Rumors that BTS’s V and Blackpink’s Jennie are dating have been swirling since May 2022 when alleged photos of the pair hanging out on several different occasions leaked over the course of a few months. Ever since, fans have been in a heated debate over whether the photos were real or doctored by fans. After all, V and Jennie are two of the biggest names in K-pop, and they wouldn’t be the first idols fans shipped passionately together despite very little evidence to back up their gut feeling.
While the V and Jennie dating rumors died down for some time, the pair’s most recent alleged sighting in Paris re-piqued fan interest. Ahead, get a breakdown of V and Jennie’s rumored relationship so far.
May 2022: First Reported Photo of Jennie and V Leaks
A photo of V driving in a car with someone who looked like Jennie on Jeju Island emerged online (via AllKPop). While some fans believed the image was real, others were skeptical, thinking it could have been edited, especially because, up until that point, Jennie had been rumored to be dating another K-pop star, Big Bang’s G-Dragon.
According to Allkpop, an employee from the Korean airline T’way Air claimed to have seen the two on a flight to Jeju Island together that May. The publication wrote: “One employee of the Korean budget airline T’way wrote on the ‘Blind’ app saying that they saw BTS’s V and BLACKPINK’s Jennie together. She also said that many of the T’way employees thought they were publicly dating because the two were traveling together in the open.” The worker reportedly made the claim on a messaging app called Blind, which is used anonymously by South Korean employees, according to Reuters.
Jennie’s agency, YG Entertainment, briefly addressed the rumors on May 23, 2022. “We have nothing to say [regarding this matter],” the agency said (via Soompi), adding, “We will inform you if we have a different response to share.”
August-September 2022: More Reported Photos of V and Jennie Leak
Over the next few months, more private photos of Jennie and V hanging out on what looked to be several different occasions leaked.
October 2022: YG Entertainment Requests Investigation Into Jennie’s Leaked Private Photos
In October 2022, YG announced an investigation into who was leaking Jennie’s photos. “We have officially requested the police to investigate who first circulated Blackpink Jennie’s personal photos,” YG said in a statement (via Rolling Stone). “We have refrained from mentioning the matter or making an official statement in order to minimize any further damage. However, there have been indiscriminate rumors, criticism, personal attacks, sexual harassment, and violations of personal life sparked by those private photographs,” the statement continued. “We are now announcing that we will take legal action and correct the situation.”
YG never specifically addressed the alleged photos of V and Jennie, so the heated debate surrounding whether they were real or doctored continued, as YG could have been referencing other privacy breaches in their statement.
May 2023: V and Jennie Seemingly Spotted Together on a Date in Paris
The rumored couple went under the radar for months until May 2023, when they were reportedly spotted taking a romantic stroll in Paris in a video captured by an onlooker from a distance. While V and Jennie’s schedules do confirm they were both in France at the time of the stroll (V for his Celine brand ambassadorship and Jennie to promote “The Idol” at the Cannes Film Festival), the debate surrounding whether the pair in the video was actually Jennie and V continued among fans. However, other close-up photos of V and Jennie with their managers wearing the same outfits seemingly confirmed the couple in the video was, in fact, V and Jennie.
According to Sports Seoul, both YG and HYBE declined to formally address the dating rumors directly, telling the outlet, “We don’t know because it is the private life of artists.” HYBE did not immediately respond to POPSUGAR’s request for comment on the latest rumors, while reps for Jennie could not be reached. Considering HYBE has denied false dating rumors in the past for various members of BTS, many fans are taking the agencies’ silence on this round of rumors as confirmation that V and Jennie are, in fact, dating.
June-September 2023: V Interacts Publicly with Blackpink Members
V and Jennie have not made any more public appearances together since their Parisian stroll. In fact, while they both attended Bruno Mars’s concert in Seoul in June, they chose to sit separately in different sections of the arena. V has publicly interacted with her bandmates, Lisa and Jisoo, however, which could mean they’re still going strong behind the scenes. He’s attended several events alongside Lisa, as they are both representatives of the Celine fashion brand. Most recently, V was spotted chatting with Jisoo at Frieze Seoul 2023 Paradise Art Festa on Sept. 4.
Fans didn’t get much more insight into V’s rumored relationship with Jennie through the lyrics on his new album, “Layover,” which dropped on Sept. 8. Much like the rest of the BTS members’ releases, none of the songs’ romantic lyrics are quite explicit enough to draw any specific connections to his super private love life.
