I Am the Best

Did You Know?

• The song was released as part of a promotional strategy where YG Entertainment released a single every three weeks starting from April 21, 2011, to promote all six tracks from the EP.
• It received first-place trophies on the July 17 broadcast of Inkigayo and on the August 5, 2011, broadcast of Music Bank.
• At the 2011 Mnet Asian Music Awards, "I Am the Best" made 2NE1 the first group to win Song of the Year twice, following their win for "I Don't Care" in 2009.

Commercial performance

In South Korea, "I Am the Best" entered the Gaon Digital Chart at number four for the week ending June 25, 2011, with 632,923 streams and 414,580 digital sales in one day of tracking. The following week it rose to number one, becoming 2NE1's fourth number one single, and sold 735,518 digital units with 2,181,326 streams, topping both the component download and streaming charts. In its third week it fell to number nine. By the end of 2011, the song had accumulated 3.47 million digital sales, ranking as the fourth best-selling single of the year in South Korea, and placed seventh on the year-end Gaon Digital Chart. Two years after release, Billboard listed it as the sixth best-selling K-pop song in the United States during 2013. As of 2020, it was the fifth-longest-charting single on that chart, tied with BTS' "Mic Drop". The song received airplay from radio stations in New York and Boston without an official airplay release.

Music video

A 10-second preview of the music video was released on June 19, 2011, on YG Life and YouTube, with YG Entertainment planning daily snippets until the single's release. After a three-day editing delay, the full video premiered on 2NE1's YouTube channel on June 27, directed by Seo Hyun-seung, who had previously directed videos for "Fire", "Try to Follow Me", and "Can't Nobody". A choreography practice video followed on July 1, and a Japanese version was uploaded later that month. The video features elaborate sets including pyramids, diamonds, and globe-shaped chairs, with glam punk and street style fashion by designers Sophie Hulme, Gemma Slack, Cassette Playa, and Gareth Pugh. CL appears as a wrestler with a sparkling WWE championship belt, and members wear futuristic and punk-inspired attire with unconventional hairstyles. They ascend stairs while breaking platinum records with baseball bats, and the final scene shows them with AK-47s destroying a pyramid as a new structure emerges with "2NE1" reflecting in light.

Promotion and live performances

2NE1 first performed "I Am the Best" on Inkigayo on June 26, 2011, followed by Show! Music Core on July 2. After releasing the choreography practice video, the group announced a dance contest on July 8, with winners chosen by 2NE1 and their choreographers to receive concert tickets, Adidas Originals merchandise, and stage attire; the winner was L.Y.N.T., a female dance troupe from Vietnam. The song was included in the set list of the Nolza tour starting in August. At the 2011 Mnet Asian Music Awards in Singapore on November 29, the group performed "Lonely" and "I Am the Best" in black outfits with gold and silver ornaments, and their stage received the ceremony's highest viewership at 5.56 percent. They reprised the song at the MTV Iggy Best New Band in the World Concert at Times Square's Best Buy Theater and at the 2011 SBS Gayo Daejeon. On June 23, 2012, they performed it at the MTV Video Music Awards Japan, and it served as the opening number for the New Evolution Global Tour. For the 2014 All or Nothing World Tour, the group sang the track while sitting astride motorbikes. At the 2015 Mnet Asian Music Awards, 2NE1 reunited for a surprise performance of "Fire" and "I Am the Best", which Fuse TV named one of the best performances of the year. On February 25, 2018, CL co-headlined the 2018 Winter Olympics closing ceremony and performed parts of the song; figure skaters Kim Kyu-eun and Alex Kam used the track in their exhibition gala routine.

Legacy

Critics have recognized "I Am the Best" as a symbol of the "girl crush" image in K-pop and a work that helped increase K-pop's global exposure. Billboard's Caitlin Kelley defined "girl crush" as conveying ferocity and stepping outside hyperfemininity, noting 2NE1 as a group that developed the image and the song as an iconic example. In 2018, Pitchfork included it in an article on 45 highlights in girl group history, and British GQ called it the highlight of 2011 and a game-changer in a decade of K-pop, regarding it as the "visual blueprint" for the girl crush concept. Billboard ranked it number four on its "100 Greatest K-pop Songs of the 2010s" list. In 2020, the song's lyrics were featured in an exhibition at the National Hangeul Museum in Seoul. GQ named it one of 24 songs that shaped the decade, and Stereogum ranked its video the second best music video of the 2010s, the only non-Western work in both lists. In 2021, Billboard editor Nolan Feeney wrote that the song helped pave the way for K-pop's takeover in America. A 2021 ranking by Melon and Seoul Shinmun listed it as the seventh best Korean idol song of all time, with critic Kim Young-dae stating that its 10-second opening by CL would be remembered as a critical moment in K-pop history. Rolling Stone ranked it the eighth greatest song in Korean pop music history in 2023, stating that 2NE1 established a new industry standard.