PSY was the first K-pop artist to reach 1 billion YouTube views, achieving the milestone with his 2012 hit “Gangnam Style.” The video crossed the billion-view mark in December 2012, making PSY the first artist associated with K-pop to reach that figure on the platform.
“Gangnam Style” became a worldwide phenomenon through its comic choreography, instantly recognizable horse-riding dance, and PSY’s satirical take on the affluent Seoul district of Gangnam. Its success pushed Korean pop music to a much larger international audience and made PSY one of the most recognizable South Korean performers worldwide.
The video was also the first YouTube video of any kind to reach 1 billion views. Its popularity eventually exposed a technical limitation in YouTube’s original view counter, which had been designed around a 32-bit integer limit.
The wording can cause confusion because later K-pop groups, especially BTS and BLACKPINK, accumulated enormous view totals. However, the first artist to pass the one-billion milestone was PSY, with “Gangnam Style.”