In 2021, local acts held 39 percent of the spots on Indonesia’s weekly Spotify top 10. In the first half of 2026, they held 97 percent. The figures come from the analytics platform Soundcharts, via an Al Jazeera report by Erin Hale, and Indonesia isn’t alone. In the Philippines, the local share rose from 31 to 81 percent. In Thailand, where home-grown music was already strong, it still climbed from 71 to 76. Southeast Asian pop has stopped being the thing people played between K-pop comebacks.
Jaycer Bajo, a call centre worker north of Metro Manila, described his own switch to Al Jazeera in plain numbers. Five years ago his listening was about 70 percent Western. Now it’s around 70 percent Filipino. Repeat that across a region of playlists and you get the charts above.
The K-pop side of the ledger looks just as stark. The Southeast Asia Desk, working from Spotify data, found Indo-pop’s share of weekly streams in Indonesia rose from 60 percent in 2023 to 78 percent in 2026, while K-pop’s fell from 5 percent to 1. In Thailand, analysis by Tsurezure Lab for The Jakarta Post’s Weekender tracked K-pop dropping from 27 to 11 percent as T-pop climbed to 78. A Jakpat survey cited by the Desk found 74 percent of Indonesian listeners now prefer home-grown artists.
The irony is that Korea wrote the manual. “K-pop has demonstrated that Asian-based pop culture is globally viable and attractive,” Mary Ainslie, a researcher at the University of Nottingham, told Al Jazeera, adding that this “has provided both inspiration and a model of innovation for local industries.” The model travelled almost intact: trained groups, polished visuals, constant fan contact. “We interact with all of our fans every single day, when we wake up until we sleep,” said Nate Porcalla of the Filipino boy band BGYO. What changed is the language on top. Artists now sing in Tagalog, Bahasa or Thai mixed with English, rather than chasing an English-only crossover.
That formula took BINI to Coachella in April, where the eight-member group became the first Filipino act to play the festival. Coverage of the 45-minute Mojave stage set described fans in Filipinianas chanting the group’s name half an hour before BINI walked on, opened with a “Mabuhay” and closed with “Pantropiko.” Thai film producer Cod Satrusayang put the shift bluntly. For the longest time, he said, Thai pop was “just an emulation of Korean and American style,” and only in the last five years or so have Thai artists started forging their own identity.
The money has followed. Statista figures cited by Al Jazeera show Indonesia’s digital music revenue grew from $164 million in 2021 to $264 million in 2025, while the Philippines nearly doubled from $93 million to $180 million. Borders are blurring too. Artists from elsewhere in the region went from 5 percent of Malaysia’s Spotify top 10 to 45.7 percent, and Indonesian acts alone grew from about 18 to 22 percent of Malaysia’s charts between 2023 and early 2026, helped by a shared language. Singapore and, to a degree, Malaysia remain the exceptions, where Western and Korean acts still hold on.
There is a catch, and The Jakarta Post put it in a headline: all the streams, but where are the crowds? Indonesia logged 23.2 billion streams across Spotify’s Top 200, more than double the Philippines, yet its biggest streaming names rarely sell out solo shows at home. “There are plenty of cases in which an Indonesian artist has amassed hundreds of millions of streaming plays, but not been offered a single stage gig,” said Kukuh Rizal of the label Sun Eater. A 2024 Populix survey found 57 percent of Indonesian respondents would rather buy a festival ticket than see a solo concert.
Anyone who follows Indian streaming charts will recognise the pattern. Spotify’s latest Loud & Clear figures for India show Indian artists filled 90 percent of the Top 50 India playlist in 2025, and more than 40 percent of their royalties came from listeners abroad. Hanumankind’s “Big Dawgs” reached number one on Spotify’s global chart, and Haryanvi streams grew nearly sevenfold between February 2023 and February 2026. The desi version of the story is less about knocking K-pop off a pedestal and more about Bollywood sharing the throne with independent and regional voices. The engine is the same, though: listeners who finally hear themselves in the music, one tap away.
K-pop isn’t going anywhere. It still has the global reach and the touring machine. What it has lost is the easy assumption that Asia’s next big pop star would be Korean. In Jakarta, Manila and Bangkok, the next one is already on the playlist, singing in the language of home.
Sources
- Al Jazeera, Erin Hale — “Southeast Asia’s homegrown artists are knocking K-pop off its pedestal,” July 1, 2026
- The Southeast Asia Desk — Indo pop rises to 78% on Spotify Indonesia, May 23, 2026
- The Jakarta Post Weekender, Felix Martua — “All the streams. Where are the crowds?”, 2026
- Rolling Stone — Bini become first Filipino group to perform at Coachella 2026
- The Hollywood Reporter — BINI makes history as first Filipino act at Coachella
- Business Today — Spotify report on Indian regional music going global, September 5, 2026
