BTS Collects Artist of the Year Again at the 52nd AMAs

BTS took home Artist of the Year at the 52nd American Music Awards in Las Vegas, adding Song of the Summer and Best Male K-Pop Artist to the night’s tally. The group beat Taylor Swift and Bruno Mars for the top honor. It wasn’t a surprise. Their relationship with the AMAs no longer hinges on novelty.

The connection runs deeper than a single ceremony. BTS first stepped onto the AMAs stage in 2017 with “DNA,” a performance that introduced them to a Western television audience that was largely unfamiliar. Three consecutive Favorite Social Artist awards followed, from 2018 through 2020. In 2021, they became the first Asian act to win Artist of the Year. That win reset expectations for what a Korean group could achieve at a major U.S. award show.

This year’s sweep is a continuation. It also arrives quietly, without the frantic energy that defined earlier milestones. BTS is now a known quantity, but the scale of their audience and the durability of their catalog keep them in a category of their own. The AMAs have become a recurring checkpoint, a place where a story that began with one carefully chosen slot continues to unfold.