SEOUL, December 06 (AJP) - Google’s Year in Search 2025 revealed a digital world captivated by culture clashes, political shocks and breakout entertainment — and Korea’s cultural engine once again emerged as one of the year’s dominant global forces.
While U.S. political turmoil topped America’s trending list, Korean pop culture and gaming IP cemented their global imprint: Netflix’s animated “KPop Demon Hunters” surged to No. 2 in the United States' trending searches, Nexon’s ARC Raiders ranked among the world’s hottest games, and Squid Game reclaimed relevance as one of the most-searched TV titles of the year.
The most striking global mover was KPop Demon Hunters — an animated adventure where a trio of K-pop idols fight a demonic boy band. Released by Netflix, the film became a cross-platform sensation, riding on K-pop’s established global fandom and the rise of stylized Asian animation.
The movie didn’t just dominate film charts; it also spilled into fashion, TikTok edits, and global meme culture, pushing searches for “K-pop,” “K-pop animation,” and “K-pop demon characters” to new highs.
Google’s list of “Trending Games of 2025” included heavyweights like Battlefield 6 and Hollow Knight: Silksong, but Korea’s Nexon stood out with ARC Raiders emerging as a breakout global title. The extraction shooter, built by Stockholm-based Embark Studios under Nexon, redefined the genre with communal robot-hunting mechanics and a more casual-friendly loop.
With more than 7 million copies sold within a month, ARC Raiders became Korea’s first mainstream global gaming hit since PUBG, reigniting Seoul’s ambition to challenge U.S. and Japanese dominance in triple-A gaming.
Squid Game, which reshaped global streaming entertainment in 2021, returned as a trending search in 2025 on the back of renewed global streaming cycles, behind-the-scenes revelations during production of its next installment, and Korea’s political and economic crises echoing the show’s original themes.
Google’s trending musicians list for 2025 included household Western names like Bad Bunny and Coldplay — but one of the biggest surprise entries was KATSEYE, the multinational K-pop girl group formed through HYBE and Geffen’s global trainee program.
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