Are we in 4th or 5th generation right now?

The real question, will 6th generation start in 2025 or 2026?

4.5

Tail end of 4th generation. We are in 4.5 generation.

May 2018 - Mar 2021 = start of 4th gen with Idle, Loona, and Izone. Then Itzy, Everglow, Aespa, Stayc.

April 2021 - present = Izone disbandment began 4.5 generation with daughter groups Ive and LSRFM, plus New Jeans, NMIXX, Baemon, Illin, etc.

5th gen will start in 2025 probably or maybe later this year at the absolute earliest. Maybe it will be Teddy's group that starts it.

tail end of 4th gen

Newjeans is mid 4th gen group

group like ILLIT should be considered late 4th gen

group like SMNGG may still be considered late 4th gen but people might favor them as start of 5th gen

Quote from BEG4DAWIN

The real question, will 6th generation start in 2025 or 2026?

omg don't start

10th gen

It's Girls Generation

5th gen started with ZB1's debut/started in mid-late 2023. Each gen starts as the groups that started the previous generation's first contracts start to end (groups that debuted 2017-early 18).

Quote from ava-beatrix

5th gen started with ZB1's debut/started in mid-late 2023. Each gen starts as the groups that started the previous generation's first contracts start to end (groups that debuted 2017-early 18).

3rd gen started with Exo but their contract not end in 2018, did it?

Quote from nevermindmejin

3rd gen started with Exo but their contract not end in 2018, did it?

Not every gen is exactly 7 years, take 2nd gen for example, started with DBSK and ended with Block B. If it was exactly 7 years, groups such as Miss A would be third gen, which they are not.

Similar to how it was back during 2018-2020. 4th gen barely had anything going on back then. Sure some itzy,skz songs did well internationally,some decent charting in Korea by itzy back then but nothing impressive.

2021 was the year after release of next level we can say 4th gen ggs absolutely took over in Korea and even internationally the top ggs were doing better than any 3rd gen gg except blackpink. 2022/2023 was just a blast for 4th gen ggs.

For 5th gen ggs like tws and riize already have way bigger success on kcharts than any 4th gen bg. International streams r tragic tho. And for 5th gen ggs let's see what illit debut does and baemon comeback.

4th gen, but I think we're nearing the point where gens are just meaningless (altho maybe they always were) if really we're considering now 5th gen. Like are we really going to make a new gen every 3 or 4 years just so the fans of new groups can feel better about themselves? I personally feel like 4th gen didn't even really take off until like 2022 when IVE and NewJeans broke through. And then 5th gen starts less than a year after that?

It's just SM/Mnet marketing that people want to believe so they can feel better about being a RIIZE/TWS/ZB1/etc. stan. Just like with early 4th gen when everyone was in the shadow of BTS/BP. But at least that took 7 years and 3rd gen actually had been the top groups for years as that point, as opposed to a few months for 4th gen.

5th gen..by 2026 we will start hearing about 6th gen

it depends on what the kmedia has said

but if it's not this year then definately next

i think we're transitioning between 4th and 5th gen

4th, but in retrospect March 2024 and even earlier might be considered 5th.

Why am I saying this? When Stray Kids debuted, people generally said we were still in gen 3. Stray Kids was called 3.5 then. Now everybody calls them 4th gen. Reason is that they are mostly competing with 4th gen groups and not so much with 3rd gen. However, when they debuted, 3rd gen still reigned supreme, with not just being the top 1 or 2 groups, but the top 20 groups all being 3rd gen.

Stray Kids were still considered 3rd gen even for quite a while longer. Only since TXT and especially Itzy's debuted, groups were generally counted as 4th gen as they debuted, with everything before that still being seen as 3 or 3.5 for a little while.

4 and 4.5 gen