BESTie’s 2013 Song Charts Again Thanks to Short-Form Video

BESTie’s 2013 song “Love Options” climbed to No. 175 on Melon’s daily chart on Sept. 7, 2026, thirteen years after its release. The unexpected comeback started with a fan-made short video pairing the track with Hearts2Hearts’ “Lemon Tang.” Former member Uji says she never imagined the song would chart this late.

A 13-Year-Old Song Returns to the Charts

“Love Options” was BESTie’s second single back in 2013. It never cracked the top 100 during the group’s active promotion period, according to Uji’s own recollection.

Thirteen years later, that missed goal finally happened, just not the way anyone expected. The song entered Melon’s daily chart on Aug. 27, 2026, then rose to No. 175 by Sept. 7.

It didn’t stop there. The track also appeared on Apple Music Korea’s Top 100, YouTube Music’s weekly chart, and hit No. 1 on Shazam’s charts in both Korea and Vietnam.

How BESTie Became a Case Study in K-pop Nostalgia

BESTie debuted in 2013 as a five-member girl group. They weren’t a top-tier act, and most casual K-pop listeners today may not even recognize the name.

That’s exactly what makes this story interesting. A song from a group without massive mainstream fame just outperformed hundreds of new releases on real-time charts.

Isn’t that a strange kind of justice? Sometimes a song just needs the right moment, even if that moment arrives over a decade late.

This isn’t the first time an older BESTie track has resurfaced through internet culture, but the scale of “Love Options” success is unusual. It shows how a single song can outlive an entire group’s active era. You can read more about the trend in Korea Times, which first reported the chart surge.

Why Short-Form Video Keeps Reviving Old K-pop Hits

The spark behind BESTie’s revival was a fan-made short video. It combined a performance of Hearts2Hearts’ “Lemon Tang” with “Love Options,” creating an unexpected pairing that spread fast.

Short-form platforms reward catchy fifteen-second hooks, not full three-minute songs. A retro chorus with a strong beat can outperform a brand-new single overnight.

Why does this keep happening with K-pop specifically? Korean pop songs are built around instantly memorable hooks, which makes them perfect material for video editors hunting for a punchy backing track.

(Somewhere, a music video editor is quietly grateful for every three-second chorus drop ever written.) This isn’t a one-off fluke, either. Older songs by other groups have seen similar spikes after trending on short-form platforms, proving that today’s charts are shaped as much by algorithms as by original release dates.

What This Means for BESTie Fans and Korea’s Music Industry

For longtime BESTie fans, this moment feels like validation. A song they loved for years is finally getting recognition, even without new promotion or a comeback stage.

For the wider industry, it raises a bigger question. Should labels rethink how they manage older catalogs, given how unpredictable viral moments can be?

There’s a real tension here worth naming honestly. Chart success built on a viral clip can fade just as fast as it arrived, leaving artists with a fleeting spotlight rather than lasting recognition.

But that same unpredictability also opens a door that didn’t exist before streaming and short-form video. A forgotten song, a former member, or a small agency can suddenly reach millions of new listeners with no marketing budget at all.

What matters now is what happens next for artists like Uji and groups like BESTie. Will labels start treating old catalogs as ongoing assets rather than archived history?

The BESTie story suggests they should. What do you think about older K-pop songs getting a second life through short-form video trends?

AI-Generated Photorealistic Image — All people, scenes, and details in this image are entirely AI-generated and fictional. Not a real photograph of an actual person or event. 이 이미지는 AI로 생성된 가상 이미지입니다.