Top 5 YouTube Channels for Korean Learners
5. Korean Learning Freak
Educational
Entertaining
Cultural Elements
Korean learning freak mainly releases educational videos and discusses grammar, vocab and TOPIK exam patterns.
When explaining vocab, the presenter starts by using English then again using Korean. Since the videos explain basic vocabulary and grammar there are no subtitles provided, however the format is still very simple and easy to follow. Korean Learning Freak's TOPIK videos provide a description of what each section of the exam contains as well as the types of questions that you may encounter.
Due to the content being heavily focused on education, there is not a great focus on culture. This is an ideal channel for those who want to start studying Korean language from the ground up.
Sweet & Tasty TV is run by Professor Oh, also known as Mina, who provides a mini guide to Korean language and culture. Although Mina originally had no intention of posting regular videos on YouTube, but she ended up changing her mind after her first Korean lesson reached 2 million views.
Her much earlier content was based around a “Korean Word of the Week (KWOW)” series where she dressed up as different characters to provide a mini dialogue and discussed the vocabulary, grammar and phrases that had been learned. Mina’s most recent videos mainly consist of introducing different Korean food which you can find in Seoul or make yourself at home.
3. Korean Unnie (한국언니)
Educational
Entertaining
Cultural Elements
Korean Unnie is becoming increasingly popular and has even released a few books targeted at Korean language beginners.
Her playlist “All about Korean” offers mini lessons on nouns, verbs and different grammatical structures. Alongside “All About Korean” she has many other playlists that are both fun and educational. In addition to her educational videos, she also teaches some aspects of culture. For example, in one video she presents a number of Korean Dad jokes (aje gaegeu) which are cheesy in all sorts of ways but somehow manage to put a smile on your face, and in another she discusses the elements of etiquette which are most important to observe in in Korea.
This channel is a must for those who want to learn cheesy jokes and have fun learning about etiquette.
Talk To Me In Korean are most well-known for writing their textbooks and workbooks by themselves. They offer a fun and practical way of studying Korean. in fact, LingoClass use their textbooks for our Korean Beginner course and our students love them!
You may think that because they make textbooks, this channel would be heavily focused on education, but Talk to me in Korean also has a lot of content related to Korean culture, discussing landmarks, food and dialects for example. In their playlist “Sights of Korea”, the videographer takes the audience on walks and bike rides to show many of the most interesting places to visit if you ever go to Korea.
TTMIK offers both educational and cultural content which is entertaining and perfect for those who want to learn Korean and have fun at the same time.
1. The World of 데이브/ Dave's Sesang (데이브의 세상)
Educational
Entertaining
Cultural Elements
The World of Dave is run by David Levene, an American who has been living in Korea for the past 12 years. He grew up in Atlanta, Georgia and moved to South Korea in 2008.
Dave runs a couple of channels but his second most watched is Dave’s Sesang. His main channel, The World of Dave, is most known for his ‘pronunciation differences’ videos where he gathers with Korean, Chinese and Japanese speaking friends. Alongside these videos, Dave also gathers with friends of other nationalities to learn more about their culture, such as Spain, Russia and Turkey. He brings a lot of satire and comedy to his cultural videos making them highly entertaining and easy to watch. His second channel, Dave’s Sesang is more English based and sometimes offers Korean lessons.
Both channels offer dual subtitles and are edited in an aesthetic vintage video game style. Since his second channel is primarily for English speaking viewers, he sometimes only adds subtitles for the language he isn’t speaking.
Korean Englishman is run by two Englishmen; Josh, who is fluent in Korean and Ollie, who is currently learning Korean. Josh studied and lived abroad in China but was welcomed by Korean classmates which sparked his love for Korea.
Josh and Ollie run two channels, Korean Englishman and Jolly. Korean Englishman is mainly focused on Korean culture and delivering it to those who might not know anything about it. Jolly on the other hand, was created to showcase the process of Josh teaching Ollie Korean. Because it shows in-depth the struggles Ollie faces when learning another language, Korean learners can often relate to specific strengths and weaknesses, making it both entertaining and educational. Both channels offer dual subtitles no matter whether they are speaking English or Korean. They use this method to help Koreans learn English and vice versa.
Ollie is a sarcastic, humorous individual who bounces off of Josh's more composed approach. Due to some recent controversy over a surprise birthday celebration that Josh provided for his wife during a two-week quarantine, Josh has released a statement stating that the two channels will be on a hiatus until further notice.
Now you have explored some of the best channels out there to improve your Korean knowledge, why not supplement that learning by booking a course with one of our expert teachers?
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