Nayeon – born Im Na-yeon in Seoul, South Korea on September 22, 1995 – is a K-Pop singer best known as a member of girl group Twice. She began her career participating in a 2010 modeling contest for JYP Entertainment and was taken on as a trainee. Her entry into showbusiness was an appearance on the television series Dream High 2 (2012). The following year, she joined the lineup of girl group 6mix, but the project never fully came to fruition. In 2015, she appeared on the talent showcase / reality TV series Sixteen, which featured contestants vying for a position in new K-Pop girl group Twice. Nayeon made the final nine-member lineup, and they released their first EP, The Story Begins, in 2015. While their first single made the Top 10, they didn’t hit number 1 on the South Korean Singles chart until the release of the 2016 single “Cheer Up.” They hit that peak position with their next eight singles and became a worldwide sensation. They released singles and albums directed at both the Korean and Japanese pop markets while also extending their reach to the US, a nation caught up in K-Pop fever. Nayeon became so popular that she made several ‘Most Popular Idol’ lists in 2017, 2018, and 2019. After the release of Twice’s third album Formula of Love: O+T=＜3, Nayeon began preparing her first solo EP. Released in June 2022, the Im Nayeon EP shot straight to number 1 on the Korean Albums chart. The EP contained the hit single “Pop!” After the release of three EPs by Twice – Between 1&2 (2022), Ready to Be (2023) and With You-th (2024) – Nayeon returned to her solo career with the Na EP (2024), which reached number 1 on the South Korean and Billboard World Music charts.
