Stray Kids Skip the 69th Grammys, Joining BTS in Submission Boycott

Stray Kids let the submission window for the 69th Grammy Awards close without entering any music, their agency JYP Entertainment confirmed on Friday. The decision places the group alongside BTS, which announced in July that it would not submit its music for consideration this cycle.

JYP Entertainment confirmed to local media that Stray Kids filed no entry before the Aug. 21 submission deadline. The agency offered no explanation and would not confirm whether the Recording Academy's new Asian Pop category played any part in the decision. Under Grammy rules, music that is not formally submitted cannot appear on nomination screening ballots and cannot compete for a win.

The eight members — Bang Chan, Lee Know, Changbin, Hyunjin, Han, Felix, Seungmin and I.N — received invitations this year to become Recording Academy voters, a role that lets them help pick nominees and winners even as they kept their own music out of the running.

At an Aug. 6 press conference in Seoul for the group's 10th EP, "This & That," members sidestepped direct questions about their Grammy plans. Seungmin deflected a question about the new category by pointing to what drives the group creatively rather than how the group is perceived externally. Hyunjin said the band has never chased an award or a chart milestone since debuting, calling fan satisfaction the group's real benchmark.

BTS broke the news of its own boycott in July, one month after the Recording Academy introduced the Asian Pop category. "We have decided not to submit for Grammy consideration this year," the group said in a statement posted across its members' individual Instagram accounts. "We hope our music can be heard and loved for what it is, rather than being divided by region or language. We thank Army and everyone who has always stood by us." BTS has been nominated for Grammys five times but has never won.

The Recording Academy spent several weeks holding listening sessions and talking with leaders in the Asian music community before CEO Harvey Mason Jr. confirmed on Thursday that the Asian Pop category would proceed for 2027. He said the Academy heard both candid opposition and strong support for keeping the category, with enthusiasm from fellow music creators ultimately outweighing the criticism.

"We understand this conclusion will not satisfy everyone, and that never feels good," Mason said. "But at the same time, we are confident it's the right conclusion for the music community overall." The Academy also said it received a "robust" number of submissions for the category's first year, and Mason said the Academy looks forward to celebrating its nominees at the 2027 ceremony.

The new category revives a familiar tension around the Grammys' genre-specific awards. Categories intended to spotlight a style of music can instead read as exclusionary, with voters steering artists toward the niche category rather than the mainstream ones. The same complaint has long trailed the Latin Grammys.

K-pop's clearest Grammy breakthrough to date came earlier this year, when "Golden" — from the animated film "KPop Demon Hunters," featuring vocals from the fictional group Huntr/x's EJAE, Audrey Nuna and Rei Ami — won best song written for visual media, though it lost in the best song category.

Nominees for the 69th Grammy Awards will be announced Nov. 16, and the ceremony is set for Feb. 7, 2027. With two of K-pop's biggest acts absent from the ballots, the debut of the Asian Pop category will unfold without the genre's most bankable names — a test of whether the award can stand on its own.