aespa has claimed another major win in what is shaping up to be one of the group’s strongest comeback cycles yet. The quartet’s latest release, LEMONADE, was voted the best new release of the week by fans in InMusic’s latest X/Twitter poll, beating out high-profile competition from Ariana Grande, Latto, and Future & Tyla.
The fan-voted victory underscores the momentum surrounding aespa’s second studio album, which has quickly emerged as one of 2026’s biggest K-pop releases. In this week’s poll, LEMONADE came out on top against Ariana Grande’s “Hate That I Made You Love Me,” Latto’s Big Mama, and Future and Tyla’s collaborative single “Game Time.”
Commercially, the numbers back up the excitement. Released via SM Entertainment, LEMONADE opened with 842,131 first-day sales on Hanteo, securing the second-biggest opening day for any female artist in 2026. Only BLACKPINK’s DEADLINE, which launched with 1,461,785 copies in February, posted a larger first-day total among female acts this year.
Across all K-pop releases in 2026, the album currently ranks No. 9 for biggest first-day sales, in a year led by BTS’ ARIRANG, which moved 3.9 million copies in its opening 24 hours. For aespa, the figure marks the seventh-biggest opening day ever recorded by a female K-pop group on Hanteo.
Streaming momentum followed immediately after release. The project entered the top five of the U.S. iTunes albums chart, climbed to No. 1 on Worldwide iTunes, and delivered a strong Spotify debut as the title track “LEMONADE” opened at No. 50 on the Daily Global Spotify Chart with 2.541 million streams, overtaking “Whiplash” as the strongest Spotify debut of aespa’s career.
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