Formal Questions: -(스)ㅂ니까?

If 해요체 yes/no questions feel almost too easy — you just raise your pitch — the formal register offers something reassuringly grammatical in return. In the polite-formal 합니다체, a question has its own dedicated ending, -(스)ㅂ니까?, distinct from the statement ending -(스)ㅂ니다. Here, and essentially only here, Korean marks a question the way European languages do: the verb ending itself changes.

Compare the statement 갑니다 ("[I] go") with the question 갑니까? ("do you go?"). Swap the final vowel — 다 → 까 — and the sentence flips from telling to asking. That clean, visible switch is what makes this ending feel so learnable.

A quick pronunciation note

The ㅂ of -ㅂ니다/-ㅂ니까 does not surface as [p]. Before the ㄴ of 니, it nasalizes to [m], so 갑니까 is pronounced [감니까] and 입니다 is [임니다]. This is why the romanizations throughout this page read gamnikka, imnida, meokseumnikka — the ㅂ has become an m. Reflect it in your speech from the start.

Allomorphy: which shape attaches?

The ending has two shapes, chosen by the last sound of the verb stem — exactly the same split as the statement -(스)ㅂ니다.

• Vowel-final stem → -ㅂ니까 (가다 → 갑니까?, 사다 → 삽니까?, 오다 → 옵니까?)
• Consonant-final stem → -습니까 (먹다 → 먹습니까?, 좋다 → 좋습니까?, 읽다 → 읽습니까?)

Here is the statement–question pairing side by side:

The ㄹ trap: the ㄹ drops

Stems ending in ㄹ (살다, 만들다, 알다, 팔다) look consonant-final, but they behave like vowel stems here — and they lose their ㄹ before -ㅂ니까. So 살다 → 삽니까?, never ×살습니까. This is the same ㄹ-elision you meet across the whole conjugation of ㄹ-stem verbs.

The copula and the honorific

The copula 이다 takes -ㅂ니까 like a vowel stem, giving 입니까?. After a consonant-final noun it stays 이 + ㅂ니까; the whole thing means "is [it]…?"

To show respect to the subject of the sentence, insert the subject-honorific -(으)시-, which fuses with the ending as -십니까?. This is standard whenever you address or ask about someone senior — a customer, an elder, a stranger you are being deferential to.

Negation and tense keep the same ending

-(스)ㅂ니까? attaches to the fully built stem, so negation and past tense change nothing about the ending itself — you negate or add tense first, then cap it with -(스)ㅂ니까?.

Notice that the ㅅ-batchim of a past stem like 갔/하셨 surfaces as [t] before the 습, exactly as it does elsewhere — 갔습니까 is [갇씀니까], romanized gatseumnikka.

Answering a formal question — answer in kind

Register runs both ways. If someone asks you in 합니다체, you should answer in 합니다체, completing 네/아니요 with a -(스)ㅂ니다 verb rather than a casual one.

The particles 네 and 아니요 themselves don't change with register, but the verb you attach does — and mixing a formal question with a casual answer is one of the register clashes flagged below. (The proposition-confirming logic of 네/아니요 is covered on answering yes/no questions.)

Where this register belongs

-(스)ㅂ니까? is the sound of distance and formality: business meetings, service counters, news broadcasts, public announcements, the military, formal speeches, and careful first meetings. It signals respect and professionalism — but it is also stiff, so it should not be sprinkled into casual talk. Between friends it sounds comically official.

At a service counter you will often hear a softer, 해요-adjacent offer instead of a bald 합니다체 question — the -ㄹ까요? form, which proposes rather than interrogates:

Common Mistakes

1. Forgetting the ㄹ-drop. ㄹ-stems lose their ㄹ before -ㅂ니까; they never take -습니까.

2. Using the old -읍니까 spelling. Pre-1988 orthography wrote -읍니까 after consonants; modern Korean spells it -습니까. You will see -읍니까 only in old texts.

3. Picking the wrong allomorph. A vowel stem takes -ㅂ니까; giving it -습니까 (or vice versa) is ungrammatical.

4. Dropping the subject honorific for a senior. 갑니까? is formal but not honorific to the subject; to a customer or elder you need -십니까?.

5. Clashing 합니다체 with casual endings. Don't mix -습니까? and 반말/해요 in one breath — the register whiplash sounds sloppy.

Key Takeaways

• 합니다체 is the one common register where a question changes the ending: statement -(스)ㅂ니다 → question -(스)ㅂ니까? (갑니다 → 갑니까?).
• Allomorphy mirrors the statement: vowel stem → -ㅂ니까, consonant stem → -습니까; the copula gives 입니까?.
• ㄹ drops before -ㅂ니까 (살다 → 삽니까?, never ×살습니까).
• Subject respect adds -십니까? (가십니까?, 있으십니까?); a bare 갑니까? is formal but not honorific.
• The ㅂ is always heard as m ([감니까]). Reserve this register for formal, distant settings — and don't blend it with casual endings.