Topic #1 – How to know when to use Pure Korean vs Sino-Korean numbers
Having two number systems to learn in Korean can be super intimidating for a new learner, and the specifics of how to formulate larger numbers or when to use which ones can be a big stumbling block. In this post I want to offer a refresher on the differences in when to use which counting system, as well as give a few examples of some exceptions to these rules.
The general idea for when to use Sino-Korean (that is, 일, 이, 삼…il, i, sam) is when you’re using the numbers to signify information or represent something theoretical. For Pure Korean numbers (하나, 둘, 셋…hana, dul ,set), we are referring to something that is being quantified.
Here are some quick examples:
- 이백삼십사 호가 어디예요? Where is room 234?
- 난 열아홉 살이야. I’m 19 years old.
- 저는 이천이 년생이에요. I’m born in 2002.
- 복숭아 다섯 개 주세요. Please give me 5 peaches.
- 라떼(라테) 하나랑 샌드위치 두 개 맞아요? 구천육백 원입니다. Is that one latte and two sandwiches? That’ll be 9,600 won
When to use Sino-Korean: | When to use Pure Korean: |
|---|---|
Giving a phone number A room number When doing math For money When discussing the number itself Years/centuries Page numbers | Counting objects Counting people Telling age |
Pure Korean is generally used to 99, so if you are counting something bigger than that you can use Sino-Korean. Easy!
Except there are a few things we might need to count that are complicated or mix the numbers together. Let me go over a couple of those right now.
The most obvious is telling time, where one uses Pure Korean for the hours, but Sino-Korean for minutes. Think of it as counting how many hours in the day, but for the minutes just assigning how far through the hour is.
There are also two counting words for months, 개월 (gaewol) and ~달 (dal). 월 (wol) originally comes from Chinese, so even though we are using the 개 (gae) counter that would normally be accompanied by Pure Korean, we use Sino-Korean. With 달, which is pure Korean, we can use pure Korean numbers. Generally they’re interchangeable but 달 would only really be used to referring to a couple of months, and sounds a bit weird with larger numbers.
There are also a couple of cases where you’ll hear native Korean speakers breaking the rules outlined above. Mostly this is done in spoken Korean to make conversations go more smoothly.
Firstly, if you find memorising the Pure Korean for numbers higher than 20 or 30 tough, you’re not alone. You probably don’t have much use for them in general conversation and can get away with not being really sure. In fact, many Korean children are also less than confident with using Pure Korean for higher numbers. While it’s not technically correct, in a casual conversation it is not uncommon to hear people give, for example, their grandmothers age 칠십삼 (chil shib sam, 73) rather than 일흔셋 (ilheun set) and still be understood.
Next, when giving a phone number verbally you should use Sino-Korean numbers. But there are certain combinations of numbers that don’t flow well together – perhaps your phone number ends in 212. In that case, saying 이일이 (i il i) isn’t going to be particularly clear for the listener, and you would often hear a native speaker saying the beginning of the number in Sino-Korean but switching to say 둘하나둘 (dul hana dul) for clarity in this part.
It might seem like a lot to memorise, and it is. There is no real trick to getting it perfect other than practise and memorisation, but I hope that this post might have given you a bit of a base to make an informed guess when you’re not sure! If you want more information, you can check out these further resources:
Lingodeer – How to Count in Korean and Everything About Korean Numbers
Minji Teaches Korean 민지 티치 코리안 - All about The Native Korean numbers (1~99) & Counters
I'll be back next week with a Konglish Refresher!! Thanks for reading~
Eva (MUKRSH Research Assistant)
