Hyoyeon

Kim Hyo-yeon, known professionally as Hyoyeon or DJ Hyo, was born on September 22, 1989, in Incheon, South Korea. Her dance training began in elementary school, where she learned hip hop, jazz, and Latin dance styles. In 1999, she enrolled in Winners Dance School, specializing in various hip-hop techniques, and formed the dance team Little Winners with Miss A’s Min. She auditioned for SM Entertainment at age 11 through the SM 2000 Casting System, driven by her mother’s desire to meet the group H.O.T. In 2004, she studied Chinese in Beijing alongside Super Junior’s Siwon and received dance instruction from notable choreographers, including the Electric Boogaloos. Before her official debut, she worked with a choreographer for Janet Jackson and performed as BoA’s silhouette dancer at the M.net KM Music Festival in 2005. Her extensive dance background earned her recognition as Korea’s No. 1 idol dancer on Star News.

Hyoyeon officially debuted in August 2007 as a member of Girls’ Generation, a K-pop girl group under SM Entertainment. The group quickly achieved widespread success, releasing their debut single “Into the New World” and their self-titled debut studio album in November 2007. Their extended play “Gee” (2009) set a record for nine consecutive weeks at number one on KBS’s Music Bank. In 2010, Girls’ Generation released their second studio album “Oh!” and made their Japanese debut with “Genie.” Their 2011 Japanese studio album topped the Oricon Albums Chart, a first for a foreign girl group. Hyoyeon expanded into television, appearing in “Invincible Youth 2” (2011–2012) and competing in “Dancing with the Stars: Season 2” (2012), where she placed second. In October 2012, she joined SM Entertainment’s special dance group Younique, releasing the single “Maxstep” in collaboration with Hyundai.

Expanding her solo career, Hyoyeon released her first solo song “Mystery” in December 2016 as part of SM Station and followed it with “Wannabe” in June 2017. In 2018, she adopted the stage name HYO and debuted as a DJ with the single “Sober,” performing in club tours and EDM festivals. She also became a member of Girls’ Generation’s second sub-unit, Oh!GG, which released “Lil’ Touch” in September 2018. Subsequent solo releases included “Punk Right Now” (2018), “Badster” (2019), and “Dessert” (2020). In 2021, she released “Second” featuring BIBI, and became a member of the supergroup Got the Beat. Her first extended play, “Deep,” was released in May 2022. Girls’ Generation reunited for their fifteenth anniversary in August 2022, releasing their seventh Korean-language studio album, “Forever 1.” Hyoyeon continued her DJ career with multiple tours across North America from 2023 to 2025 and released the single “Retro Romance” in September 2024.