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There are eight basic vowels in Korean:
| Korean Letter | Pronunciation |
| ㅏ | ‘a’ like in ‘after’ |
| ㅓ | ‘o’ like in ‘on’ |
| ㅣ | ‘ee’ like in ‘green’ or ‘steel’ |
| ㅗ | ‘or’ like in ‘four‘ or ‘thought’ |
| ㅜ | ‘oo’ like in ‘blue‘, ‘two‘, or ‘choose’ |
| ㅡ | ‘oo’ like in ‘book’ or ‘would’ |
| ㅐ | ‘eh’ like in ‘air‘ |
| ㅔ | ‘ey’ like in ‘hey‘ or ‘say‘ |
(The last two Korean letters in the above table are pronounced very similarly, and for the most part you can just pronounce them in the same way, and Koreans will still understand you.)
Notice how the first six of these vowels all consist of a long vertical or horizontal line, either with a single dash on one side of it, or no dash.
The last two of these basic vowels are actually each two of the previous vowels written together:
ㅏ and ㅣ becomes ㅐ
ㅓ and ㅣ becomes ㅔ
Korean is written in syllabic blocks, and a syllable must contain at least an initial consonant and a vowel. So if we want to write these vowels as syllables, we need to use the letter ㅇ as the initial consonant – which represents no sound.
For vowels that consist of a long vertical line (and either a dash or no dash), ㅇ is written on the left of the vowel. For vowels that consist of a long horizontal line (and either a dash or no dash), ㅇ is written above the vowel.
| Korean Syllable | Pronunciation (as above) |
| 아 | ‘a’ |
| 어 | ‘o’ |
| 이 | ‘ee’ |
| 오 | ‘or’ |
| 우 | ‘oo’ |
| 으 | ‘oo’ |
| 애 | ‘eh’ |
| 에 | ‘ey’ |
Exercises
Once you’ve read through and learnt the information above, have a go at these exercises on basic vowels.
1. Match the syllable to the sound
For each Korean syllable in the table below, choose the correct pronunciation.
| 이 | a.) ‘a’ | b.) ‘ee’ | c.) ‘oo’ |
| 오 | a.) ‘or’ | b.) ‘a’ | c.) ‘oo’ |
| 우 | a.) ‘ee’ | b.) ‘i’ | c.) ‘oo’ |
| 아 | a.) ‘eh’ | b.) ‘ey’ | c.) ‘a’ |
| 애 | a.) ‘eh’ | b.) ‘oo’ | c.) ‘or’ |
| 에 | a.) ‘or’ | b.) ‘ey’ | c.) ‘o’ |
2. Match the sound to the syllable
For each vowel sound in the table below, choose the correct Korean syllable.
| ‘ee’ | a.) 아 | b.) 어 | c.) 이 |
| ‘or’ | a.) 오 | b.) 우 | c.) 으 |
| ‘o’ | a.) 오 | b.) 우 | c.) 어 |
| ‘eh’ | a.) 이 | b.) 아 | c.) 애 |
| ‘ey’ | a.) 이 | b.) 에 | c.) 으 |
| ‘oo’ | a.) 아 | b.) 애 | c.) 우 |
Answers
Exercise 1: b, a, c, c, a, b
Exercise 2: c, a, c, c, b, c