Sometimes, you just need to sing your heart out, and let’s be real: a little choreography never hurt anyone.
There are valuable language lessons in K-pop, and you can learn a lot from watching K-pop music videos or just listening to the songs. And with the 10 K-pop music apps below, you’ll have all the music you need to make you dance for joy while improving your Korean skills.
Yes, you may already have one of the best K-pop apps installed on your phone.
Spotify, one of the top music apps on the market, has plenty of K-pop songs you can enjoy. You can search by song or artist, create your own K-pop playlist or listen to an existing playlist.
And with countless existing playlists, you’ll have no trouble finding one that you’ll love. For instance, if you like something light and uplifting, you can check out “Satang Mix.” If K-pop pumps up your energy levels in the morning, try “Morning K-Pop!”
The free option allows you to listen to playlists, albums or artists on shuffle, albeit with ads. The premium version, on the other hand, removes the ads, allows you to download songs to listen to offline and gives you more control over what songs you listen to and when.
KPOP Amino is dedicated to all sorts of Korean entertainment. However, the focus of this app is somewhat different from the others. Rather than providing you with songs or videos, KPOP Amino’s main focus is giving you a community to discuss your favorite Korean entertainment.
Sure, there’s also plenty of great media like photos, GIFs, memes and blog posts about music, celebrities, culture, fashion and language. But what makes KPOP Amino stand out is all the fans. You can share your own fan art, post about your favorite singers or celebrities and participate in special fan “projects.”
And while you’ll get plenty of opportunities to learn more about K-pop and discuss your favorites, you might also be able to befriend a native speaker who happens to share your interests.
Mubeat lets you stream popular K-pop videos from various Korean TV channels. They feature popular artists like BTS, BLACKPINK and EXO, so you’ll have plenty of great viewing ahead of you. You can even follow your favorite artists so you don’t miss out on any of their latest videos.
Not sure what to listen to? Regularly updated charts will help you see what’s hot at the moment.
And if interacting with other fans is more up your alley, Mubeat also allows you to share images and posts with the community.
Sometimes, a good cover can be even better (or at least, more interesting) than the original. If you can’t get enough of K-pop covers, you’ll definitely want to try the Coverstar app.
Coverstar allows you to view user-uploaded K-pop covers. But that’s not all! You can also upload your own covers, which is the perfect opportunity to get in some Korean practice while channeling your inner pop star.
No list of K-pop music apps would be complete without the world’s biggest video-sharing platform. If you decide to subscribe to the Premium version, you can stream K-pop music in the background just like a regular music player. Otherwise, the app will automatically stop whatever it’s playing the moment you switch to another app on your phone.
Of course, the great thing about this video app is the added eye candy—and I’m not just talking about the ridiculously good-looking K-pop stars! If you search for the official lyric video of any K-pop song, there’s a good chance you’ll come across it and pick up Korean while you bob your head to those catchy tunes.
Want to show off your knowledge of your favorite K-pop group? This game is a fun way of doing just that!
To access the games, you need to choose a fandom and pass the initial quiz. Once you get past that, you can play games categorized under “Action” and “Art.” Don’t let the name of the second category fool you: you’ll be challenged by the likes of “music cocktail,” where melodies will be mixed up and you have to guess which three songs are playing at the same time.
There’s apparently a third category called “Puzzle,” but as of this writing, the developers are still working on it.
This app is exactly what it says on the tin. It’s your gateway to over 30 radio stations that play some of the greatest K-pop hits.
Like Spotify, K-pop Music Radio allows you to create your own playlists, shuffle between playlists and share your favorite tracks to the social media channel of your choice.
Plus, if you want to blast your favorite tunes for the world (or at least, your house) to hear, you can always pair this app with a loudspeaker and let those beats bop.
This app feels like YouTube if the latter only streamed K-pop music. You can catch all the trending K-pop songs, play multiple videos at the same time, minimize the track you’re currently playing so you can look at other tracks in the meantime and create your own playlist.
The one downside to this app is that some of the latest K-pop tracks aren’t included for some reason. Otherwise, compared to other similar apps, it’s easy to use and the ads aren’t too bothersome.
Just as K-Pop+ feels like a Kpop-only version of YouTube, K-Pop Music feels like a Kpop-only version of Spotify.
You can search through thousands of free tracks, adjust the quality of your audio according to the quality of your internet connection, mark your “Favorite” songs for easy access later and curate your very own playlist.
If you don’t mind being bombarded with ads (which is the one downside to this app), plug those headphones in and get in with the beats!
If you’re looking for a lyrics game app that exclusively features K-pop music, look no further. In fact, the developers explicitly state that this app is suitable for Korean language learners.
Some of the highlights include a Romanization feature for the lyrics to help you get used to that tricky Korean pronunciation. And in case you’re stuck on some hard-to-translate lines, you can bookmark them so you can study and master them later. For an added challenge, switch to Test Mode and take the quizzes to see just how much of what you listened to stuck with you.
Why Use a K-pop Music App?
With a K-pop music app, you can have your favorite Korean songs with you on the go. Whether you’re at school, at work or traveling, you’ll have your tunes with you. It’s so much easier than lugging around a textbook to study Korean.
Plus, apps will give you a greater variety of Korean music options than you might have otherwise. Downloading individual songs can get pricey, and you may find yourself limiting your listening options to save money. With apps, though, you’ll have a lot more songs at the tips of your fingers. And you know what that means: more great Korean vocabulary!
Best of all, when you have a K-pop music app on your phone, you can fit in a little Korean practice whenever you have time. Songs are brief, so they’re an ideal learning tool for when you only have a handful of minutes free. Since you can listen to K-pop songs hands-free, you can listen in the car, during your shower or even while you’re cooking.
You can even use your K-pop music app in tandem with a language learning program like FluentU to learn even more.
FluentU takes authentic videos—like music videos, movie trailers, news and inspiring talks—and turns them into personalized language learning lessons.
You can try FluentU for free for 2 weeks. Check out the website or download the iOS app or Android app.
FluentU makes it possible to learn with K-pop videos, funny commercials, entertaining web series and more. Just a quick look will give you an idea of the variety of FluentU videos on offer:
FluentU really takes the grunt work out of learning languages, leaving you with nothing but engaging, effective and efficient learning. It's already hand-picked the best videos for you (which are organized by level and topic), so all you have to do is simply choose any video that strikes your fancy to get started.
Each word in the interactive captions comes with a definition, audio, image, example sentences and more.
Access a complete interactive transcript of every video under the Dialogue tab, and easily review words and phrases from the video under Vocab.
You can use FluentU’s unique Quiz Mode to learn the vocabulary and phrases from the video through fun questions.
FluentU keeps track of what you're learning, and tells you exactly when it's time for review, giving you a 100% personalized experience.
Review sessions use video context to help embed the words in your memory.
