Counting down to Seventeen: 17 facts to know about the K-pop boy band

SINGAPORE – Boy band Seventeen will ignite the National Stadium over two nights on Jan 25 and 26, marking their fifth time performing in Singapore. Here are 17 number-related bits of trivia about one of K-pop’s biggest acts.

1. 13 members

Officially, Seventeen are made up of 13 men aged 25 to 29, split into three units.

The hip-hop unit in charge of much of the group’s rapping is helmed by leader and oldest member S.Coups, with Wonwoo, Mingyu and Vernon. The performance unit in charge of dance and choreography is led by Hoshi, with Jun, The8 and Dino. The vocal unit, which takes on much of the singing, is led by Woozi, with Jeonghan, Joshua, DK and Seungkwan.

Together, the group are one united entity. So, 13 + 3 + 1 = 17!

However, long-time fans who have followed Seventeen’s activities since before their 2015 debut will know that the group were possibly meant to debut with their namesake number of members.

Their founding label Pledis Entertainment originally had 17 trainees, but four left.

2. 1st Marina Bay Sands-K-pop collaboration

The integrated resort

will be lit in the band’s signature pink and blue hues

– Rose Quartz and Serenity under the Pantone palette – from 7pm to midnight on Jan 25 and 26.

This marks the first time MBS is lighting its facade for a K-pop act.

3. 2nd K-pop group to play two nights at the National Stadium

Prior to Seventeen, the only K-pop acts that have played at Singapore’s 55,000-capacity venue are BTS, Blackpink and Stray Kids in 2019, 2023 and 2024 respectively. Among them, only Blackpink

held a two-night show.

Seventeen performed in Singapore four times before, including at the Indoor Stadium in 2018 and 2022.

4. 3 countries

Seventeen comprise members from three countries.

Americans Joshua and Vernon were born in Los Angeles and New York respectively. There are also two members from China – The8, whose real name is Xu Minghao, and Jun, whose real name is Wen Junhui.

The rest of the members are South Korean.

5. 4th world tour

Seventeen Right Here is their fourth world tour.

It kicked off in October 2024 at Goyang Stadium in South Korea, before travelling to the US and Japan. It is slated to conclude at the Rajamangala National Stadium in Bangkok, Thailand, in February 2025.

This tour does not feature all 13 members. Jeonghan is fulfilling South Korea’s mandatory military service, while Jun has acting commitments in China. 

6. 5th most copyright credits

Seventeen are known for self-producing, with members often taking part in songwriting and creating dance choreography.

Woozi is the group’s primary producer, with composer and lyricist credits on most of their songs. As at December 2024, Woozi has 185 songs registered under his name with the Korea Music Copyright Association, making him the K-pop idol with the fifth-most copyrighted songs.

Placed ahead of him are rapper Ravi, BTS’ RM, Stray Kids’ Bang Chan and Day6’s Young K.

7. The power of The8

Only The8 has a stage name using a number.

In an October 2020 episode of South Korean variety show Men On A Mission, DK said the stage name originated as Yongpal – which literally means “dragon eight” in Korean to signify the powerful vocals of eight dragons. Eventually, it evolved into the name The8 (which sounds similar to D8, for “dragon eight”), and was supposed to be DK’s stage name.

After some reshuffling, Xu, who is also sometimes known as Myungho – the Korean way to read his given name Minghao – took on The8 instead.

8. 10th anniversary in 2025

In an interview with American broadcast outlet iHeartRadio posted in December 2024, Dino said he sees himself and the members keeping Seventeen going for a long time.

“I believe we’ll always be making music, dancing and singing, just like now.”

9. 11 weeks on Billboard’s World Albums chart

While Seventeen may have taken a while to become the worldwide record-smashing success they are today, they came out of the gate strong. Their debut EP 17 Carat (2015) spent 11 weeks on Billboard’s World Albums chart after its release.

10. 12 daesangs

Seventeen – including sub-unit BSS, formed by Seungkwan, DK and Hoshi – have notched 12 “daesangs”, or grand prizes, one of the most prestigious awards an act can receive at South Korea’s major year-end music award shows.

Their first daesang was for the 2019 album An Ode, which nabbed Album of the Year at the Asia Artist Awards. They have since gone on to win daesangs like Album of the Year for FML and Seventeenth Heaven at the 2023 and 2024 Mama Awards respectively.

11. 58cm-wide shoulders

Wonwoo and Mingyu are often lauded as the hunky, sexy members, with Mingyu even showing off his abs as brand ambassador for American fashion label Calvin Klein.

But it is the soft-spoken, bespectacled Wonwoo who is best known for his broad 58cm-wide shoulders, with Mingyu losing out by 1cm.

12. 241 dancers for music video Super

One of the group’s biggest hits is the powerful dance track Super (2023), inspired by the Chinese mythological tale of the Monkey King, or Sun Wukong. In the music video, 228 backup dancers join Seventeen’s 13 members for a complex, large-scale choreographed dance.

13. 97-liners

Several members of Seventeen are part of a famous K-pop friend group known as the 97-liners, as all of them were born in 1997.

The official line-up of the A-list idol buddies was revealed by BTS member Jungkook, who gave a shout-out to his fellow 97-liners in a thank-you note accompanying his band’s 2017 album You Never Walk Alone.

He addressed Got7’s Yugyeom and BamBam, NCT’s Jaehyun and Seventeen’s DK, The8 and Mingyu, and said: “Let’s meet soon and hang out.”

14. 10,000 Boos

Seungkwan, who took part in the Netflix strategy game show series The Devil’s Plan (2023) and whose real name is Boo Seung-kwan, has one of the rarest surnames in his country. Only about 10,000 people in South Korea, which has a population of over 51 million, share it.

The surname originates from Jeju Island, where Seungkwan grew up.

15. 3.99 million in a day

Their 2023 EP FML smashed records by selling 3.99 million copies in just one day, marking the biggest first-day sales in South Korean music chart Hanteo’s history. FML was also the best-selling album of 2023 globally, according to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, which did not release sales figures.

16. 5.09 million in a week

Seventeen also hold Hanteo’s record for the best-selling K-pop album in its first week, with Seventeenth Heaven (2023) moving over 5.09 million copies.

17. 10 million won penalty

To maintain a close bond, the band commit to having at least one meal together every month outside of work.

To ensure members turn up, a whopping 10 million won (S$9,374) penalty is implemented for no-shows without a valid excuse and 100,000 won is charged for every minute the person is late. No one, at least publicly, is known to have been fined for missing such sessions. The gatherings are usually themed, with members taking turns to host.