BTS beat Taylor Swift to be named the best-selling global artist of 2020

K-pop band released two best-selling albums last year

South Korean boyband BTS have been crowned the best-selling global artist of 2020.

The K-pop hitmakers beat American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift to the honour, which was bestowed by the global music body IFPI.

BTS released two albums in 2020, Map of the Soul: 7 and Be, both of which topped charts in many countries around the globe.

They are the first act whose songs are not predominantly sung in English to claim the crown, and the first artist from outside of the West.

Global sales, downloads and streams are all taken into account when the IFPI calculates the winner, covering the entirety of each artist’s back catalogue.

Swift also released two albums last year, the folk-infused Folklore, which came out in July, and Evermore, a second surprise release which dropped in December.

The artist is followed in the rankings by Canadian hip-hop star Drake, with The Weeknd and Billie Eilish taking the fourth and fifth spots.

The rest of the top 10 is filled out by Eminem, Post Malone, Ariana Grande, Juice WRLD and Justin Bieber.

It was reported earlier this week that hundreds of popular K-pop songs have been removed from Spotify due to a licensing dispute between the streaming platform and South Korean distributor Kakao M.