two-layer scoring system: certified industry data supplied by Circle Chart, combined with an international fan-vote layer operated by the global fandom platform BIGC, which co-organized the ceremony alongside broadcaster SPOTV . According to reporting on the methodology, fan voting was weighted at roughly 20% of the total score in most competitive categories, while the separate Global Fan Choice bracket was decided 100% by fan votes . That split is the mechanical reason a group roughly three months into its career could leave with individual trophies.
The two weightings do different jobs:
- ~20% fan vote: applied to competitive categories where Circle Chart's certified sales, streaming and chart data carry the remaining share — a structure inherited from the Circle Chart Music Awards, which this ceremony succeeds .
- 100% fan vote: applied to the BIGC-backed Global Fan Choice bracket, where accumulated chart performance is not part of the calculation at all .
AND2BLE's Zhang Hao took Global Fan Choice OST for "Refresh!" and Best iCONIC, and bandmate Ricky took Best Spotlight — all fan-decided honors rather than data-weighted ones . A rookie act with a short release history has little accumulated chart data to compete on, but an active international voting base translates directly into wins in a 100%-vote bracket. The same logic applies to the other Global Fan Choice recipients — Nana of UNIS, Lee Chan Won and DAY6.
The show's structure reinforced that generational framing. The opening performance block was built around legacy tributes rather than the newest releases: POW covered EXO's "MAMA," IDID performed SEVENTEEN's "Adore U," and MODYSSEY performed BTS's 2013 debut single "No More Dream" . CLOSE YOUR EYES and cosmosy also performed. Hosting duties went to announcer Jang Sung Kyu, Tsuki of Billlie and Han Yujin of AND2BLE, with a red-carpet segment running ahead of the 5 p.m. KST broadcast on SPOTV2 and SPOTV PLUS .
Where SPOTV's Picks Fit in a Fractured 2026 Awards Season
The 2026 SPOTV K-Pop Awards produced a top-prize split that matches no other ceremony this year, which is the clearest sign yet that 2026 has no consensus Song of the Year. SPOTV spread its three grand prizes across three acts — KiiiKiii (Best Song of the Year), AKMU (Best Artist of the Year) and BTS (Best Album of the Year for ARIRANG) . Earlier shows landed elsewhere entirely.
Tracked across the season, the top-honor picture looks like this. G-Dragon took Song of the Year at the 40th Golden Disc Awards on January 10, 2026, then Best Song at the 33rd Hanteo Music Awards on February 15, 2026 . HWASA won the daesang for "Good Goodbye" at the KM Chart Awards on July 25, 2026 . Three ceremonies, three different answers — and SPOTV, in September, added a fourth by handing its song prize to KiiiKiii.
That divergence is structural rather than accidental. Each show weights its inputs differently: SPOTV built its scoring on Circle Chart's certified industry data blended with fan voting at roughly 20% in most competitive categories, with the Global Fan Choice bracket decided entirely by fans . Ceremonies that lean harder on physical album sales, streaming share or digital points will keep producing different winners from the same twelve months of music.
The practical takeaway for anyone following the season: treat the September 6 results as one reading of 2026, not a closing verdict. SPOTV's own framing — as the successor to the Circle Chart Music Awards — tells you what it measures, and what it measures favored KiiiKiii, AKMU and BTS on this particular night . The more useful signal from the evening was AND2BLE, three months post-debut and already carrying a Bonsang out of KINTEX . Rookie momentum tends to show up in year-end shows before it shows up in charts, so the December ceremonies are where this season's picture actually resolves.
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Last updated: 2026-09-07. Winners and category names reflect English-language reporting from Soompi, Forbes and inmusicblog published on and after September 6, 2026; trophy tallies for AND2BLE vary slightly between outlets.
Frequently asked questions
When and where were the 2026 SPOTV K-Pop Awards held?
The inaugural SPOTV K-Pop Awards took place on September 6, 2026 at KINTEX in Ilsan, part of Goyang in Gyeonggi Province, South Korea, with the ceremony starting at 5 p.m. KST . It was co-organized by broadcaster SPOTV and the fandom platform BIGC and aired domestically on SPOTV2 and SPOTV PLUS . Announcer Jang Sung Kyu, Tsuki of Billlie and Han Yujin of AND2BLE hosted, and a red carpet ran ahead of the show .
How many awards did AND2BLE win?
AND2BLE, which debuted roughly three months before the ceremony, is reported to have taken about five trophies across the night: Best New Artist (shared with ALPHA DRIVE ONE), Artist of the Year in the Bonsang tier, and fan-voted honors for members Zhang Hao (Global Fan Choice OST for "Refresh!" and Best iCONIC) and Ricky (Best Spotlight) . Their agency's co-CEO Jung Hae-chang was separately named Best Creative Producer . Outlets tally the total slightly differently — some count five, others describe it as two group awards plus three individual wins — so treat the number as approximate.
Who won Best Song, Best Artist and Best Album of the Year?
The three grand prizes were split across three acts: KiiiKiii won Best Song of the Year, AKMU (Akdong Musician) won Best Artist of the Year, and BTS won Best Album of the Year for ARIRANG . SPOTV branded these as "Best … of the Year" rather than using the traditional daesang label. For BTS it was a second album honor within two weeks, following their Best Album Award at the 2026 K-World Dream Awards .
Is the SPOTV K-Pop Awards replacing the Circle Chart Music Awards?
SPOTV positioned the show explicitly as the successor to the Circle Chart Music Awards, carrying forward that ceremony's approach of weighing certified industry data from Circle Chart alongside audience input . The new element is BIGC, the global fandom platform that co-organized the ceremony and supplied the international voting layer . In practice that means Circle Chart's data lineage continues under a new name and a new broadcaster.
How much does fan voting count toward winning?
Fan voting was weighted at roughly 20% of the score in most competitive categories, with the remainder drawn from Circle Chart's certified data and jury evaluation . The Global Fan Choice bracket worked differently: those categories were decided entirely by fan votes cast through BIGC, which is how Nana of UNIS (K-Pop), Lee Chan Won (Trot), DAY6 (Band), Zhang Hao (OST) and Ricky (Best Spotlight) took their trophies .
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This article was written using information collected and analyzed by NAMANE's in-house K-pop research AI engine. We use AI technology to bring you faster, broader coverage, and in the process some details may occasionally differ from the latest facts. For important information such as dates, venues, and prices, please double-check with official sources.
