Once numbers get big, Korean does something that quietly breaks every English speaker's mental math: it groups digits in fours, not threes. English drops a comma every three digits and gives each group a name — thousand, million, billion. Korean's invisible comma falls every four digits, anchored on the word 만 (ten thousand). This is not a minor cosmetic difference; it means "one million" has no single Korean word (it's 백만, "a hundred ten-thousands"), and it means you cannot read a large number by translating the English name — you have to re-chunk it. This page teaches the four-digit habit and the place-words 만, 억, and 조 that ride on top of the basic Sino digits.
The place-words
Below 10,000 the ladder is the familiar 십·백·천. The moment you hit ten thousand, a new word takes over — and then a brand-new word appears again only every four digits after that.
| Value | Korean | Reading |
|---|---|---|
| 10 | 십 | sip |
| 100 | 백 | baek |
| 1,000 | 천 | cheon |
| 10,000 | 만 | man |
| 100,000 | 십만 | simman |
| 1,000,000 | 백만 | baengman |
| 10,000,000 | 천만 | cheonman |
| 100,000,000 (10⁸) | 억 | eok |
| 1,000,000,000 | 십억 | sibeok |
| 10¹² | 조 | jo |
Look at what happens between 만 and 억. There is no new word for a hundred thousand, a million, or ten million — you just stack 십·백·천 on top of 만 (십만, 백만, 천만). Only when you reach 10⁸ does a fresh word, 억, appear. Then the whole cycle repeats: 십억, 백억, 천억, and at 10¹² comes 조. New words land every four digits.
The four-digit reading trick
Here is the reliable method. Ignore the English commas, and re-comma the number from the right in blocks of four digits. Then name each block with 조 / 억 / 만, reading whatever sits inside the block as an ordinary number.
Take 12,345,678. Re-chunk from the right into fours: 1234 5678. The left block is the 만 block, the right block is the ones. So:
1234만 5678 → 천이백삼십사만 오천육백칠십팔
The left block 1234 is read as an ordinary number (천이백삼십사) and tagged with 만; the right block 5678 is read plainly (오천육백칠십팔). Two more:
25,000 →
25000→ 이만 오천 (iman ocheon) 340,000 →340000→ 삼십사만 (samsipsaman)
In the wild
Prices, populations, and salaries are where these numbers actually live, so here they are doing real work.
이 노트북은 백만 원이 넘어요.
i noteubugeun baengman woni neomeoyo
This laptop is over a million won.
서울 인구는 약 천만 명이에요.
Seoul inguneun yak cheonman myeongieyo
Seoul's population is about ten million.
이 게임은 전 세계에서 오천만 명이 해요.
i geimeun jeon segyeeseo ocheonman myeongi haeyo
This game is played by fifty million people worldwide.
이 아파트는 오억 원이에요.
i apateuneun oeok wonieyo
This apartment is 500 million won.
복권에 당첨돼서 십억을 받았어요.
bokgwone dangcheomdwaeseo sibeogeul badasseoyo
I won a billion won in the lottery.
우리 회사 작년 매출이 삼백억이 넘었어요.
uri hoesa jangnyeon maechuri sambaegeogi neomeosseoyo
Our company's revenue last year passed 30 billion won.
Note the pronunciation shifts you can hear in the readings above: 백만 comes out as [뱅만] (baengman) and 작년 as [장년] (jangnyeon) — a stop nasalizing before ㅁ/ㄴ. These aren't spelling changes; you write 백만 and 작년, but they're voiced with the nasal.
The leading 일: dropped for 만, kept for 억
When a big place-word stands at the very front with nothing above it, Korean drops the leading 일 for 천, 백, and 만 — but keeps it for 억 and 조. So ₩10,000 is 만 원, not ×일만 원, in ordinary speech; but ₩100,000,000 is 일억 원, never ×억 원.
이거 만 원이에요.
igeo man wonieyo
This is 10,000 won. (만 원 — no leading 일)
그 차는 일억 원쯤 해요.
geu chaneun ireok wonjjeum haeyo
That car costs about 100 million won. (일억 — the 일 stays)
(In very formal or written contexts — cheques, contracts — you may see 일만 spelled out to prevent tampering. In everyday speech it's just 만.)
만 원: the everyday unit of price
Because ₩1,000 (천 원) buys little and ₩10,000 (만 원) is about the price of a modest meal, everyday Korean prices cluster on 만 원. Round figures like 삼만 원, 오만 원, and 십만 원 are the texture of daily shopping, along with the vague 몇 만 원 ("a few tens of thousands of won"). The suffix -짜리 ("worth ~") turns any amount into a describable item.
이 티셔츠는 삼만 원짜리예요.
i tisyeocheuneun samman wonjjariyeyo
This T-shirt is a 30,000-won one.
This is also why the won-price page leans so heavily on 만 — for practical purposes, 만 원 is the "dollar-sized" chunk of Korean money.
조 and the register of very large numbers
You'll seldom reach for 조 (10¹²) in daily conversation, but it's everywhere in news and economics (news / academic register): national budgets, GDP, corporate revenue. These figures are typically read in the formal 합니다체.
올해 정부 예산은 육백조 원이 넘습니다.
olhae jeongbu yesaneun yukbaekjo woni neomseumnida
This year's government budget exceeds 600 trillion won. (news register)
Even here the four-digit rule holds: 육백조 is "six hundred 조," and any 억-and-만 blocks below it would follow, each named in turn.
Common Mistakes
1. Hunting for a single word for "million." There isn't one. A million is a hundred ten-thousands, 백만.
- ✗ (trying to recall "one Korean word for million")
- ✓ 백만
2. Grouping by threes, English-style. "Fifty thousand" tempts a literal ×오십천 (오십 "50" + 천 "1000"). But 천 is not the top place-word here — 만 is. Fifty thousand is five ten-thousands.
- ✗ 오십천
- ✓ 오만
3. Keeping the 일 on 만 in speech. ₩10,000 in normal conversation is 만 원.
- ✗ 일만 원 주세요.
- ✓ 만 원 주세요.
여기 만 원 있어요.
yeogi man won isseoyo
Here's 10,000 won.
4. Dropping the 일 from 억. Unlike 만, the word 억 needs its 일 when it leads.
- ✗ 억 원짜리 시계
- ✓ 일억 원짜리 시계 ("a 100-million-won watch")
Key Takeaways
- Korean groups large numbers in units of 만 (10,000) — a mental comma every four digits, versus English's every three.
- New place-words appear only every four digits: 만 (10⁴), 억 (10⁸), 조 (10¹²). Between them you stack 십·백·천 (십만, 백만, 천만).
- To read a big number, re-chunk it from the right into blocks of four and name each block 조/억/만.
- "Million" = 백만, "billion" = 십억 — these are built, not translated word-for-word.
- Leading 일 is dropped for 천/백/만 (만 원) but kept for 억/조 (일억).
Now practice Korean
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