How to Pronounce Korean Surnames: Kim, Lee, and Park
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Kim, Lee, and Park are pronounced closer to “Geem,” “Ee,” and “Bak” — not the way their English spellings suggest. Korean romanization borrows English letters without their sounds, so reading these three surnames off a business card almost guarantees a pronunciation a Korean listener won’t recognize: a hard K on Kim, an L that isn’t in Lee, and a phantom R on Park. Here’s what each one should actually sound like, and why the spelling drifted so far from the sound.
Quick answers
- “Kim” is closer to a soft “Geem,” since the initial consonant in Korean is unaspirated, not the hard English K.
- “Lee” has no L sound at all in modern Korean — it’s just “Ee,” with the L surviving only in the old romanization.
- “Park” has no R sound whatsoever; it’s pronounced “Bak,” rhyming with “sock,” not with the English word for a green space.
How to Pronounce Korean Surnames the Right Way
The short version is that Korean romanization borrows English letters but not English sounds, so reading a Korean surname like an English word will almost always mislead you. Korean consonants like ㄱ, ㅂ, and ㄷ sit somewhere between the English voiced and voiceless pairs (g/k, b/p, d/t), which is why the same name gets spelled “Kim” on one passport and would sound, to an English ear, closer to “Gim.” Vowels are also simpler and more consistent than English spelling suggests — there’s no diphthong hiding inside “Park,” for instance, just one flat vowel. Once you stop trusting the English letters and start listening for the actual Hangul syllable, all three names get much easier to say correctly.
Why “Kim” Sounds Like “Geem,” Not “Kim”
Kim (김) starts with a lenis, unaspirated consonant, which lands halfway between an English “g” and “k” with almost no puff of air. English speakers instinctively add a hard aspirated K, the same one that starts “kite” or “kettle,” and that extra aspiration is exactly what makes an English “Kim” sound foreign to a Korean listener. As of the 2015 national census — the most recent full count — roughly 21.5% of South Koreans carry this surname, making it by far the most common family name in the country. Softening that K into something closer to “Geem” is usually the single change that makes a foreigner’s pronunciation click for a Korean listener.
Why “Lee” Has No L Sound At All
This is the one that surprises people the most: modern spoken Korean for 이 has no L sound whatsoever, and it’s simply pronounced “Ee.” The L exists only because of an old romanization habit tied to South Korea’s initial-sound rule (두음법칙), which historically dropped or altered certain consonants — including an original ㄹ — at the start of a word. North Korean and some older South Korean documents render the same surname as “Yi” or “Ri,” which is a closer echo of that original consonant, but in everyday 2026 conversation in Seoul, you’ll hear a clean, single syllable: “Ee.” Say “Lee” to a room of Koreans and you’ll be understood, but say “Ee” and you’ll sound like you’ve actually studied the language.
Why “Park” Doesn’t Rhyme With the English Word “Park”
Park (박) has zero rhotic sound in it — there is no R anywhere in the Korean pronunciation, and the vowel is a short, open “ah,” not the English “ar” you’d hear in “car” or “park” the noun. The correct sound is closer to “Bak,” rhyming with “sock” or “rock,” with that same soft, unaspirated consonant at the start that also affects Kim. The R only appears because of the McCune-Reischauer romanization system, which used “ŏ” and “a” combinations that got flattened into “ar” spellings when diacritics were dropped for everyday use. Under the Revised Romanization of Korean — the system South Korea’s government adopted in 2000 and still uses on road signs and official documents — 박 is spelled “Bak,” which is the more accurate guide if you’re writing the name rather than just saying it out loud. You’ll find this surname behind roughly 8.4% of the population per that same 2015 census, making the Kim-Lee-Park trio responsible for close to 45% of all Korean surnames combined.
A Quick Reference Table for the Three Most Common Surnames
| Hangul | Common Spelling | Closer Pronunciation | Common Mistake |
|---|---|---|---|
| 김 | Kim | Geem | Hard English K |
| 이 | Lee | Ee | Adding an L sound |
| 박 | Park | Bak | Adding an English R |
Photo © Korea Tourism Organization
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: How is the Korean surname 박 romanized — “Park” or “Bak”?
Both are correct romanizations of the same name, 박. “Bak” is the spelling under the Revised Romanization of Korean, the system the South Korean government adopted in 2000 and still uses on road signs and official documents, and it’s the closer guide to the actual sound. “Park” is the older, far more common spelling on passports and business cards, inherited from earlier romanization habits — which is also where its silent, non-existent R came from.
Q: How do you write “Lee” in Korean?
In Hangul, the surname is a single block, 이 — just the vowel ㅣ under the placeholder consonant ㅇ, with no separate letter for an L sound anywhere in it. On English documents you’ll see several different spellings depending on the romanization era and personal preference: “Lee” is by far the most common on modern passports and business cards, while “Yi,” “I,” and “Rhee” (as in South Korea’s first president, Syngman Rhee) show up on older records and in academic transliteration.
Q: Is “Lee” pronounced “Lee” or “Yi” in Korean?
Neither exactly — modern spoken Korean says “Ee,” with no L or Y sound; “Yi” is an older romanization that’s closer to the historical consonant than “Lee” is, but you won’t hear it in everyday 2026 speech in Seoul.
Q: How do you pronounce “Kim” in Korean, and why does it sound like “Geem”?
Say “Geem” — the Korean consonant ㄱ is unaspirated, sitting between an English “g” and “k,” and the hard aspirated K that English speakers naturally add makes the name sound noticeably foreign to Korean ears.
Q: How do you pronounce “Park” in Korean?
Say “Bak,” rhyming with “sock” — there’s no R sound in the Korean pronunciation at all, and the R only exists because of an older romanization system that got simplified over time.
Q: Why do Korean surnames get spelled so differently from how they sound?
Because Korean romanization systems were built to transliterate Hangul letter-by-letter for readers of English, not to reproduce the actual sounds, so gaps like the missing L in “Lee” or the phantom R in “Park” became permanent on paper long after the pronunciation habits that caused them changed.
Once you unlearn the English letters and start listening for the Hangul underneath, Kim, Lee, and Park stop being a pronunciation minefield and start being three of the easiest names to get right — which matters, because you’ll be saying at least one of them constantly if you spend any real time in Korea.
