Where Are K-Pop Songs Actually Recorded?
Some major K-pop companies have their own recording studios. But that does not mean every song—or every stage of a song—is made there.
One song.
Several rooms.
- Production
- Recording & editing
- Mixing
- Mastering
Separate stages can mean separate specialists, facilities and countries.
Open the credits of a K-pop album and you may find something interesting. A JYP artist may record at JYPE Studios. A HYBE artist may work at HYBE Studio. An SM release may pass through several dedicated SM rooms.
Yet those same credits can also name independent facilities, specialist mixers and overseas mastering engineers. The company on the release is not necessarily the address of every session.
Modern K-pop production works through a network of company facilities, outside recording rooms, producer workspaces and mixing and mastering specialists. Five examples show how that network becomes visible in the credits.
When the company has its own studio
Internal recording rooms can make repeated sessions easier to coordinate: guide vocals, final takes, harmonies and revisions do not always happen in one sitting. But access to a company studio does not mean that the entire record stays inside the company.
01 / NMIXX — JYPE Studios
The published credits for Fe3O4: STICK OUT list recording at JYPE Studios across its six tracks. Seo Eun-il, Kwak Bo-eun and Eom Se-hee are among the engineers named, with assignments varying by song.
The next stages take different routes. “BEAT BEAT” was mixed by Lee Tae-seop at JYPE Studios. “Moving On” was mixed by Shin Bong-won at GLAB Studios. Both credit Kwon Nam-woo at 821 Sound Mastering.
The title track, “See that?,” follows another path: Josh Gudwin mixed it at Henson Studios in Hollywood, and Dave Kutch mastered it at The Mastering Palace in New York. It would therefore be misleading to give the entire EP one mixing or mastering address.
02 / DK & SEUNGKWAN — HYBE and outside rooms
PLEDIS’ official credits for SERENADE make the division of work especially clear. The fourth track lists recording by Yang Ha-jung and Wang Bo-kyung at HYBE Studio, mixing by Shin Bong-won at GLAB Studios, and mastering by Kwon Nam-woo at 821 Sound Mastering.
The second track names three recording locations: Seoul Studio, Ingrid Studio and HYBE Studio. The fifth combines HYBE and Seoul Studio.
These are recording credits, not a session diary. Where vocals and live instruments share a credit list, the list alone does not tell us which performer recorded in each room. What it does establish is that even one track can involve several recording facilities.
03 / LE SSERAFIM — from HYBE to Los Angeles
“Smart,” originally part of EASY, offers a concise example of the international route. Source Music’s published credits on the Smart (Remixes) release include the original song and name Hwang Min-hee and Lee Yeon-su at HYBE Studio as recording engineers. The mix is credited to Jordan “DJ Swivel” Young at The Flood Zone in Los Angeles.
The recording room and the mix room perform different jobs. A vocal session can happen within the label’s production system, while the recorded parts travel to an outside mixer.
The label on the release is not an address for every session.
Major artists also use outside studios
The line between “in-house” and “outside” is less rigid than it first appears. Credits can show both kinds of facility on one project—and sometimes on one song.
04 / IVE — Ingrid Studio
The published credits for “XOXZ” name Yang Young-eun at Ingrid Studio for recording and Jeong Eun-kyung at the same facility for digital editing.
Mixing is credited to Patrizio “Teezio” Pigliapoco, assisted by Emiliano Olocco, and Alawn at Alawn Music Studios. Kwon Nam-woo at 821 Sound Mastering handles the final master, with assistants Yu Eun-jin and Jang Seung-ho.
That is a concrete example of a major-label release moving through an outside recording and editing facility before reaching separate mixing and mastering specialists. The track’s distributed engineering credits on Shazam also identify the principal engineers.
05 / aespa — SM rooms and doobdoob
WINTER’s “BLUE,” on aespa’s SYNK : aeXIS LINE – 2025 Special Digital Single, names three recording locations: Kang Eun-ji at SM Wavelet Studio, Kim Ju-hyun at SM Droplet Studio and Kwon Yu-jin at doobdoob Studio.
Kim Cheol-sun is credited with the mix at SM Blue Ocean Studio. The release’s mastering credit names Chris Gehringer at Sterling Sound.
The song was not simply “recorded at SM” or “recorded outside SM.” Its credits include both. They also distinguish recording from mixing: SM Blue Ocean appears here as the mix location, not another vocal-recording credit.
A song does not have to belong to one room
It is easy to picture an artist walking into one impressive studio, singing a song and leaving with a finished record. The examples above show why that image can be incomplete.
A project can move through these stages, with some combined and others handled separately:
- ProductionWriting, arrangement and instrumental production in a producer’s workspace or a larger studio.
- RecordingVocals and live instruments captured in one or more rooms.
- EditingTakes selected, assembled and adjusted by the recording team or another specialist.
- MixingThe recorded parts balanced and shaped into a coherent mix.
- MasteringThe mix prepared and checked for its final release format.
This is a simplified workflow, not a fixed itinerary for every K-pop song. A producer can combine several roles; revisions can send a project back to an earlier stage. Nor does a facility credit prove that every contributor was physically present there.
Why go outside the company?
There are practical reasons a team might choose an outside room: a preferred engineer, scheduling, access to a particular recording space, or a specialist’s established working setup.
Those are possible explanations—not documented reasons for every session in this article. The credits tell us who and where; they rarely tell us why that room was chosen.
What they do make clear is that recording, mixing and mastering need not share an address. The person producing the instrumental need not work beside the singer, and an overseas mix does not require the artist to travel with the files.
The studio credit tells a hidden story
Studio names reveal some of the infrastructure behind K-pop. JYPE, HYBE and SM rooms show the role of company production facilities. Ingrid, doobdoob and other outside studios show how that work connects to a wider recording community.
For a musician reading these credits, the useful lesson is not that one famous room guarantees a better record. It is that the work is divided among people with specific responsibilities. That connects to the separate costs of producing, recording, mixing and mastering a song—and to the decisions behind the tools producers use.
The finished song may carry one artist’s name.Behind it can be several engineers—and several different rooms.