The first week of promotions has ended for Yeji's solo debut album "AIR". She ended the week with over 220,000 copies of the album sold — a strong showing for the leading member of ITZY.
A Solid Solo Start
"AIR" performed well compared to ITZY's 2024 releases, garnering over two-thirds of "BORN TO BE" first week sales and about half of "GOLD" within the same period of time. In general, solo-member albums like "AIR" can be expected to sell fewer copies than albums released by the full group. For instance, the solo debuts of ITZY's sister group TWICE also saw fractional sales figures versus TWICE as a whole. Tzuyu's debut album "abouTZU" moved just a third of the number of copies as TWICE's "With You-th" and nearly half of "Strategy". This shows that the sales for "AIR" have done quite well comparatively.
| ITZY album | first week sales | TWICE album | first week sales | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AIR (Yeji) | 220k | abouTZU (Tzuyu) | 331k | |
| BORN TO BE | 318k | With You-th | 1000k | |
| GOLD | 438k | Strategy | 729k |
JYP Entertainment (JYPE) groups aside, Red Velvet's Seulgi sold 127k in a week for "Accidentally on Purpose" and (G)I-DLE's Minnie sold 193k for "Her", both of which released this year. Yeji slotting herself in second place among the four recent female idol solos shows that the ITZY brand maintains a strong appeal.
Going forward we could see future ITZY member solos continuing to do well given the improvement in their sales from their last two albums. TWICE soloists have continued to perform well over the years, selling anywhere from 252k ("IM NAYEON") to 530k ("ZONE") within the first week, so expect the same for ITZY.
Turbulence in the Air
Though ITZY's prospects look good for now, there is alot of uncertainty on the horizon. While only a small portion of ITZY's album sales may come from the United States, the shaking up of the U.S. economy is having global repercussions. Because of this, the group's future sales may be more meaningfully impacted. However, it is notable that the music industry can also be strong during economic downturns, resulting in album sales that could be stable or even increase in the future despite the gloomy situation in other sectors.
China could also be a positive factor too. The country is considering lifting it's ban on Kpop, which could help buoy the industry's sales, ITZY included. And regardless of economic troubles elsewhere, China's economy is doing well, which is great for Kpop as the country was a big spender on the industry in years past.
A Competitive Month
Current sales aside, March is proving to be a competitive one for girl groups. JYPE is throwing a triple header with ITZY, NiziU, and NMIXX all having Korean releases this month. Girl groups from outside of the company are dropping new music too, including heavy hitters like LE SSERAFIM and NJZ (formerly NewJeans). Worse, the charts are already dominated by recent releases from IVE and the members of BLACKPINK.
Despite the competition, sales of "AIR" should stay strong due to most album purchases coming from the existing fandoms, however trying to grow market share may be more difficult in a sea of strong competitors. There is a bright spot though: with three groups cross promoting each other, the JYPE group's offerings could be more resilient over time compared to other idols. It's that resiliency that could drive better than usual performance over the long term.