One Ear at 30%: BTS V Hearing Loss, Two Years Hidden

BTS V hearing loss stopped being a fan theory on 12 August, when the singer sat down for a Weverse livestream and told viewers that if his left ear is running at 100, his right is at about 30. He has been living with it for roughly two and a half years. He is taking medication and going to hospital regularly. And he is doing all of that midway through a stadium tour that does not wrap until March 2027.

The detail that lands hardest isn't the number. It's what he did with it. V said he initially wrote the problem off as a question of mental strength — something to push through rather than something to get scanned. He only involved doctors once it got worse, and he believes his military service, which he completed in June 2025 after enlisting in 2023, made it deteriorate further.

British fans have a direct stake in this. V played Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on 6 and 7 July, part of a London takeover that also filled the Korean Cultural Centre and Outernet with pop-ups and merch queues. Anyone who stood in that crowd watched a performer work two nights of stadium volume with one ear already well down. He said nothing about it at the time.

What V Actually Told Fans

The disclosure came unprompted, in the loose, chatty format Weverse livestreams usually take. He didn't name a diagnosis and no medical documentation has been made public, so the specific cause remains unclear. What he did give was a comparison anyone can picture.

If the hearing in my left ear is at 100, it's only about 30 in my right.

He is not the only member managing something. Jungkook has spoken about inflammation in his shin and what he described as micro-damage to the bone, and he is performing through it. Two injuries, two members, one tour that keeps moving. Neither disclosure came with a schedule change.

Why BTS V Hearing Loss Stayed Quiet So Long

Performers sit on this kind of thing constantly, and the reasons are boringly practical. Admitting to hearing damage invites questions about whether you can still do the job. On a tour this size, a cancellation is not one refund — it's a stadium, a freight schedule, a crew of hundreds and a insurance conversation. The incentive to keep going is enormous.

There's also timing. V and RM were discharged in June 2025, the group regrouped, and the Arirang tour opened in Goyang in April 2026 after years of pent-up demand. That is a difficult moment to raise your hand and say your ear isn't right. By his own account, the condition began around early 2024 — during service, well before a single ticket went on sale.

How Hard the Arirang Tour Pushes

From Goyang to Tottenham in Three Months

The tour is built at a scale that dwarfs the group's 2019 Wembley run: reported at 79 shows across 34 cities in 23 countries. London landed in early July, then the production crossed the Atlantic and restarted at MetLife Stadium on 1 August, with Baltimore following on 10 and 11 August.

Nine Months Still to Run

Arlington, Toronto, Chicago and a September run at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles are still ahead, before the tour eventually closes in the Philippines in March 2027. That's roughly seven more months of stage volume, cabin pressure and in-ear monitors for someone whose right ear is already compromised.

Why In-Ear Monitors Cut Both Ways

Modern stadium acts wear moulded in-ear monitors, which seal the canal and let performers hear a controlled mix instead of a wall of noise. Used properly, they protect. Pushed loud — and singers do push them loud when 60,000 people are screaming — they deliver that level straight to the eardrum with nothing in between.

How Common Is Hearing Damage in Music?

Far more common than the silence around it suggests. Research collated by the Hearing Health Foundation puts musicians at around four times the general population's risk of hearing loss and roughly 57 per cent more likely to develop tinnitus. Studies of professional players have found tinnitus rates above 40 per cent.

The audience isn't exempt either. Tinnitus UK estimates 7.6 million people in the UK live with tinnitus, about 1.5 million of them severely, and noise exposure is the leading preventable cause. An RNID survey found 58 per cent of people heading to music events had already experienced ringing or temporary hearing loss afterwards — a third of them more than once.

What to Do About Your Own Ears

The useful thing about a story like this is that the fix is cheap and the damage isn't reversible. If you go to gigs regularly, or you play, a few habits genuinely help:

• Wear filtered earplugs, not foam. Musicians' plugs cut volume evenly instead of muffling the top end, so the mix still sounds right.
• Help Musicians runs a scheme with Musicians' Hearing Services offering an assessment plus custom-moulded plugs for around £50 — less than most stadium tickets.
• Step away from the speaker stacks. Ten metres back and slightly to the side is a measurably quieter spot with better sound anyway.
• Treat ringing that lasts past the next morning as a warning, not a souvenir.
• Sudden loss or muffling in one ear is urgent. Get it looked at within days, not months — early treatment windows are short.

Watch what happens next on the tour rather than what gets said about it. If HYBE quietly adjusts monitor levels, trims a setlist, or adds rest days before the SoFi run in September, that tells you more than any statement will. And if you were at Tottenham in July and your ears rang for two days afterwards, take the hint V took two and a half years to take.