Heeseung Leaves ENHYPEN But Stays With Label, Will Launch Solo Career
BELIFT LAB announced on March 10 that Heeseung will depart from K-pop group ENHYPEN while remaining signed to the label to pursue solo music, as the group continues as a six-member act.
The Announcement
The news was shared in a statement posted across ENHYPEN’s official channels. BELIFT LAB confirmed that Heeseung will leave the group but stay under the label umbrella while preparing a solo career.
The company said the decision followed a long period of deliberation between Heeseung, the other members and management.
“Through in-depth discussions with each of the members about the future they envision and the direction of the team, it became clear that Heeseung has his own distinct musical vision,” the company said.
This marks the first lineup change for ENHYPEN since the group debuted on November 30, 2020, with the release of Border: Day One. All seven members — Heeseung, Jungwon, Jay, Jake, Sunghoon, Sunoo and Ni-ki — were originally selected through the survival audition program I-LAND in June 2020.
The original lineup held together for nearly five years before this departure.
What ENHYPEN Has Built
The stakes of this transition are significant given the group’s commercial track record. ENHYPEN has charted on the Billboard Artist 100, Billboard 200 and Hot 100, and accumulated streaming milestones across Spotify, iTunes and YouTube.
The group became the fastest K-pop act to reach 1 billion streams on Spotify. They concluded their Walk the Line world tour in late 2025 after making their Coachella debut earlier that year.
Their seventh EP, The Sin: Vanish, was released in January with the lead single “Knife” — arriving nearly two months before the departure announcement.
Those milestones represent significant commercial infrastructure: touring revenue, streaming royalties, brand partnerships and festival bookings. ENHYPEN’s Coachella appearance and world tour stops represent the kind of events that drive local economic activity in the cities that host them.
The Remaining Six Members
The remaining members — Jake, Jay, Sunghoon, Sunoo, Jungwon and Ni-ki— will continue promoting as ENHYPEN. No specific plans for upcoming releases or tours were announced at the time of the statement.
However, in a February interview with Teen Vogue, member Sunghoon said the group was preparing for “an upcoming tour and also other activities that are lying ahead of us,” though no official announcements had been made by BELIFT LAB.
That comment, made before the departure was publicly confirmed, suggests the label had already been planning the group’s post-Heeseung trajectory while deliberations were still underway.
Heeseung’s Solo Path
Heeseung addressed fans, known as ENGENE, after the announcement.
“Thanks to the members with whom I shared countless emotions, and to ENGENE, who always filled every empty space with their support, I was able to take step after step toward a dream that once felt out of reach,” he wrote. “I am working hard on an album so I can meet you all again soon.”
BELIFT LAB said Heeseung is currently preparing a solo album. No additional details have been announced — no release window, no single teasers, no collaborator announcements — which suggests the project may still be in its formative stages.
The Business Strategy
The arrangement of keeping a departing member under the same label is notable. By retaining Heeseung on the roster, BELIFT LAB positions itself to develop both his solo output and ENHYPEN’s continued group activities simultaneously.
The solo launch will serve as a test case for BELIFT LAB’s ability to develop an artist outside of the group framework while maintaining the group itself. That requires distinct marketing strategies, separate production pipelines and careful fan-community management.
Industry observers have noted that how labels handle member departures — whether through acrimonious splits or managed transitions — often determines the long-term viability of both the group and the departing artist.
BELIFT LAB’s approach, publicly framing the departure as a mutual decision rooted in artistic vision rather than conflict, represents a model designed to preserve commercial relationships on all sides. Whether it succeeds will depend on the quality of Heeseung’s solo material, the continued momentum of the six-member ENHYPEN, and the label’s ability to keep both projects commercially viable.
BOTTOM LINE: Whether BELIFT LAB can successfully run both Heeseung’s solo career and a six-member ENHYPEN will be a closely watched test of K-pop’s evolving approach to group member transitions.
Production of this article included the use of AI. It was reviewed and edited by a team of content specialists.
