Life in Korea Information
I’ve lived in Korea for a long time, and over that time I have worked as an English teacher, studied to obtain a Masters degree, worked in a government office that supports the expat community, found my career calling in talent acquisition and management, and learned Korean to a full working proficiency level. I’ve also gotten married and am now raising a child in Korea. These experiences have given me a relatively deep understanding of Korea from the perspective of an expat, and on this page I would like to share some of what I’ve learned to help others who are considering moving to and living in Korea long-term.
Korea is a modern dynamic country that also has a unique traditional culture.
In the capital Seoul you can see ultra-modern office buildings juxtaposed with historical sites like royal palaces,
and Korean people, while embracing full-on all that modern life has to offer,
also retain more traditional aspects of their culture like a strong sense of filial piety and community.
This mix of old and new makes it a very interesting place,
and for people who have a curious and open mind there are great opportunities to build a fulfilling life in Korea.
Like any other country in the world, Korea has things to both love and not like so much (hate is too strong of a word^^).
In the first two sections of this page, I’ll give my opinions on some of the positive and negative aspects of life in Korea as I perceive them.
In the third section I’ll cover some of the practical things you should know if you are thinking about moving to Korea.
I hope what I share here will help you learn a bit the country and what life as an expat in Korea might be like.
Things I love about Korea
Strong group bonds and sense of community
I often hear expats in Korea talk negatively about Korea’s more group oriented culture, as opposed to the more individual centered culture of the West.
From an individual focused Westerner’s point of view, Koreans seem to be overly conformist in many of their decisions and actions,
often deferring to the will of a larger group over what they may want or feel as an individual.
Over my time living in Korea though, I’ve come to the realization that having a tendency towards group oriented thinking in society is a very good thing.
Koreans put a lot of effort into making life better for their families, supporting their friends, and maintaining strong group relationships.
Bonds between people in groups like school classes and company departments are strong in Korea and I think this helps people in life a lot.
People also have a strong sense of communal responsibility which helps keep society generally more cohesive.
And, when gathering in groups, Koreans just know how to have a really good time!
I’d long had the impression that Korea’s group oriented culture was a good thing on the whole,
but its value was really driven home for me at the onset of the covid pandemic.
As one of the most densely populated countries in the world, Korea was at great risk of infections spreading very fast when the first cases were discovered.
However, in stark contrast to what I was seeing in more individualistic cultures,
the entirety of the population in Korea acted very quickly to conform to health and safety measures right from the beginning,
which helped to stem the spread, keeping case numbers very low and saving countless lives, all without having to resort to lockdowns like other countries.
For me at least, life in Korea has a kind of hard-to-define generally pleasant feel to it,
and I think it’s largely due to the relative importance that Koreans place on groups over themselves.
It creates an atmosphere of togetherness, free from fear of others, which just feels comfortable and makes Korea a great place to live.
That’s why I put this one at the top of the list of things I love about life in Korea.
If you are going to live in a city, I think Korean cities, and in particular Seoul, cannot be beat.
Korean cities are extremely vibrant and the exploration you can do in them is endless.
There is a huge variety of cafes, restaurants, and bars and so many of them have really unique atmospheres.
There are beautiful public spaces and parks with cycling and hiking paths.
And, you can feel safe walking around anytime day or night in Korean cities.
City life in Korea is also very convenient.
The excellent public transportation infrastructure makes it easy to get around without the need to own a car,
and whenever you want to buy or do something it’s never far away.
Korea also has some of the fastest internet connection speeds in the world, with hi-speed wifi in subways and cafes so you can stay connected all the time.
The cities are great, but it’s inevitable that you will want to escape city life sometimes too.
Fortunately, Korea has great natural areas to explore.
About 70% of Korea is mountainous and the country is surrounded on three sides by the ocean with hundreds of islands.
The mountains have extensive well-maintained hiking trails, and on the coasts you can enjoy nice sandy beaches and various water sports.
Korea is a very small country so you don’t have to travel far to get to the mountains or the coast,
and once there you can stay in hotels, small guesthouses, or do some camping.
Being Canadian, I of course love camping, and I’ve found some really great places to camp both in the mountains and on the coasts in Korea.
The tricky part is finding places to camp that aren’t too crowded as camping has become quite trendy recently.
The key is to avoid peak times and get a bit off the beaten track.
Korea’s largest island, Jeju, is a sub-tropical island that has beautiful white sand beaches.
It is also where South Korea’s largest mountain, Hallasan, is located.
I visit Jeju often since it’s just a short 45 minute plane ride away and tickets usually costs less than the equivalent of 100 USD.
There are also a lot of interesting smaller islands to explore and most of them are accessible by ferry.
If you spend some time in Korea, you will come to feel that it is a very safe place to live.
Personal gun ownership is nearly unheard of, and if an individual does own a gun for sporting purposes they must store it at a police station.
Since people generally do not have access to guns there is no threat of gun violence,
and people also don’t really worry much about theft or other kinds of petty crime either.
Drug use is also quite uncommon.
This means that you also don’t see much of the crime and social problems that go along with widespread drug use either.
Overall, the level of fear of being a victim of violent crime is low in Korea,
and for parents it’s reassuring that the risk of your kids being exposed to drugs is also low.
I learned some French in middle school and took a Spanish class in university,
but I never really got into learning a second language until I came to Korea and started studying Korean.
Perhaps it was because I was living in the country with lots of opportunity to use the language, but I really loved learning Korean right from the start.
Learning the script is easy, but learning vocabulary and grammar is much more challenging, at least it was for me as mono-lingual English speaker.
The challenge of learning Korean pushed me to work hard to learn it,
and I was also strongly motivated by the encouragement and compliments I received from Koreans that I spoke with in Korean.
Learning Korean has opened up a lot of opportunities for me in Korea, and it has made life a lot more fun.
As an expat in Korea you can get by just fine with little Korean ability,
however I think learning the language is one of the best ways to improve your experience living in Korea.
With survival level Korean you can do simple things like ordering food and asking for directions.
If you get to an intermediate level, it becomes much easier to travel around the country, find things you are looking for, socialize,
and use apps and services that are only in Korean.
And, if you reach an advanced level of Korean, your abilities become valuable for employment and academic opportunities.
To consistently progress you need to make language study a part of your daily life
and purposely put yourself into as many situations as possible in which you can use what you are learning.
I’d never even tried Korean food before coming to Korea, but it quickly shot to the top of my favorite kinds of food list after my arrival. There is great variety in Korean food as it makes use of many different kinds of vegetables, meats, and fish. A lot of Korean food is spicy, which I like, and I’ve also come to love the many different kinds of fermented food. And of course there is Korean barbeque which is both delicious and a real eating experience. Perhaps what I like most though is the wide variety of soups and stews. There is nothing better than a piping hot jjigae!
Life in Korea is never boring. If it is for you, then you’re doing it wrong.
Korean entertainment is now world-renowned with the explosion in popularity of Korean pop music, movies, and TV shows. Living in Korea you get to enjoy this first-hand.
And, in addition to today’s popular entertainment options, you can also enjoy traditional performing arts like samulnori, mask dancing, and pansori.
Korea also has an endless variety of different kinds of places to visit.
One example of this is the ever-expanding types of “cafes” you can find.
Coffee is huge in Korea, and there are regular coffee cafes everywhere,
but the meaning of the word cafe has expanded in Korea to encompass a wide variety of themed places where you can eat and drink something.
Kids cafes are everywhere, and as a parent I cannot stress enough how great these are.
There are cat cafes, dog cafes, plant cafes, aquarium cafes, board game cafes, study cafes, and I’m sure many others I don’t even know about yet.
Festivals are also big in Korea.
Every year there are festivals celebrating everything from green tea and cherry blossoms to mud and water guns in different regions around the country.
With so many events going on you can always find something fun to do.
Things I don’t like so much about Korea
The lax enforcement of safety laws and regulations
The Korean government often takes a libertarian paternalistic approach (to borrow a term from the book Nudge)
to pursuing public order and influencing behavior in the society.
A lot of campaigns and programs are used instead of strict law enforcement and restriction of people’s choices.
I really like this approach for many situations,
and I’ve always felt that life in Korea has a pleasant feeling of freedom to it that is lacking in countries that have more intrusive and omnipresent law enforcement.
However, I draw a firm line on this when it comes to laws and regulations that are needed to protect people’s lives.
When people’s lives are at stake, laws must be properly enforced, and Korea is doing a poor job of that.
Korea has some of the highest traffic accident rates in the OECD, and the rate of accidents involving children and the elderly is especially high.
There are plenty of traffic laws, slow speed zones, and signs, but the problem is the police do not enforce the laws.
Drivers speed, run red lights, and make illegal turns at will, oftentimes right in front of police cars, and they do nothing.
Speed traps are useless as they are clearly marked and navigation systems even tell you exactly where they are.
When the police actually do decide to enforce laws they announce a “crackdown period” during which they will actually hand out fines,
but then after the period ends people can just go back to breaking the laws again.
And even these crackdowns are very rare.
Large-scale accidents that are entirely preventable also continue to occur in Korea.
The root cause of the sinking of the Sewol ferry in 2014 that claimed the lives of more than 300 people (mostly high school children) was overloading of the ship,
in complete neglect of safety regulations.
Although not as commonplace as in the past, corruption and nepotism still exist in Korea, and this, combined with lax monitoring and enforcement of regulations,
leads to a lot of cut-corners, ineptitude of people in positions of responsibility, and general neglect.
As a parent I worry about the safety of my child near roads in Korea because far too many drivers do not obey traffic laws,
and it’s just sad to keep seeing lives lost in accidents that could be prevented
if Korea would only properly enforce the safety laws and regulations it already has.
I suppose it depends on your frame of reference, but for me being from Canada the air quality in Korea is not very good.
According to a report on world air quality in 2020 released by Air QI,
Seoul ranked 33rd, with an average PM2.5 concentration of 20.9,
on a list of world capital cities ranked by annual average air pollution levels.
This is far better than the capital in the top spot, Delhi (avg. PM2.5 concentration of 84.1),
and some other capitals in Asia such as Jakarta (avg. PM2.5 concentration of 39.6) and Beijing (avg. PM2.5 concentration of 37.5),
but far worse than Ottawa (avg. PM2.5 concentration of 7.3) which ranked 85th.
Korea has a high population density and uses a significant amount of coal to meet its energy needs,
which results in an overall higher baseline level of pollution,
but it’s on the days when additional pollution blows in from China that the air quality reaches really unhealthy levels.
I’m the kind of person who likes to spend a lot of time outdoors, and I like to run and play soccer.
The pollution can get bad enough some days that I’m forced to stay inside rather than do the outdoor activities I want to do, and this bothers me.
The pollution tends to be bad during the relatively drier periods of winter and early spring, but the rest of the year it’s much better.
Air purifiers are ubiquitous so indoors the air quality is fine even on days when pollution levels are high,
but if you are an outdoors person like me, or someone who has breathing problems, then the air quality could be a significant concern for you.
Korea is a very densely populated country, so naturally there are crowds of people everywhere you go.
Especially if a particular event or place becomes popular the size of the crowds can be overwhelming.
And, in Korea, there are particular activities that everyone associates with a certain time of the year,
like going to see the cherry blossoms in spring or going to the beach in August, and the crowds get absolutely ridiculous.
Anytime someone says to me “it’s the season for doing ‘x’, let’s go!”, this is when I say “maybe next time”.
I’ve found that the best way to avoid crowds is simply to adjust your plans a bit around the times people consider the best time for doing something.
For example, instead of going the beach in August,
if you go in September the conditions are actually even better (a little less hot) and the crowds are largely gone.
In the past, xenophobic sentiments were quite widespread in Korea and the government also often enacted policies that discriminated against foreigners,
but I feel like this has gotten significantly better over the time I have been living in Korea.
Koreans have become much more open-minded about people from other countries being a part of Korean society,
to the point where some of the most popular shows on TV are about foreigners living in Korea, and there are actually a lot of foreigner celebrities now.
I was reminded though that xenophobia has not completely disappeared in Korea during the covid pandemic
when local governments enacted discriminatory mandates that singled out foreigners for covid testing,
regardless of symptoms or exposure, under the threat of fines and even potential deportation.
Despite some lapses into discriminatory policy making,
the government has generally worked hard to support foreigners living in Korea and xenophobic attitudes among the general population seem to be disappearing.
Korea still has a long ways to go in terms of becoming a multicultural society, but progress is definitely being made.
The methods of management in Korean companies have a legacy of being strictly hierarchical, with decision making highly centralized at the top,
which results in a work environment that can be tough for people who value having ownership over how to do their jobs.
Plans are expected to be carried out exactly as decided at the top and, once a plan is initiated,
bottom-up feedback or new ideas that run counter to the plan tend to be stifled.
This kind of management has the advantage of getting everyone moving quickly in a unified direction,
which worked well when the goal of most companies in Korea was to manufacture physical products in a highly uniform manner but,
with software and services now becoming the main drivers of product profitability,
creativity and finely-tuned responsiveness to consumer needs have become essential.
To be successful in this kind of business requires operational decision making to be pushed out as much as possible to frontline managers
who are experts in their fields and have their fingers on the pulse of what is happening in the moment.
The good news – and the reason I put this one at the bottom of my list of things I don’t like about living in Korea –
is that most Korean companies have already recognized that the management methods and corporate culture of the past are no longer viable in today’s world,
and they are making great efforts to change.
For large older companies, these changes are very difficult to make because of the existence of an “old guard”
who have spent their entire careers working under the existent culture.
Nevertheless they are making a lot of changes to flatten out hierarchical title structures, encourage open communication, and reduce deference to senior leaders.
For small younger companies it’s much easier, and most of them are establishing open and agile cultures right from the start.
As the generation that is leading companies in Korea changes, I am confident that strictly hierarchical corporate culture will become a thing of the past.
At least for me, the things I love about life in Korea far outweigh the things I don’t like, and Korea always seems to be consistently changing for the better. Life in Korea as an expat is certainly challenging at times, but it’s always interesting and there is no shortage of opportunities to learn new things. I have no regrets about spending so much of my life in Korea and I’m happy to call it my home.
The Practical Stuff to Know
Visas and the Foreigner Registration Card
If you are a foreigner coming to live in Korea, then you must obtain a visa to stay long-term and be legally eligible to work.
In particular, if you are coming to Korea for a job, you need to get an employment visa, which is sponsored by your employer.
Once you have a signed employment agreement, your employer will help you with the application process,
and in most cases the visa is issued to you at a Korean embassy or consulate outside Korea before you enter the country.
If you will be coming to Korea on a long-term employment visa, and have accompanying family members,
your spouse and children can apply for dependant visas, concurrently when you apply for your visa, which allow them to reside in Korea with you.
There are also other types of visas for other non-employment related activities
such as studying at a university, investment, or involvement in religious activities.
All foreigners who reside in Korea on a long-term visa are issued a foreigner registration card.
This card serves the same purpose as the national ID card that all Korean citizens have.
You will need to have this card to do many essential things
like open a bank account, get a credit card, sign up for mobile phone, internet, or cable plans, and register for insurance.
So, after arriving in Korea, one of the very first things you need to do is go to an immigration office to request the issuance of this card.
For more information on different visa types and their respective requirements
check the Korea Immigration (HiKorea) website.
You can also call the immigration office at 1345 from within Korea or +82-2-1345 from outside Korea.
There are some unique aspects to the housing options in Korea that are important to understand if you are considering moving to Korea.
In terms of the types of housing, apartments are by far the most common and single residence houses are rare in metropolitan areas.
As such, it is most likely that you would live in an apartment in Korea.
Apartments in Korea range in size from small studio style ones (often called one-rooms or officetel)
to large ones for families that have multiple bedrooms and bathrooms.
Apartments are mostly built in large complexes of multiple buildings that have facilities like underground parking, fitness centers, and playgrounds.
The methods of payment for housing are also somewhat unique in Korea.
Outside of outright purchase of housing, there are two options called weolse and jeonse in Korean.
Weolse means essentially paying monthly rent.
When you sign a weolse lease contract you have to put down some amount of deposit that you get back when the lease is terminated.
Jeonse, on the other hand, is a system under which you transfer a large sum of money (hundreds of thousands in US dollars) to the house owner,
which you get back when the lease is terminated, and you do not pay any monthly rent.
There is also hybrid version of these two methods called jeon-weolse.
If you have some Korean ability you can use apps like Zigbang
and Naver Real Estate
to look at the prices of housing in different areas around the country.
Before coming to Korea, and especially if you are considering a job offer, you should take some time to learn about Korea’s tax, pension, and health insurance schemes.
This will help you estimate the net income you can expect for a job, and you can learn about the benefits provided by these services.
You can switch the language to English when you visit the websites listed in the descriptions below.
For information on the tax system, visit the website of the National Tax Service.
On this site you can download the most recent version of the “Year-end Tax Settlement” guide.
Near the beginning of this large document you can find a flowchart that shows how to calculate the tax liability for different levels of gross income.
For information on public health insurance, visit the website of the National Health Insurance Service.
This site has information on contribution rates and you can learn more about the insurance benefits and coverage.
For information on how the pension system works, visit the website of the National Pension Service.
On this site you can find information on current contribution rates,
and you can also check to see if you are eligible to receive a “lump sum refund” on your contributions when you leave Korea.
Eligibility for this refund depends on whether or not your country of citizenship has an agreement with Korea that makes this possible.
All of these services also have dedicated phone numbers that foreigners can call to get further information in English.
Hospitals in Korea are technically advanced and provide excellent care.
Many major hospitals have international clinics at which the doctors and staff specialize in assisting foreigner patients and speak English very well.
Actually most doctors in Korea speak English quite well because a lot of their education is conducted in English.
In addition to large hospitals, you can also easily find smaller clinics in your neighborhood that specialize in different areas
such as internal medicine, physical therapy, skin treatment, and oriental medicine.
Korea has a public health insurance system (mentioned in the section above) with premiums that are relatively low
and the coverage provided helps defray a large percentage of the cost of basic medical treatment.
However, most people also get some additional private insurance that covers additional costs that can occur in the event of more serious accidents or diseases.
In Korea, the Fire and Rescue phone number is 119 and the Police Report phone number is 112.
Both of these services have English speaking responders on hand.
Additionally, embassies provide information to citizens one what to do and where to go in case of an emergency,
so it’s a good idea to contact your embassy to inform them of your presence in Korea when you first arrive.
To support foreigners living in Korea, the government has developed specialized services and opened a network of centers, that includes the Itaewon Global Village Center where I worked for four years. The hub of this network is the Seoul Global Center and there are many different types of centers that serve different segments of the foreigner community including expats, multicultural families, and small business owners. These centers offer various programs including language classes and cultural activities, and services such as legal, immigration, and daily living consultations. For more information on all the centers and their services you can visit the Seoul Foreigner Portal website.
Korean parents take the education of their children very seriously from an early age, so the quality of education in Korea is high,
and there are a wide range of public and private options.
There are daycares and kindergartens, both public and private, for children 0 to 6 years of age
that are conveniently located in residential areas and in the office buildings of some larger companies.
Public education from elementary through high school is free in Korea.
However, most parents also chose to supplement their children’s education with additional classes at after-school private academies, called hagwon in Korean.
These hagwon offer a wide variety of classes and activities ranging from additional study in core subjects like math and English
to all manner of arts, music, and sports.
There are also excellent, albeit very expensive, international schools in Korea that have curriculums taught entirely in English.
Below are links to the websites of some of the international schools in Seoul.
Seoul Foreign School
Korea International School
Yongsan International School of Seoul
Dwight School Seoul
Asia Pacific International School
Korea has a very extensive low-cost public transportation system that makes it very easy to get around.
So easy in fact that you really don’t need to own a car at all. The Seoul subway system is one of the world’s best.
It has more than 300 stations, with 10 lines reaching all areas of the city and surrounding suburbs.
There is also a huge bus system, consisting of local neighborhood buses that make lots of stops
and longer-range route buses that go across the city and to and from suburban areas.
And, on major roads and highways there are dedicated bus lanes that allow the buses to go much faster than the rest of the traffic during rush hours.
All public transportation is easy for foreigners to use because signage and announcements on subways and buses are made in both Korean and English.
To make use of public transportation you will need to get a transportation card that’s used to pay fares and transfer between buses and the subway.
These cards are sold at subway stations and convenience stores or can be added as feature on a credit card.
In busy metropolitan areas, taxis can also be flagged down just about anywhere, or reserved by phone or using a taxi app, and the fares are very reasonable.
For domestic travel between cities, there are inter-city buses and trains, including the high-speed KTX train that can get you from Seoul to Busan,
which is pretty much across the whole country, in about 3 hours.
You can find more information on getting around Korea
on the Korea Tourism Organization website under “Transportation”.
There are many different shopping options in Korea including department stores, discount marts, grocery stores, and convenience stores.
Most people do their regular food shopping at large “marts” like Emart or Homeplus or smaller local grocery stores.
If you are looking to find food and ingredients for dishes from your home country, most large marts and department stores have imported food sections,
and there are some foreign food specialty markets in the neighborhood of Itaewon in Seoul.
It’s also a lot of fun to visit Korean traditional markets like Namdaemun or Gwangjang Market in Seoul to shop and eat at the numerous food stalls.
Another great convenience of life in Korea is the ubiquity of online shopping and home delivery.
These services really make life a lot easier and save a ton of time, but you will need some Korean ability to use the apps and place your orders.
Food ordered from restaurants is delivered within about an hour, and you can order by phone or use food delivery apps.
The most popular food delivery app is called Baedal Minjok.
For online shopping, the most popular app is Coupang
and you can use it to buy just about anything: clothing, household items, furniture, sports equipment, and your groceries.
Most goods and groceries purchased through Coupang are delivered to your door the very next day.
The use of English in Korea is continually increasing and it is now quite widespread.
Most Koreans, especially the younger generations, speak English well
and the government ensures that a lot of information is available in English, and other languages, for expats and tourists.
Most road signage and announcements on buses and subways are in both Korean and English.
Many stores and restaurants, especially in large urban centers, include English on their signs and menus.
Although English is quite widely used and understood,
you may sometimes have difficulty finding information you need in English or communicating with people who do not speak English well.
In this kind of situation, you can use a free interpretation service offered by the Korea Tourism Organization.
You just have to dial 1330 on your phone to access this service.
Generally Koreans do not expect foreigners to know a lot about Korea or speak the language,
and you can get by living in Korea without learning Korean.
However, if you do put in the effort to learn Korean it makes your experience in the country much more rich and rewarding.
The best way to get started with Korean is to learn the script, Hangeul.
It’s easy to learn the characters, and it’s quite strictly phonetic, so with minimal effort you will be able to read Korean.
Learning to read the characters early on can really help with your initial adaptation to life in Korea
and it gives you a good foundation to get into learning the vocabulary and grammar.
If you find yourself feeling homesick after you initially arrive,
making friends with people who share your cultural background can help you feel more comfortable in your as-of-yet unfamiliar surroundings.
One way to meet other expats in Korea is through expat community groups on social media.
Some of these groups also hold offline networking events and activities.
Embassies, chambers of commerce, and groups like the Royal Asiatic Society also hold regular events every year that many expats attend.
Of course you will want to make Korean friends too, and one of the best ways to do that is by joining a club.
Korean people love doing things in groups, and clubs dedicated to particular sports and activities are very common.
One way to learn about clubs you could join is through a shop that specializes in equipment for your favorite sport, hobby, or craft.
Or you could try joining a language exchange group if you are interested in learning Korean and helping others learn a language you know.
The best government provided resources for further information on living in Korea as an expat
are the websites of the Seoul Global Center,
Korea Immigration,
and the Korea Tourism Organization.
Another good way to learn more about what life in Korea might be like is to join Korea-related groups
on forums like Reddit and social media like Facebook on which expats living in the country post regularly.
Be aware however that some of these groups are overrun with people who have only negative unconstructive things to say,
so choose wisely which groups you join and whose opinions you listen too.
And, if you have questions about working in Korea specifically, you can connect with me on LinkedIn.
As a recruiter, I’m pretty much always on there.
Please just include a brief message with your connection request that explains what you are contacting me about.
I hope reading this post has helped you determine if Korea might be a good place to live for you. If you do decide to move to Korea,
I hope that you will find life in Korea as rewarding and happy as I have,
and, it’s a pretty small country, so who knows maybe we will meet each other someday!