#1. 4.19889 billion won. It is the amount raised for the release of the webtoon “Magical Girl Isegye Idol,” also known as Isegye Idol, and its merchandise on the crowdfunding platform Tumblbug on Jan. 25. More than 30,000 fans flocked to the release of the comic book featuring the six members of the virtual girl group Isegye Idol, which is in its third year of debut. It marks the highest amount of support in the history of crowdfunding for a single content in South Korea. The virtual girl group’s song “Kidding,” released last year, reached No. 1 on the domestic music platform Bugs Music and No. 3 on the U.S. Billboard K-Pop chart.
#2. Virtual boy group PLAVE topped the Melon Hot 100 chart after releasing their Christmas carol song “Merry PLLIstmas” last month. Their first mini album, released last August, became the first virtual idol to sell more than 200,000 copies in the first week of release. It surpassed the initial sales of “WHO!” (110,442 copies), the debut single of BOYNEXTDOOR, a boy group under the major record label HYBE.
Virtual idols are garnering attention with performances comparable to real idols in traditional metrics such as music chart rankings, concert attendance, and merchandise sales. At the “Isegye Festival” held in September last year at Songdo Moonlight Festival Park in Incheon, where Isegye Idol was the headline act, all 10,000 tickets sold out within eight minutes of going on sale. “It is estimated that about 20,000 fans gather whenever Isegye Idol holds a performance or sells merchandise,” said an official from Parable Entertainment, Isegye Idol’s agency.
“Either way, you can freely combine the desired faces and voices,” an official from a major domestic music agency said. “The most important task for an idol agency is to find trainees with excellent looks and singing and dancing skills. Virtual idols can debut with partial requirements, and their competitive advantage is that they can easily manage sudden incidents and image control.” Pop music critic Kim Do-heon commented, “Recently, even K-pop idols in real life are actively engaged in webtoons and web novels that change their members into virtual characters. Virtual idols are already optimized for such content.”
Technological advancements are also having a significant impact, making it possible to replicate most of the content that real idols can do at a lower cost. “The virtual equipment used per member costs about 5 to 6 million won. In the field of virtual idols, activities are possible without big capital as long as there is high-quality content planning,” Isegye Idol official said.
Virtual idols like MAVE: and PLAVE appear on TV music shows through pre-recorded performances or offer one-on-one fan communication chat services used by traditional idols. Virtual human girl group IITERNITI held the first solo concert by a Korean virtual idol last September at IVEX Studio in Gwangmyeong, Gyeonggi Province, using extended reality (XR) technology for displays.
