Following BTS's footsteps through Seoul

If you're traveling to Seoul as a BTS fan, the city will pretty quickly start to look like a big map of their story. Some spots take you back to the days before their debut, others are tied to years of their biggest concerts, and some have simply become places where fans from all over the world meet up today.

There's no classic BTS museum at the moment. HYBE INSIGHT, which was located in HYBE's Yongsan building, closed in January 2023. HYBE announced at the time that the project would continue through exhibitions at other locations, but the permanent museum space in Yongsan is no longer open to visitors.

Myeongdong is a good place to start your tour, especially if it's your first time in Seoul. LINE FRIENDS SQUARE Myeongdong is there, a large store dedicated to their characters and collections, including BT21. The current store opened in 2024, and BT21 collections and events are still a major part of what it offers. It's also interesting for ARMY because of BTS's handprints, so this is one of those stops where you usually end up staying a bit longer than planned.

If you're more interested in BTS's beginnings, head toward Gangnam. Yoojung Sikdang looks at first glance like a completely ordinary small Korean restaurant, but this is where the members often ate during their trainee days. Their practice room at the time was nearby, and the restaurant's owners still keep memories of the period when the members regularly came by. The walls have since filled up with photos, messages, and mementos, turning the place into a kind of small time capsule from the era before BTS was the BTS we know today. The restaurant is still open, and with the group's big comeback it's once again among the spots drawing fans from around the world.

Not far away is Cafe HYUGA, another place tied to their past. The space where you can grab coffee today used to be one of the homes where the members lived together. Today it's a café and bakery, where fans leave letters, photos, and small mementos from different parts of the world. It's interesting to see how something that used to be a completely ordinary home for seven young musicians has become a place people now travel across the world to visit.

Jamsil is a different part of their story. There's no sense of small beginnings here anymore, just BTS filling stadiums. The Seoul Olympic Stadium complex is tied to some of their biggest performances in their hometown, so it's interesting for fans even when there's no concert on. Handprints from Korean musicians, BTS's included, can also be found around the Olympic complex. If you go looking for them, it's best to check their current location shortly before your visit, since the lineup and locations of individual handprints have changed over the years.

And that's a useful rule for BTS touring in Seoul in general: don't rely entirely on a guide that's a few years old. Some places that still show up in older blog posts no longer exist or have changed, while new ones keep popping up all the time. Especially around album releases, anniversaries, concerts, and members' birthdays, the city fills up with temporary exhibitions, pop-up shops, fan events, and specially themed cafés.

BTS's 2026 comeback showed that maybe better than ever. Seoul once again became a meeting point for ARMY from around the world, and the locations tied to their early days got a whole new generation of visitors.

That might be exactly why a tour like this is more interesting than a classic list of tourist attractions. In a single day you can sit in the restaurant where they ate as trainees, walk through the neighborhood where they used to practice, and end up in front of the stadium they were selling out years later.

Seeing it all in person suddenly gives their story a whole different scale. Seoul stops being just a city from videos, photos, and stories you know by heart. For a moment, it becomes part of the same story.

Note: check current opening hours and exact locations before visiting. Pop-up exhibitions, shops, and individual BTS content in Seoul change often.