BTS Busan Concert Delay: HYBE Apologizes After 50,000 Fans Face Entry Chaos
The concert was scheduled to start at 7 p.m. BTS had been ready since 6. At 8:15, they finally walked onstage - and 50,000 fans who had been waiting outside the Busan Asiad Main Stadium in 28-degree heat were still filtering through the gates.
The opening night of BTS's two-day "ARIRANG" World Tour stop in Busan on June 12 was delayed by one hour and fifteen minutes. HYBE, the group's parent company, issued a formal apology through Weverse and BTS's official X account after the show concluded. "We sincerely apologize to all fans who attended the BTS WORLD TOUR 'ARIRANG' IN BUSAN for the significant inconvenience caused by the delayed start," the statement read. The company cited three contributing factors: confusion in on-site guidance, bottlenecks in fan gift distribution lines, and delays in merchandise pickup. It pledged to review all entry and distribution operations before the second night.
The members were already backstage when the situation unfolded. During the delay, several took to a Weverse live stream to communicate directly with fans. "There's a bit of delay, sorry," one wrote. "We are waiting too." Jimin uploaded a carousel of tour photos to Instagram mid-wait; Jin replied in the comments: "Is this the time to be posting on Insta?" J-hope added: "We gotta head in for the concert~ Jimin-ah~." According to fan accounts at the venue, the members had specifically asked organizers to hold the start until the majority of the audience was inside. HYBE confirmed Jimin and Jungkook later apologized to fans on behalf of BigHit Music in a post-show Weverse livestream.
The complaints from those on the ground went beyond the delayed start. Fans described confusion over facial recognition entry systems, gift collection queues that had no visible management, and no contingency guidance for concertgoers who needed to catch the last public transit back from the stadium. One attendee wrote on X: "I gave up on getting the entrance gift at 8:10 PM and barely managed to enter while crying. No one was managing the Face Pass or customer service queues and they didn't even give us guidelines." Several fans pointed out that the 2022 "Yet to Come in Busan" concert, the group's last full-group show before military service, had drawn similar crowd-management criticism - raising the question of why those lessons weren't applied to the larger, more logistically complex return.
The stakes of the Busan run were not small. The two sold-out nights at the 55,000-capacity stadium represented BTS's first return to the city in nearly four years and fell on June 13, the group's 13th debut anniversary. The second show was broadcast live to approximately 3,800 cinemas across more than 80 countries. The city itself had mobilized around the concerts: Gwangan Bridge and Busan Harbor Bridge were lit in red - the key color of the Arirang album - and BTS THE CITY Arirang events were running across the waterfront.
Day 2 was a different story. The Korea Times reported that the second night's production ran without comparable disruption, with all seven members performing live vocals throughout, surprise unit stages - the vocal line delivering "Dimple," the rap line performing "Ddaeng" - and the world premiere of "Come Over," a new song released on June 12. The show closed with an unannounced performance of "One More Night" before the finale, "Into the Sun."
HYBE's apology covered the first night. What it didn't address is whether the systems in question - facial recognition ticketing, fan gift logistics at scale - are adequate for a tour that has 86 remaining shows across 34 cities, next heading to Madrid on June 26.
