KOREAN STREAMING PLATFORMS

There are four major platforms / charts in South Korea, including Melon, Genie, Flo and Bugs. The platform collects its main digital points from the number of ULs (Unique Listeners), apart from the number of streams. The increasing ULs number of a song will further encourage the song to rise to the higher rank in chart.

1. ULs (Unique Listeners) are the number of users who play a song over a given time span. Indicates how many different users have listened to the song. 1 UL is obtained from 1 stream per hour. Although 1 user plays 1 song up to 10 times in 1 hour, only 1 stream counts as ULs
2. The number of streams is the total number of playback of a song. If the previous ULs-counted user plays the same song again then the second etc. playback counts as number of streams, no longer as ULs.

In addition to physical points (album sales), these digital points are also the most important criteria for winning in music shows as well as year-end awards. The higher the digital points the higher the chance of winning. Songs that rank high on the charts can attract GP (general public)/knetz attention so that they can help the song to last longer on the charts & be more popular. The main point of all of this is mass numbers.

International DREAMzens can greatly help digital sales, by join streaming team provided by fanbases or renting / buying streaming facilities themselves. Before that, it would be good to understand some general terms other than ULs and the number of streams.

• Verified account has been verified with Korean data and phone number. In addition to being able to follow and vote 1x, this account can also be streamed and downloaded, but it needs a stream pass and download pass first purchased by using a Korean bank. Non-Koreans usually use verification services.
• Unverified account is not verified, can only hear 1 minute songs. If you have a streaming pass, you cannot streaming if the account has not been verified.
• Limited streaming pass cannot use playlist while streaming, must be streamed 1x/hour. The total stream is limited (e.g. 100x or 300x), in 1 day at least 10x streams with a distance of > 1 hour. For the price, it’s pretty cheap compared to unlimited passes.
• Unlimited streaming passes use a playlist that is already provided by the fanbase and can stream multiple times (playlists on loop) until the streaming pass is expiring. For a price, it’s pretty expensive compared to limited.
• Download pass is something that is necessary to download a song. It can help to push the song up the charts. 1 account/user can only download 1x the same song. The more people downloaded the song at the same time, the better for the chart ranking. 1x download equals 100x streams.

Melon has a variety of charts, including 5 minutes, TOP100, HOT100, 24 Hits, real-time, daily, weekly, and monthly. All of these charts are different but interconnected. It is most important to understand common charts first such as the 5 minutes chart, HOT100, TOP100 and 24Hits.

1. 5 minutes chart is a chart that describes the highest streaming and downloading activity in a time span of every 5 minutes.
2. Hot 100 charted for each new song within 30 or 100 days of its release. The chart is based on 40% streaming and 60% download. The chart is updated every hour and does not appear at 02:00am KST – 06:00am KST.
3. Top 100 is a combination of the old chart or commonly called the real time chart (accumulation of 40% streaming and 60% download in the last 1 hour) and 24Hits (total ULs in the last 24 hours) with a 1:1 ratio. This chart will disappear when the 24Hits chart appears on freeze/zombie hours (01:00am KST – 07:00am KST)
4. 24Hits chart that represents the total ULS in the last 24 hours. The chart appears from 01:00am KST to 07:00am KST (zombie hours). When this chart comes up then the Top 100 chart will be temporarily lost. 24Hits greatly influenced Melon’s daily chart.

Beside 4 platforms above, several other platforms that are also influential for obtaining CAK (Certified All-Kill) and PAK (Perfect All-Kill) are VIBE Naver Music and Youtube Music. VIBE also includes music show assessment criteria such as Music Bank, Music Core, and Mcountdown.