마다: Every, Each

마다 is Korean's distributive particle: attach it to a noun and it means "every one of them, taken one at a time" or "at every interval." 날마다 is "every day," 사람마다 is "each (individual) person," 3일마다 is "every three days." It looks like a simple translation of English "every," and much of the time it behaves like one — but 마다 carries a flavor English "every" often loses: it insists on the members individually, one by one, rather than lumping them into a single mass. That individual-by-individual feel is what separates it from the pre-noun 모든 ("all"), and it is why 마다 turns up in the very common pattern "X마다 다르다" — "it varies from one X to the next." One piece of good news up front: 마다 has no allomorph. It clips onto any noun, vowel-final or consonant-final, in exactly one shape.

The core: "each and every one, individually"

Put 마다 on a countable noun and it sweeps across the whole set while keeping each member in view. It is the difference between "the whole crowd" and "every single person in it."

In each of these the emphasis is on repetition or coverage that touches every member: every day, every seat, every weekend, no gaps. Because 마다 is a particle and not a separate word, it attaches directly to the noun (자리마다, 주말마다) with no spacing before it.

Nuance 1: with a time word, "every / each interval"

When 마다 rides on a word for a stretch of time — 날 (day), 주 (week), 해 (year), 시간 (hour) — it means "at every one of those intervals," i.e. "daily / weekly / yearly / hourly."

Notice 한 시간마다: 마다 happily attaches to a counted interval — a number-plus-counter phrase — not just a bare time noun. "Every three days," "every ten minutes," "every two weeks" are all built this way (three-days마다, ten-minutes마다). This productivity is exactly what the Sino-Korean prefix 매 cannot do, as the next section shows.

Nuance 2: "it differs from one X to the next"

Here is the reading English speakers most often miss. Put 마다 on a countable noun and follow it with a verb of difference or variation — 다르다 (differ), 달라요 (varies) — and the sentence means "each individual X is its own case; it varies depending on which one you look at." English renders this not with "every" but with "each … differs" or "depending on."

This "each is its own case" meaning falls straight out of 마다's insistence on the individual member. Because it holds each person, country, or shop separately in view, it is the natural partner for "and they're all different." Reach for this pattern whenever you would say in English "it depends on the X" or "X to X, it varies."

The reframing: 마다 vs the prefix 매, and vs 모든

Two other words crowd into the same "every" space, and English collapses all three. Sorting them out is the real work of this page.

마다 vs 매 (Sino-Korean prefix). Korean also builds "every day / every week / every month" from the Sino-Korean prefix 매: 매일 (every day), 매주 (every week), 매달/매월 (every month), 매년 (every year). 매일 and 날마다 both mean "every day," and in that narrow case they are near-synonyms. But 매 is a bound prefix — it welds onto a single Sino-Korean noun to make a fixed vocabulary item, and that is the end of its reach. 마다 is a productive particle that attaches to almost anything, including native nouns (자리마다, 골목마다) and counted intervals (한 시간마다) that 매 could never take. You cannot say ×매 한 시간 for "every hour"; you say 한 시간마다.

마다 vs 모든. The other trap is reaching for 모든, a pre-noun (관형사) meaning "all/every," when the "one by one, individually" sense of 마다 is what you want. 모든 사람 and 사람마다 both touch on "everybody," but they frame it oppositely: 모든 사람 gathers everyone into a single group ("all people, collectively"), while 사람마다 spotlights each person separately ("each person, individually"). With a verb of variation, only the individual framing works — 모든 사람 다르다 is odd, because "all people, as a lump" cannot differ; it is the individuals that differ, so you need 사람마다.

Common Mistakes

1. Reaching for 모든 when you mean "each, individually." For the "one by one / it varies" sense — especially before a verb of difference — you need 마다, not 모든.

2. Trying to make 매 productive. 매 only welds onto set Sino-Korean nouns; for counted intervals and native nouns, use 마다.

3. Adding a space before 마다. 마다 is a particle and attaches directly to its noun.

4. Doubling up 매 and 마다. They do the same job; use one or the other, never both.

Key Takeaways

• 마다 = "every / each, taken individually" or "at every interval"; it attaches to a noun with no allomorph (날마다, 사람마다, 나라마다).
• With a time word it means the interval ("every year," 해마다); it even takes counted intervals (한 시간마다).
• With a countable noun before a verb of difference it means "it varies from one X to the next" — the very common 사람마다 다르다 pattern.
• 매 is a bound prefix on a single Sino-Korean noun (매일, 매주); 마다 is a productive particle. Where a 매-word exists they overlap; where none does, only 마다 works.
• Don't swap in 모든 ("all, collectively") when you mean "each, individually" — especially before "differs."