Hangul is not a mystery alphabet. It has 40 letters, they combine into square blocks in a fixed order, and once you know the handful of sound rules on this page you can read almost anything aloud — including words you have never seen.
Fourteen basic consonants, plus five tense pairs. The second romanization appears when the letter sits at the end of a syllable.
The one thing to internalize: ㄱ ㄷ ㅂ ㅈ are soft, ㅋ ㅌ ㅍ ㅊ are the same sounds with a puff of air, and ㄲ ㄸ ㅃ ㅉ are the same sounds with a tight throat and no air. Three settings, one shape family.
Ten basic vowels. A short extra stroke adds a y in front — that pattern covers half the table for free.
ㅐ and ㅔ are pronounced identically by nearly all modern speakers. Same for ㅙ, ㅚ and ㅞ. Do not spend a week on the difference — spend it on ㅓ vs ㅗ, which really do change meanings.
Korean is never written as a flat string of letters. Every syllable is packed into one square, always in the order consonant → vowel → (final consonant).
A syllable that starts with a vowel sound still needs something in the consonant slot, so ㅇ fills it and stays silent. That is why 아 is just a, while 강 ends in a real ng.
Any consonant can be written at the bottom of a block, but only seven sounds can actually be pronounced there. Everything else collapses into one of them.
| Written | Pronounced as | Example |
|---|---|---|
| ㄱ ㅋ ㄲ | k (unreleased) | 부엌 → 부억 bu-eok |
| ㄴ | n | 산 san |
| ㄷ ㅌ ㅅ ㅆ ㅈ ㅊ ㅎ | t (unreleased) | 옷 → 옫 ot |
| ㄹ | l | 물 mul |
| ㅁ | m | 밤 bam |
| ㅂ ㅍ | p (unreleased) | 잎 → 입 ip |
| ㅇ | ng | 강 gang |
Unreleased means you stop the air and never let it out — the k in English back said without the final puff. Beginners are usually understood far better once they stop releasing final consonants.
Korean spelling is consistent; pronunciation shifts at the seams between syllables. Four rules cover most of what you will hear.
| Rule | What happens | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Liaison | A final consonant moves into the next block when it starts with ㅇ | 한국어 → 한구거 han-gu-geo, not han-guk-eo |
| Nasalization | k/t/p before ㄴ or ㅁ turn into ng/n/m | 학년 → 항년 hang-nyeon |
| Tensing | A soft consonant after k/t/p becomes tense | 학교 → 학꾜 hak-kyo |
| ㅎ weakening | ㅎ between voiced sounds fades or disappears | 좋아요 → 조아요 jo-a-yo |
Decode each block left to right, top to bottom, then apply the rules above. Tap a card to check yourself.
If you got most of these, you can now read Korean signs, menus and song titles aloud without understanding a word of them — which is exactly the point. Meaning comes next; decoding comes first.