Hangul Guide

Hangul Basics

Hangul is the Korean alphabet.
It may seem like an alien language but is simple to learn.
Can learn to read and write it in a few hours with practice.
Avoid writing Korean using the English alphabet as it will hinder progress when learning grammar.
Hangul was created in the mid-1400s by King Sejong.
Before Hangul, most Koreans couldn't read or write their own language and used Chinese instead.
Hangul is an alphabet, so there are only 24 unique letters to learn.

Consonants and Vowels

Hangul is made up of consonants and vowels, similar to the English alphabet.
Vowels are a, e, i, o, u, and sometimes y.
Consonants are all other letters that are not vowels.
To make a sound or syllable in Korean, at least one consonant and one vowel are needed together.

First Consonant

To write the first consonant, start from the top left and draw it in one stroke going to the right and then downward.
Writing letters in the correct order is important because incorrect stroke order can make them appear as different letters.
This letter is pronounced similar to a k or a g in English, but it's softer and between the two sounds.

First Vowel

To draw the first vowel, start at the top and draw a single line down, then draw a shorter line to the right.
This letter is pronounced "ah," like in the words "law" or "car" in American English.

Syllable Blocks

In Korean, syllables are written in blocks.
There are six types of blocks depending on the vowels used and the number of letters.
The first block type is consonant + vowel (CV).
When writing "ka", combine the consonant (similar to k/g) and the vowel "ah" to create the sound "ka".
The pronunciation is between a k and a g in English.

Second Consonant

To draw it, start at the top and draw it all in one stroke going down and to the right.
This letter is similar to n in English.
Combining it with the vowel a makes the sound "na".

Third Consonant

It's drawn in two pieces. Draw a horizontal line going from left to right. Then, draw a line from the left of the line, and in one stroke go down into the right.
This letter is similar to a t or a d sound in English, but it's not a hard t or d sound.
Combining this consonant with the vowel ah makes the sound ta.

Practice

Practice reading the sounds: ka, na, ta.
Write each letter individually, then write them together, and sound them out.
Practice as much as possible for quick learning.

Additional Consonants and Vowels

Fourth Consonant

To draw it, start at the top left and draw a line down. Then, going back to the top left, draw one stroke that goes to the right and then down. Finally, make one more horizontal line from the bottom left to the bottom right.
Avoid drawing it using only one line to prevent confusion with another letter.
This letter is similar to M in English.
Combining it with the vowel "ah" makes the sound "ma."

Fifth Consonant

To draw it, start at the top left and draw a line down. Then go to the top right and draw a line down. Finally, draw two horizontal lines from left to right, from the middle of the stroke and from the bottom of the stroke.
This letter is pronounced similar to a p or a b in English, but it's softer and between the two sounds.
Combining it with the vowel "ah" makes the sound "pa."

Sixth Consonant

To draw it, start at the top and draw a slightly curved line going down and sideways to the left. Start again from the top, and this time draw a similar line to the right.
This letter is similar to s in English.
If we combine it with our vowel we can hear that this letter would become sa.

Seventh Consonant

To draw it, make a horizontal line from left to right. Then, draw a slightly curved line going down and sideways to the left, just as we did with our last letter. Draw another similar line to the right.
This letter is similar to a c h or a j sound in English, English, but it's not a hard c h sound like in the word cherry and it's not a hard j sound like in the word job.
We can combine this consonant with our vowel ah and hear its sound directly. Ta.

Eighth Consonant

To draw it, draw a short line from the top going down. Then draw a horizontal line from left to right. Finally, draw a circle underneath the horizontal line starting from the top and going counterclockwise.
This letter is similar to h such as in the word hand in English.
If we combine it with our vowel a, we can hear that this letter would become Ha.

Second Vowel

To draw it, start at the top and draw a line down. Then draw a longer horizontal line from the left to the right.
This letter is pronounced such as in the word old in English.

Syllable Blocks

"Vertical vowel block": Used when the vowel is vertical, such as ㅏ.
"Horizontal vowel block": Used when the vowel is horizontal; e.g. ㅗ.

More Consonants and Syllable Blocks

Ninth Consonant

To draw it, start at the top left and draw a line to the right and then down. Next, draw the horizontal line below that, starting from the left and going to the right. Finally, draw the line from the start of the line, going down, then to the right. Although it might seem easier to just draw this letter like a backwards s, doing so can make the letter look unbalanced. It's best to draw this in three strokes instead of one.
This letter sounds like it's between an l and an r in English. However, it's neither an l or an r. Instead, to pronounce this letter, position your tongue as if you were going to say a d sound, such as in the word dog, but make an l sound instead.
If we combine it with our vowel a from before, we can hear that the sound would become la, la.

Tenth Consonant

It's simple to draw. Make a circle starting from the top and going counterclockwise.
This letter has two uses. This letter can be used at the beginning of a syllable to give an empty sound.
Since this new consonant doesn't have any sound when it's used at the beginning of a syllable, we can use it instead of another consonant to hear the vowel sound directly. In this way, it acts like an empty consonant. But this letter has two uses, and its use is at the end of a syllable.

Syllable Block

In order to use this consonant at the end of a syllable, we'll need to learn a new kind of syllable block.
Here are the two new syllable blocks that we'll need. We can use these syllable blocks, which each use two consonants and one vowel, to create syllables that have three letters them. The left syllable block can be used with vertical vowels just like before, and the right syllable block can be used with horizontal vowels.
At the start of a syllable, this consonant has an empty sound, and at the end of a syllable, it has the sound of NG.

New Vowels

Third Vowel

To draw it, make a short horizontal line from the left to the right. Then draw a longer vertical line from the top to the bottom, which touches the right end of the line.
You can think of this sound as being similar to the one you'd hear in the beginning of the word up in English.

Fourth Vowel

To draw it, make a horizontal line from the left to the right. Then draw a vertical line starting from the middle of the line and going down.
This vowel is pronounced oh, like the oh sound in the English word glue.

Fifth Vowel

To draw it, make a single horizontal line from the left to the right.
This vowel is pronounced like the sound in the word good.

Sixth Vowel

To draw it, make a vertical line from the top to the bottom.
This vowel is pronounced ee, like the ee sound in the word tree.
Whenever this consonant is used with the vowel I, it becomes She and not Se.

More Vowels

Seventh Vowel

To draw it, make a short horizontal line from the left to the right. Then draw a longer vertical line from the top to the bottom that touches the right side of the line. Then draw a vertical line from the top to the bottom.
Now we can hear that this vowel has the sound E. You can think of this sound as being similar to the one you'd hear in the word egg.

Eighth Vowel

To draw it, make a vertical line from the top to the bottom. Then draw a short horizontal line from left to right, touching the middle of the vertical line. Finally, draw another vertical line from the top to the bottom, the right side of the short horizontal line.
There is a slight difference between the two in how they're pronounced, these days it's fine to simply pronounce them both the exact same way, E.

Ninth Vowel

To draw it, make a vertical line going from the top to the bottom. Then draw a short horizontal line from about a of the way down the line and to the right. Finally, draw another short horizontal line from left to right, this time from two thirds of the way down the line.
This vowel is pronounced you, like the you sound in the word yawn.

Tenth Vowel

To draw it, make a short vertical line from the top to the bottom. Draw another short vertical line to the right of the also from the top to the bottom. Then draw a longer horizontal line that connects with the bottoms of the two vertical lines. It should look like a you turned on its back.
This vowel is pronounced like the sound in the phrase check it out Yo.
These vowels, you and yo, when combined with That Consonant letter we previously learned, will also create the SH sound that we saw with the vowel e.

Final Vowels

Eleventh Vowel

To draw it, make two short horizontal lines from the left to the right. These two lines will touch the next line that we're about to draw at 1 of the way down and two thirds of the way down. Then draw a vertical line to the right of those.
Now we can hear that this vowel has the sound Yaw. You can think of this sound as a combination of the vowel E with the vowel O

Twelfth Vowel

To draw it, make a horizontal line from the left to the right. Then draw two short vertical lines from 1 of the way down the line and two thirds of the way down the line, going from the top to the bottom.
Now we can hear that this vowel has the sound You. You can think of this sound as a combination of the vowel E with the vowel U.

Thirteenth Vowel

To draw it, draw the letter y'all as we learned, but then add one more vertical line to the right of it going from the top to the bottom.
Now we can hear that this vowel has the sound Ye. You can think of this sound as a combination of the vowel I with the vowel E.

Fourteenth Vowel

To draw it, draw a vertical line from top to bottom. Then draw two short horizontal lines from 1 of the way down the line and two thirds of the way down to the right. Then draw a vertical line touching the ends of the two short horizontal lines.
Now we can hear that this vowel has the sound, yeah. You can think of this sound as a combination of the vowel E with the vowel E.

Sound Rules

A Korean person example. But because there's an empty letter at the beginning of the sound in, whatever letter before it can flow through it as if it were connected.
Note that this only affects how a word is pronounced, not how it's written.

Four-Letter Syllable

This syllable block can be used for making syllables using four letters. Specifically, this block is used with a vertical vowel.
When using a four letter syllable, if the next syllable starts with the empty consonant, you'll blend the sound of the very last letter at the bottom of the syllable into the next syllable.
This block also uses four letters and can be used when you have a horizontal vowel.

Double Consonants

Five double consonants in Hangul. All five are simply the same letters we previously learned, written twice.
Drawing a double consonant is almost the exact same as drawing a regular consonant. Just draw the regular letter twice using the same amount of space as if it were one letter.
These five double consonants are pronounced in mostly the same way as their single versions. However, these are spoken by slightly tensing your mouth before you say them.

Strong Consonants

There are four strong consonants that we'll need to learn.
A strong consonant is simply a stronger version of a regular consonant that we've already learned.

Diphthongs

Diphthongs are vowels, but fortunately, we don't have to learn anything new. Diphthongs are simply a combination of two vowels into one.

Seven Diphthongs to Learn

Consonant and Vowel

Sound change rules in Korean help us to be able to know how to pronounce words when they would otherwise be too difficult to say.
Whenever one of these seven consonants appears at the end of a syllable and the syllable isn't followed by an empty consonant, it will instead be pronounced as this letter which is called a tikat.
When used at the end of a consonant, these two consonants become pronounced as their normal versions instead.

Names of letters

Simply take the consonant, attach the vowel I, then attach E, and finally attach the consonant again at the bottom of that.

Exceptions to this: Digat, Tibet, Shiyat.

Additional rules

If any of these four consonants appear at the end of a syllable, they're just pronounced as normal.

Base Consonants

Whenever you have a consonant, specifically a base consonant, a double consonant, or a strong consonant, that's followed by a base consonant, the base consonant will become pronounced like a double consonant.
Whenever it comes before or after a base consonant, it changes the base consonant into a strong consonant.
Whenever you have a M before the sound I, that I sound becomes pronounced.
Whenever you have a SH before the sound I, the sound becomes pronounced O.
Whenever you have a H before the sound YO, the sound becomes pronounced Y.

Guidelines

Whenever you have a T followed by one of our five base consonants, the base consonant will usually become a double consonant.
The consonants N and M are what's known as nasal consonants because they are pronounced partially using your nose.
But don't worry, most of these are so commonly used that you'll end up learning them just by hearing them, and you might not even realize they're irregular.