Intensifiers: 아주 / 매우 / 너무 (very, too)

To turn "tasty" into "very tasty" or "expensive" into "too expensive," Korean puts a small degree adverb in front of the descriptive word — it never changes the shape of the adjective itself. This page covers the boosters that crank a quality up: 아주 and 매우 (both "very"), 너무 ("too" / colloquially "so"), and the emphatic 정말 / 진짜 ("really"). They look interchangeable in a beginner's dictionary, but they carry very different registers and, in the case of 너무, a genuine split personality that trips up almost every English speaker.

The safe neutral "very": 아주

아주 is your default, no-risk "very." It stacks onto an adjective, another adverb, or a gradable verb and adds positive intensity without any hidden nuance. If you want to say something is very good, very big, very tasty and you don't want to think about connotation, reach for 아주.

The adjective (맛있어요, 좋아요) stays exactly as it is; 아주 simply sits in front and does all the intensifying. There is no Korean equivalent of English's -er / very choice or of French très vs trop worries here — 아주 is emotionally flat and always positive.

The bookish "very": 매우

매우 also means "very," but it belongs to a different register. It is the "very" of essays, news reports, textbooks, and formal presentations. In casual conversation it sounds like you are reading aloud from a printed page, so natives almost never say it over coffee — they say 아주, 정말, or 너무 instead.

The word that split in two: 너무

Here is where English gets you. 너무 was born meaning "too much, excessively" — a degree that overshoots what is acceptable, with a built-in complaint. That original sense is alive and well:

Both of these mean the quality has gone past a comfortable limit — the price is more than it should be, the coffee is undrinkable right now. This is 너무 doing exactly what English "too" does.

But over the last few decades 너무 has drifted into a general booster, and modern colloquial Korean now uses it even for wonderful things, where no excess is implied at all:

Nobody hearing 이 노래 너무 좋아요 thinks the speaker is complaining that the song is excessively good. In everyday speech 너무 has simply become "so / really." Prescriptivists — and the official style guides — still insist that positives should take 아주 or 정말 and that 너무 should be reserved for genuine excess. Native speakers ignore this completely in conversation and use 너무 everywhere. You will hear it constantly, so you must be able to produce and understand both readings.

The emphatic "really": 정말 / 진짜

정말 ("really, truly") and its more casual twin 진짜 ("for real") add emotional emphasis rather than pure degree. They are the go-to boosters for exclamations and heartfelt reactions, and they sidestep the 너무 ambiguity entirely because they never mean "too much."

진짜 is noticeably more casual than 정말 and pervades texting and friend-talk; 정말 is safe across most registers. Both can also stand alone as reactions — 정말? / 진짜? = "Really?!"

Where the booster goes

All of these adverbs sit immediately before the word they intensify — the adjective, another adverb, or a gradable verb — and Korean's verb-final order keeps them near the end of the clause. You never inflect the adjective for degree the way English does; the adverb carries the whole load. For the general rules on where adverbs land in a sentence, see lexical adverbs and placement.

English → Korean: the trap in one line

English "too" is always excessive and always negative — "too pretty" is a paradox or a joke. Korean 너무 has grown a second life as a plain "so / really," so the beginner instinct to hear 너무 예뻐요 as a complaint ("too pretty") is exactly backwards: to a modern speaker it is pure praise. Train yourself to let the context, not the dictionary gloss "too," decide the meaning.

Common Mistakes

1. Dropping 매우 into casual speech. It is grammatically fine but sounds like a written report.

2. Reading every 너무 as "too" and hearing praise as a complaint. The sentence 이 선물 너무 좋아요 tempts beginners to hear "this gift is excessively good" — a complaint. In modern speech there is no excess implied at all; it is straightforward praise. Let the positive adjective 좋다 tell you the 너무 is a booster, not a warning.

3. Putting the booster in front of a noun instead of the predicate. 너무 modifies a verb or adjective, not a bare noun. To say "too many people," intensify the adjective 많다.

4. Using 아주 안 for "not very." 아주 안 좋아요 does not mean "not very good" — it means "very NOT good," i.e. really bad. For the English "not very / not that," Korean uses a different adverb, 별로.

See negative-degree adverbs 별로 / 그다지 for that pattern.

Key Takeaways

• 아주 = the safe, neutral, always-positive "very." When in doubt, use it.
• 매우 = "very" for writing and formal speech only; it sounds bookish in conversation.
• 너무 originally meant "too much (excessive)," but colloquially it is now an all-purpose "so / really" — even for good things. Context, not the word, tells you which.
• 정말 / 진짜 = "really" for emphasis and reactions; 진짜 is the casual one. Neither ever means "too much."
• The booster always sits before the adjective/adverb/verb; Korean never inflects the adjective for degree.