As the leader of arguably the most successful K-Pop group in the world, RM’s net worth is quite impressive. Kim Namjoon, better known by his stage name RM, is the lead rapper and leader of BTS. With the continuous success of BTS and their solo projects, there’s no stopping their immense talent from reaching every corner of the world.
Bangtan Sonyeondan, better known as BTS, debuted in 2013 under Big Hit Entertainment with their first song “No More Dream.” Since then the Bangtan Boys’ seven members—RM, Jin, Suga, J-Hope, Jimin, V and Jungkook—have become some of the most recognizable names in not only K-pop, but in music history. The Bangtan Boys have collaborated with Halsey, Steve Aoki and Nicki Minaj, and have performed at the Grammys, the American Music Awards and other award shows. In August 2020, BTS earned their first number one on the Billboard Hot 100 with their single, “Dynamite,” the band’s first song fully recorded in English.
During their 2022 Festa video celebrating the anniversary of their debut, the band announced that they would be taking a break. The boy band would not be breaking up, but instead, they would be focusing on their solo projects. Several members released their hit projects after the announcement such as J-Hope’s album Jack in the Box and Jin’s solo single “The Astronaut.” In October 2022, Big Hit announced that the oldest member of the group Jin would be enlisting in the Korean military (which is mandatory for able-bodied Korean men under the age of 30), with the rest of the members joining later. The company also noted that the band is “looking forward to reconvening as a group again around 2025 following their service commitment.”
RM is the latest member to release his solo project Indigo, on December 2, 2022. Here’s how much RM makes from his music and other endeavors.
What is RM’s net worth?
Image: Han Myung-Gu/WireImage via Getty Images
What is RM’s net worth? According to Celebrity Net Worth, RM’s net worth is about $20 million. A majority comes from performance earnings with BTS, and another portion comes from endorsements and investments. He is currently 18 on the list of K-Pop idols with the highest net worth according to Seoul Space.
According to the net worth site, the K-Pop group earned $170 million in touring revenue in 2019 for their Love Yourself World Tour, which is a record for any musical group. Though the group didn’t tour in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, they offered virtual online concerts to their fanbase (known as ARMY) such as Map of the Soul O:NE and Permission to Dance on Stage Online. Once restrictions were lifted, the boys returned to the stage with Permission to Dance on Stage performances in Los Angeles, Las Vegas and Seoul. All those concerts sold out in a heartbeat, and the Los Angeles show sold out on Ticketmaster during the presale rounds before the general public sale.
BTS is also brand ambassadors for a plethora of brands such as Mcdonald’s, Samsonite, Seoul Tourism, Louis Vuitton, Formula E, Puma, FILA, Coway, LG, Hyundai, Samsung and Lemon-a and even more! The Korea Times reported that the band is paid between 3 billion won ($2.69 million) and 5 billion won ($4.48 million) per endorsement.
Let’s not forget the impact of BTS’ music on their earnings! According to Billboard, the band was responsible 1/3 of all U.S. K-Pop sales & streams in 2021. Their latest album BE sat on top of the Billboard Charts for weeks, and it was their fifth album that reached number one, with 242,000 album-equivalent units, including 177,000 sales. It also hit number one on South Korea’s Gaon Album Chart with over 2.2 million copies sold in its first week. It almost became the highest opening week sales figures in the chart’s history, but their previous album Map of the Soul: 7 still takes the record.
In September 2020, Big Hit Entertainment went public on the South Korean stock exchange. Big Hit and HYBE founder and BTS’ producer Bang Si-Hyuk offered the boys 478,695 common shares of the company. At the time of the opening, Big Hit’s share was priced at $235 (270,000 South Korean Won). According to Rolling Stone, it took to a market cap of $7.6 Billion and BTS themselves earned $108 million in shares, or $15.4 million per group member.
Known as an affectionate art and nature lover among ARMY (there’s even an action named after him called “Namjooning”), RM invests his time and money towards art appreciation. In an interview with the New York Times, the outlet revealed that in 2020, he donated 100 million won (about $84,000 at the time) to the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA) to reissue out-of-print art books and distribute them to libraries. RM is also a passionate art collector with one of his prized collections containing a $1.2 million sculpture by American multidisciplinary artist Roni Horn titled Untitled and an abstract painting by Yun Hyong-keun. “I think that there’s something that I can offer as an outsider of the art industry,” RM told NYT.
RM’s debut studio album Indigo was released on December 2, 2022. Though it’s his debut studio album, RM has released solo material in the past in his previous mixtapes mono. and RM. The album visits his artistic process and his vulnerabilities and contains a multitude of collaborators such as Anderson .Paak, Erykah Badu, Colde, Paul Blanco, Mahalia, Tablo of the K-Hip Hop group Epik High, Kim Sawol, youjeen and parkjiyoon. “I was always concentrating on wanting to prove something to people. Like, ‘I just want to make you guys listen to this. I want to just share my thoughts. Please listen to this!’” he explained in an interview about the album with Variety. “This time I was focusing on expanding my personal thoughts to something universal, so people can approach it and think it could be their own stories, too. When I made this, it was all mine. But once I made this whole album, it feels like it’s not mine anymore, and I just give it to people, and people would maybe digest it and, through their own colors, reflect on their own lives.”
Courtesy of: Big Hit Entertainment
Our mission at STYLECASTER is to bring style to the people, and we only feature products we think you’ll love as much as we do. Please note that if you purchase something by clicking on a link within this story, we may receive a small commission of the sale.