Whether you’re heading to a ์ ์ง (bar), ํธํ์ง (Korean-style pub), or enjoying a night out with friends in Korea, knowing the right Korean drinking-related vocabulary and expressions will help you fully immerse in the experience.
In this post, youโll learn:
โ
70+ essential Korean bar & drinking words
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Real-life expressions for ordering, toasting, and drinking culture
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Hangul + Romanization + English
โ
Cultural etiquette you must know
๐ฎ Types of Bars & Drinking Places in Korean
| Korean | Pronunciation | English |
|---|---|---|
| ์ ์ง | sul-jip | Bar/pub |
| ํธํ์ง | hop-eu-jip | Korean-style beer pub |
| ํฌ์ฅ๋ง์ฐจ | po-jang-ma-cha | Street bar tent |
| ๋ ธ๋๋ฐฉ | no-rae-bang | Karaoke room |
| ์ฃผ์ | ju-jeom | Tavern-style bar |
| ํด๋ฝ | keul-leop | Club |
| ์์ธ ๋ฐ | wa-in ba | Wine bar |
| ์นตํ ์ผ ๋ฐ | kak-te-il ba | Cocktail bar |
| ๋งฅ์ฃผ์ง | maek-ju-jip | Beer bar |
๐บ Common Drinks in Korean
| Korean | Pronunciation | English |
|---|---|---|
| ์์ฃผ | so-ju | Soju (Korean spirit) |
| ๋งฅ์ฃผ | maek-ju | Beer |
| ๋ง๊ฑธ๋ฆฌ | mak-geol-li | Makgeolli (rice wine) |
| ์นตํ ์ผ | kak-te-il | Cocktail |
| ์์ธ | wa-in | Wine |
| ์์คํค | wi-seu-ki | Whiskey |
| ์ฌ์ผ | sa-ke | Sake |
| ๋ณด๋์นด | bo-deu-ka | Vodka |
| ์ผ์ | eo-reum | Ice |
| ๋ณ๋งฅ์ฃผ | byeong-maek-ju | Bottled beer |
| ์๋งฅ์ฃผ | saeng-maek-ju | Draft beer |
| ์์ฃผ | an-ju | Side dishes for alcohol |
๐ข Popular Bar Foods (์์ฃผ)
| Korean | Pronunciation | English |
|---|---|---|
| ์นํจ | chi-kin | Fried chicken |
| ๊ฐ์ํ๊น | gam-ja-twi-gim | French fries |
| ์กฑ๋ฐ | jok-bal | Braised pigโs feet |
| ์ค์ง์ด | o-jing-eo | Dried squid |
| ๋๋ถ๊น์น | du-bu-gim-chi | Tofu with kimchi |
| ๋ฒ๋ฐ๊ธฐ | beon-de-gi | Silkworm pupae |
| ๊ณ๋๋ง์ด | gye-ran-mal-i | Rolled omelet |
| ๊น์น์ | gim-chi-jeon | Kimchi pancake |
| ํด๋ฌผํ์ | hae-mul-pa-jeon | Seafood pancake |
๐ฃ๏ธ Useful Korean Bar & Drinking Expressions
| Korean | Pronunciation | English |
|---|---|---|
| ๊ฑด๋ฐฐ! | geon-bae! | Cheers! |
| ํ ์ ํ ๊น์? | han jan hal-kka-yo? | Shall we have a drink? |
| ์์ฃผ ํ ๋ณ ์ฃผ์ธ์. | so-ju han byeong ju-se-yo | One bottle of soju, please. |
| ๋งฅ์ฃผ ๋ ์ ์ฃผ์ธ์. | maek-ju du jan ju-se-yo | Two beers, please. |
| ์ผ์ ๋ฃ์ด ์ฃผ์ธ์. | eo-reum neo-eo ju-se-yo | Please add ice. |
| ์ ์ ๋ชป ๋ง์ ์. | sul jal mot ma-syeo-yo | I canโt drink well. |
| ์ฒ์ฒํ ๋ง์ ์. | cheon-cheon-hi ma-syeo-yo | Drink slowly. |
| ์ง ! | jjan! | Clink (cheers sound) |
| ๋ค์์ ํ์ํด์. | da-eum-e han-jan-hae-yo | Letโs have a drink next time. |
๐งโ๐คโ๐ง Korean Drinking Culture Vocabulary
| Korean | Pronunciation | English |
|---|---|---|
| ํ์ | hoe-sik | Company outing (often involves drinking) |
| ๊ฑด๋ฐฐ์ฌ | geon-bae-sa | Toast speech |
| ์ ๊ฒ์ | sul-ge-im | Drinking game |
| ํญํ์ฃผ | pok-tan-ju | Bomb drink (soju + beer) |
| ์ฃผ๋ | ju-ryang | Alcohol tolerance |
| 2์ฐจ / 3์ฐจ | i-cha / sam-cha | Round 2 / Round 3 (next bar) |
| ์ทจํ์ด์ | chwi-haess-eo-yo | Iโm drunk. |
| ํด์ฅ | hae-jang | Hangover cure |
| ํด์ฅ๊ตญ | hae-jang-guk | Hangover soup |
โ ๏ธ Drinking Etiquette in Korea
โ
Pour drinks with two hands (especially for elders or seniors)
โ
Donโt pour your own drink โ offer and receive drinks with manners
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Turn your head when drinking in front of elders
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Donโt leave your glass empty for too long โ someone may refill it!
๐ฏ Practice These Phrases
๐น How do you say โCheers!โ in Korean?
๐น Whatโs the Korean word for โbottle of sojuโ?
๐น How do you politely ask for more beer?
Comment your answers or try practicing with a partner! ๐ฃ๏ธ๐ฌ
๐ Want to Learn More?
โ๏ธ Museum & Art Gallery Vocabulary
โ๏ธ Amusement Park Vocabulary
โ๏ธ Airport Vocabulary in Korean
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