The founder of SM Entertainment planned to debut a new group in 2011, which will be divided into 2 subgroups. The same songs will be performed, but once in South Korea and once in China. EXO was divided into EXO-K (Korean) and EXO-M (Mandarin). On January 29, 2011, the 12 boys made their first public appearance, on the annual SBS show "Gayo Daejeon." At the same time they released their first single "What Is Love" and a little later the second single "History", both of which ended up in the Gaon charts. At the end of March they played their first concert in Seoul with 3000 people in the audience. 

Both subgroups had their offizeilles debut on 08.04.2012 with the album "Mama". The Chinese version directly reached number 1 of the Sina album charts and the Korean version made it into the top 3 of the Gaon album charts. Quickly, EXO were awarded the "Best New Asian Artist Award" for their work in the same year. EXO-M also won a Newcomer Award at the Golden Disc Awards and EXO-M won an award for Most Popular Group at the Top Chinese Awards.

Their fanbase only grew in 2013 with the album "XOXO," which was promoted by both subgroups but not recorded entirely together. Only the song "Wolf" was recorded by all of them together, the rest separately. Both versions ended up at #1 on the Billboard World album charts. The repackage of "XOXO" was also a huge success. EXO had reached a goal at that point that no one had reached in 12 years, and that was all of their versions sold more than 1 million copies. It was also crowned album of the year at the 2013 Mnet Asian Music Awards. The guys suddenly found themselves at the top of the Korean music industry, as no one had ever sold so many albums before and produced so many albums in one year. At the time, their EP "Overdose" was considered the most pre-ordered album in Korean music history. Her first solo concert EXO from Exopalnet #1 on May 24 at Seoul Olympic Gymnasium also broke another record, selling out completely in 1.47 seconds.

It didn't come easy for EXO though, as 2 Chinese members left the group in 2014. Kris Wu filed a lawsuit against SM Enterteinment as he was struggling with health problems due to poor treatment. Luhan filed a lawsuit a few months later for the same reasons and left the group. 

Tao left the group in 2015 for the same reasons and because he wanted to focus on solo projects. All 3 started solo careers in China. 

However, the loss of 3 members did not reduce EXO's success. Further albums always ended up high in the charts and there is no lack of awards for the 9 guys. Their 2017 tour sold out in 20 minutes and they are considered the youngest K-pop act to ever perform at the Seoul Olympic Stadium.

EXO broke its own record with the album "The War." The album generated even more advance sales than any other and was already the fourth album to break the 1 million mark. At the end of 2017, EXO was allowed to travel to Dubai as the first K-Pop group to perform at the Dubai Fountain Show. 

In 2018, EXO was an act for the closing ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang. On September 15, the time finally came! Exo came to Berlin together with Straykids, Wanna One and (G)-IDLE on the occasion of the KBS- Music Bank. This was the first time you could see EXO as a group live in Germany and hopefully not the last time. Only Kai performed in Frankfurt in 2022 at the KPOP FLEX Festival.