In 2016, at a high school dance festival in Yangsan, a teenage Kim Minjeong performed alongside her older brother, neither expecting the trajectory that would follow. SM Entertainment scouts approached them—but initially showed more interest in her brother. "When I first went to audition for SM, the SM employee who oversaw my audition looked at my brother and took my brother instead of me," Winter revealed years later on the YouTube show Salon Drip 2. "I thought to myself, 'Wait, wasn't he just here because of me? Was it this easy for him to get in?'" Her brother auditioned as well, but Winter sang better—a fact she states plainly. Yet even that wasn't enough: she was rejected at the Seoul audition that followed.1

The rejection might have ended there, but Winter auditioned two more times. She was scouted at a dance festival, taken to Seoul for a formal audition, and rejected again. When SM held global auditions in Busan, she tried once more—and was rejected once more. At that point, she began auditioning at other companies, all of which expressed interest in seeing her again. But she remained in contact with the SM casting scout who had initially discovered her. "I was still talking to the SM casting team, so I told them 'I think I'll be going somewhere else,'" she recounted. "And they wanted to have me come in and audition one last time. So I was like, 'They said they didn't like me… Are they just trying to stop me from going to a different company?' But since I wanted to go to SM, I auditioned one last time and I got in then."1 She signed with SM Entertainment in 2017, beginning a three-and-a-half-year training period that would culminate in her debut as the first revealed member of aespa.

During her trainee years, Winter and fellow trainee NingNing were known as the "cute and innocent" duo—a stark contrast to the powerful, futuristic concept aespa would eventually embody. "Back when Ningning and I were trainees, we were considered the 'cute and innocent' duo," Winter explained in 2025. "When they told us we'd be recording 'Next Level,' we thought it was an OST remake. That was actually our debut song."2 The shift was abrupt: from training in bright, youthful concepts to debuting with a dark, sci-fi aesthetic anchored by AI avatars and metaverse storytelling.

On October 27, 2020, SM Entertainment revealed Winter as the first member of aespa. The group debuted three weeks later on November 17 with "Black Mamba," a single that would chart on the Billboard Global Excl. U.S. chart and introduce the "KWANGYA" universe—SM's interconnected metaverse concept linking its artists across virtual and physical realms. In December 2020, Winter performed BoA's debut single "ID; Peace B" at the Mnet Asian Music Awards as part of a tribute celebrating BoA's 20-year career, marking her first solo stage appearance barely a month after debut.3

In January 2022, SM Entertainment announced a new supergroup project called "Girls On Top," which would unite female artists across generations under one banner. The first unit, GOT the Beat, featured Winter and Karina alongside industry legends BoA, Taeyeon, Hyoyeon, Wendy, and Seulgi. They debuted on January 3, 2022, with "Step Back," a high-energy anthem that placed Winter—at just 21 years old—among some of K-pop's most accomplished vocalists.

Two days after GOT the Beat's M Countdown performance on January 27, the official fancam footage was uploaded to YouTube. Within 25 days, Winter's individual fancam reached 10 million views—the fastest any female idol fancam had ever achieved that milestone, surpassing previous records held by EXID's Hani (151 days) and BLACKPINK's Lisa (157 days). The thumbnail alone became a phenomenon: Winter in double buns, dubbed "dumpling hair" by fans, staring directly into the camera with wide eyes and a slight pout. The juxtaposition was striking—while her groupmates posed with fierce, commanding expressions, Winter's thumbnail was endearingly playful. It trended on YouTube South Korea for days, and the fancam became the most-viewed fourth-generation idol fancam at the time, eventually surpassing ITZY Ryujin's "WANNABE" fancam as the most-viewed fourth-gen fancam overall.4

On Chinese social media platform Weibo, the term "Kim Minjeong Double Ball Head Shape" trended at #8 on the entertainment hot search. Korean fans searching for "만두 직캠" (dumpling fancam) would immediately find Winter's video at the top of results. The cultural reach extended beyond fandom: Japanese influencers and celebrities expressed admiration for the styling, while content creators across multiple platforms shared clips and reactions. The fancam's success was not merely viral—it demonstrated Winter's ability to command attention through subtlety and charm in an industry often dominated by overt intensity.

In May 2022, Winter and NingNing released "Once Again," an OST for the tvN drama Our Blues. The soft acoustic pop ballad showcased a side of Winter rarely heard in aespa's intense discography—her voice, gentle and emotive, complemented NingNing's powerful range. The song debuted at #29 on the worldwide iTunes album chart and reached #1 in the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam.5 It also charted at #119 on South Korea's Gaon Digital Chart, a respectable performance for an OST by idol singers typically associated with high-energy dance tracks rather than ballads.

Later collaborations expanded Winter's range further. In February 2023, she featured on Super Junior's Yesung's "Floral Sense," a track from his repackaged album Sensory Flows. In December 2022, she contributed to two tracks on SM Entertainment's winter album SMCU Palace: "Jet" and "Priority," performed alongside multiple SM artists. These projects demonstrated Winter's versatility beyond the metaverse-heavy concept of aespa, positioning her as a vocalist capable of handling both power and delicacy.

On November 20, 2023, Polo Ralph Lauren announced Winter as its brand ambassador for Korea, unveiling a campaign featuring pieces from the label's 2023 Fall and Holiday collections. The photos captured Winter in classic preppy silhouettes—cable-knit sweaters, plaid wrap skirts, berets—balancing timeless American elegance with youthful energy. She joined NCT's Mark as a representative for the brand within SM Entertainment's roster, and stood alongside other K-pop ambassadors for major luxury houses, including Stray Kids' Felix and LE SSERAFIM for Louis Vuitton, and Jay Park for Gucci.6

The partnership highlighted fashion's increasing reliance on fourth-generation K-pop idols as global ambassadors. Winter's appointment came shortly after aespa's group deal with Givenchy, and alongside her groupmates' individual ambassadorships: Karina with Prada, Giselle with Loewe, and NingNing with Versace. The entire quartet had secured major fashion house representation within three years of debut—a testament to both their individual star power and aespa's status as a cultural force.

On April 12, 2024, SM Entertainment confirmed that Winter had undergone preventive surgery for pneumothorax, a condition commonly known as collapsed lung. The procedure, performed in April, was a precautionary measure to prevent recurrence of the condition, which occurs when air leaks into the space between the lung and chest wall, potentially causing partial or full lung collapse. Winter had last appeared publicly on April 6 during Japan's NHK music show Venue 101, returning to South Korea on the morning of April 9.7

SM Entertainment's statement emphasized that the surgery was carried out "as a preventive measure in accordance with her doctor's opinion" after extensive discussion, and that Winter's recovery would be the company's "top priority moving forward" in scheduling activities. Pneumothorax can recur if not treated preventatively, particularly in individuals with certain physical characteristics or who engage in strenuous activity. The news prompted widespread concern from fans, who flooded social media with messages of support and calls for the company to prioritize her health over schedules. Winter recovered fully in time for aespa's second world tour, Synk: Parallel Line, which began in Seoul on June 29, 2024.

On October 9, 2024, aespa released Synk: Parallel Line, a special digital single featuring four solo tracks performed during their world tour. Winter's contribution, "Spark," was a house-pop anthem she co-wrote and co-composed, describing the thrill of falling in love through the metaphor of a spark igniting into fire. Produced by R.Tee, VACK, and NOYEAH, the track featured a gradual buildup mirroring the emotional crescendo of infatuation, culminating in a euphoric drop that became a highlight of aespa's concerts.8

The solo tracks showcased each member's individual artistry: Karina's hip-hop anthem "UP," Giselle's R&B introspection "Dopamine," and NingNing's edgy "Bored!" All four members participated in writing their respective songs, marking a significant step in establishing their identities as songwriters and not merely performers of SM-produced material. For Winter, "Spark" represented her first official songwriting and composing credit on a released track, cementing her evolution from trainee to multifaceted artist.

Winter's appeal lies in duality. Onstage, she embodies technical precision—her vocals consistently stable across challenging choreography, her expressions calculated yet natural. Offstage, glimpses of her personality emerge: awkward laughs that become memes, candidness about alien sightings and UFOs (she once claimed to have witnessed one on February 24, 2021, at 8:35 PM near SM's practice studio), and her tendency to slip into her Gyeongsang dialect when upset. Fans affectionately call her "Maltese Winter" for her small frame and puppy-like expressions, a nickname that underscores the contrast between her fierce stage presence and her softer demeanor.

Her background—a military family in Yangsan, her father and brother both serving, her initial dream of a military career—adds context to her discipline. She excelled in mathematics, was elected vice president of her class, played multiple instruments, and practiced numerous sports. That same rigor carried through her training period and into her professional career, where her fancams consistently rank among the most-viewed for fourth-generation idols. Yet the discipline coexists with vulnerability: the multiple audition rejections, the health scare, the honest admission that she nearly signed elsewhere because SM repeatedly turned her down.