For more information, check http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_phonology or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hangul.

Simple Vowels.
A. /a/. Sounds like Attention or the 1st sound from I.
E. //. An open E. Sounds like bEd, hEAd, thrEAt. Romanized AE.
E. /e/. A closed E. Sounds like the a from day (= hangulization of Day).
I. /i/. Sounds like ee; fEE, grEEn, bEE.
O. //. An open O. Sounds like hUnt, nUt. Romanized EO or sometimes U.
O. /o/. A closed O. Sounds like fOreign, Always, suppOrt.
U. /u/. Sounds like oo; spOOn, sUpport
U. //. A weird U. Doesnt sound like anything in English. Kind of in between OO and
EE, but more similar to oo. Romanized EU.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_back_unrounded_vowel <- Check that

+Y Vowels.
Exactly like the ones above, but with a y sound before. But they emphasize a lot on the true
sound of the vowel and the y is used only as a support. Thats why Hyeri is spelled (Heri)
in Japanese. Yura, though, as she has no consonant before the yu, the y kind of adopts the
consonant role and has as much emphasis as the U.
Ya Y Ye Y Yo Yu. Just add a stroke to the already existent one to form
these.

+W Vowels.
These are diphthongs created by a horizontal vowel followed by a vertical one. They sound as
the addition of the two vowels sounds, even though the ones started by have this sound
more similar to OO than usual, as they are the weak vowel on the diphthong. Both and
are romanized as W here.
wa w This should sound like wi but actually sounds exactly like .
w we wi
There are only 6 of those, and any other combination would be wrong. To remember these, I
think about that: as and have an stroke to the left which can be boxed under the ,
while and have not, therefore theyre matched with .
Finally there is . It sounds, of course, as an addition of both vowels together, being the
horizontal the weak and the vertical the strong, like the other ones, but this is very hard to
pronounce. You have to do the EE sound supported on the weird U one. It takes a lot of
practice and listening to people pronounce it to get it right.

VOWELS SUMMED UP:




Ok, now you must know that Korean is written in SYLLABLE BLOCKS. All syllable blocs have:
- An Initial Consonant.
- A Vowel (either simple, +Y or +W)
- An Ending Consonant (Optional)

Some consonants sound different depending if they are initial or ending. And sometimes,
other consonants positioning affects the pronunciation of the other ones. But easy languages
are for stupid people :D.
Consonants:


is the M and it always sounds M, like in Minah =

is the N and it always sounds N, like in Sojin =

is Silent at an Initial Position, used when there is no consonant before the vowel, like in
Yura=. At an Ending Position, it sounds like ng (or ), as in every -iNG verb (siNGiNG,
walkiNG...). The word (Annyong=Hi) showcases both uses of this letter.

is both, the R and the L. When it sounds like an R, its a soft one (like the Japanese one, not
like the French or Hebrew one). Before a vowel, it sounds R; otherwise, it sounds L. However, if
is placed at the ending of a syllable block AND at the beginning of the next one, it will make
a sound like LL (like an L but a bit longer). So =Hyeri, =Mal, =Alla, =Songru.

is the H. At an Initial Position, it sounds like H. If its after another consonant, its sound
is combined with the previous letter; e.g. = Saranghe, but the H sound is combined
with the NG one, forming an NGH, which is almost the same as NG. At an Ending Position,
it is silent (will later explain why is it used). Important to remember that is pronounced /t/,
and not /s/, in front of an . So = Tuthe.

is the K or the G.
At an Ending position, it sounds as K, but without intensity; if its the end of the word it just
means that you have to end the word shortly. Most of the times you wont hear a final K,
just a word ending shortly, the opposite as , where we prolong the A. If its not at the
end of the word but at the end of a syllable, then it is pronounced as a soft K.
At an Initial position it is pronounced as a G, except if it is the beginning of the word, in
which case it sounds K. Note that Koreans K and G are very similar, thats why
(Inkigayo) is not romanized as Ingigayo: they just pronounce this specific a little harder. If
you try pronouncing it, youll realize transforming Ingigayo to Inkigayo is almost natural. Thats
because makes the /n/ sound, and to say Ingigayo theyd have to make the // sound
(ng) , which is made by .

is the aspirated version of . At an Ending position, it sounds the same. At an Initial one, it
always sounds like an aspirated K, which stands for the English sound of the K (or sometimes
C) at the beginning of the word, or for Kh sometimes. Canada, Keep, Car, Kid.

is the tense version of . At an Ending Position, it sounds the same. At an Initial once, it
sounds like an strong K, like the English sound of the K that goes after an S, like sKy,
sKate or as the KK sound.

is the T or the D sound. Its aspirated version is , and its tense version is . Its
pronunciation is the same explained above, but instead of K read T and instead of G read
D. Its Ending Position Sound is the soft T, although, unlike the K, its almost always
pronounced.

is the P or the B sound. Its aspirated version is , and its tense version is . Its
pronunciation is the same explained above, but instead of K read P and instead of G read
B. Its Ending Position sound is like the K one (but with a p): very softly pronounced at the
end of the word. When writing English words in hangul, is used to represent the F sound,
although in Korean it just sounds as an aspirated P.

is the S sound. Its tense version is . It doesnt have an aspirated version. At an Ending
Position, it has the same sound that would have (as in !=Oh! My God). At an Initial
Position, it always sounds like an S ( as SS), but in front of an i it becomes SH, as in
SHampoo. This also happens in front of an y ( ) and in front of . For
example, , Sistar, would in theory be pronounced Sshisuta (the u would be barely
pronounced, as it is used to give support to lonely consonants when writing non-Korean words
in Korean). SHINee is written . (Fifty) sounds shwin.

is the CH or the J sound. Its aspirated version is , and its tense version is . At an
Ending position, they sound the same as . At an Initial position: has the sound of an
aspirated CH, as in CHocolate or CHair. has the sound of JJ or an strong J, as in
Jazz. The sound of is hard to determine. Keep in mind that Koreans pronounce almost the
same CH and J. In theory, at the beginning of a word, is pronounced CH, and when
not at the beginning is pronounced J. So (JiHae) is pronounced Chihe. In Japanese,
they translated it as (Chihe), so this pronunciation is quite accurate. The CH sound of
would be like franCHise. The J sound of would be like ninJa.

CONSONANTS SUMMED UP:
Initial Position:
K/G K
h
KK
T/D T
h
TT
P/B P
h
PP
CH/J CH
h
JJ
S(sh) SS(ssh)
MN Silent R H

Ending Position:
[K]:
[P]:
[T]:
[M]: [N]: [NG]: [L]: [Silent]:

So now you can already read and write in Korean! Just kidding, there are a shitton of rules you
have to know before you can do that. They only come into play when there is a consonant in
the Ending Position, so you should pay especial attention to those:
Rule 0: There can be TWO ending consonants instead of one. But not any combination is
possible, only these ones: , , , , , , , , , , . I dont find to be worth it to
memorize them; just knowing of its existence is enough. There is no standard rules for which
of them is pronounced: sometimes its the first one, sometimes its the second one, and
sometimes both. You need to learn the particular pronunciation in each case.
1
st
Rule: If a Syllable block has an ending consonant and the following one starts with (as
long as there is no space in between the two syllable blocks), phonetically the ending
consonant replaces the . For example, in the word , phonetically the replaces the .
In other words it has a greater impact; e.g. would be read kusso, because even though
the s sound should be T, it phonetically replaces the , as if it were . If there are two
ending consonants, only the second one replaces . And the first consonant can affect the
second one (following the rules below) as if the second one was really in the place of the .
For example, is pronounced opsso. When an replaces another , the sound is [NG].
2
nd
Rule: If a syllable block ends with any of these consonants (
) and the next syllable block (no space in between the two) starts with any of these
( ), they are transformed: becomes , becomes , becomes ,
becomes , and becomes . Remember that these changes are only phonetic, and
they writing shall stay the same.
3
rd
Rule: If a Syllable block ends with and the next one (no space in between the two) starts
with any of these ( ), they are transformed: becomes , becomes ,
becomes , and becomes . Again, these changes are only phonetic. The same
happens vice versa, if a syllable block ends with / / / and the next one starts with
, the resulting sound will also be / / / respectively.
4
th
Rule: If a Syllable blocks Ending Consonant and the following Syllable Blocks Initial
Consonant (no space in between) are and or and , the becomes (phonetically)
a , so the resulting sound is LL (long L). = Alla, =Uhelli, =Challaga.
5
th
Rule: If a Syllable block ends with any of these consonants (
) and the following one (no space in between) starts with or , the Ending
Consonant of the first syllable block is transformed. Again, these changes are only phonetic.
and are pronounced like ([NG])
and are pronounced like ([M])
and are pronounced like ([N])


RULES SUMMED UP
There can be two ending consonants instead of one.
gets replaced by previous ending consonant if there is one.
Consonants that have a tense version and are in the ending position make the next consonant
become its tense version (if it has one).
does the same but with the aspirated version (happens vice versa too).
+/+=
Consonants that have a tense version (plus ) and are in the ending pos. change if followed by
/.

So this was it! Now you can already read all the tweets from any Korean people you might like,
even though you probably wont understand anything! Good luck with your learning, hope this
helped.