By Stevie Tan Last updated: July 25, 2024

Korean Adjectives [Descriptive Verbs]

To really understand Korean adjectives, you’ll need to learn more about Korean verbs:

That’s because Korean adjectives actually belong to a class of verbs.

They’re also known as “descriptive verbs.”

Here’s your guide to the basics of Korean adjectives.

Contents

• Common Korean Adjectives
• • Shapes and sizes
  • Colors
  • Tastes
  • Qualities
  • Adjectives to describe people
• Where to Place Korean Adjectives in Sentences
• • Before the noun
  • After the noun
• How to Conjugate Korean Adjectives
• • Step 1: Drop the 다
  • Step 2: Add the appropriate ending
  • Irregular Korean adjectives
• How to Conjugate Korean Adjectives According to Tense
• • Past Tense
  • Future Tense
• And One More Thing...

Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)

Common Korean Adjectives

Shapes and sizes

Colors

Tastes

Qualities

Adjectives to describe people

Where to Place Korean Adjectives in Sentences

Korean adjectives can be placed before or after the noun.

But the adjectives look a little different, depending on their placement.

Before the noun

In Korean, you can stick the conjugated forms before the noun.

For conjugated forms like 큰 and 작은, you put them side-by-side right before their noun.

For example, “big ears” would be 큰 immediately before 귀, the Korean word for ears.

큰 귀 — big ears

Similarly, “small face” would be 작은 before 얼굴, the Korean word for face.

작은 얼굴 — small face

After the noun

Korean sentences usually end with a verb, which also means they can technically end in an adjective.

For the adjectives that come after the noun (those at the end of sentences), you can just use the “dictionary form.”

That is the 다 form, the un-conjugated, infinitive state of the adjective.

Here are some examples: 

우리 집은 크다 — Our house is big

우리 차는 작다 — Our car is small

In the first sentence, 크다 is used instead of the conjugated 큰.

For the second, notice that 작다 is used instead of the conjugated 작은.

How to Conjugate Korean Adjectives

Remember that Korean verbs in the infinitive or dictionary form end in 다. For example:

크다 — to be big

작다 — to be small

예쁘다 — to be pretty

But this isn’t the form you usually deal with in conversations.

Instead, you’ll be dealing with conjugated adjectives that have gone through some transformation.

Here’s how it works.

Step 1: Drop the 다

The first step to conjugating Korean adjectives is to remove the 다 at the end.

This leaves you with the verb stem.

In the examples above, by removing the 다, you’re left with:

크

작

예쁘

Step 2: Add the appropriate ending

After dropping the 다 to get the stem, you now need to add a suffix ending.

The ending adds another unit of meaning to your verb stem.

For our purposes here, the suffix you use will depend on whether or not the stem ends with a vowel or a consonant.

If the stem ends with a vowel, you add ㄴ.

In the example above, 크 (big) and 예쁘 (pretty) both end with the vowel —.

So:

          크 + ㄴ = 큰 , the conjugation for “big” in Korean.

          예쁘 + ㄴ = 예쁜, the conjugation for “pretty” in Korean.

You now know that it comes from the dictionary form 크다 .

If the stem ends with a consonant, you add 은.

In the example above, 작 (small) ends with the consonant ㄱ.

So:

          작 + 은 = 작은 , the conjugation for “small” in Korean.

Irregular Korean adjectives

Irregular adjectives are the few exceptions to the rule. Here are two of the most common ones:

When the verb stem ends in ㅂ, drop it and add 운.

For example, like the verb 쉽다 , which means “to be easy.”

First, you drop the 다.

          쉽다 – 다 = 쉽

Now you have the verb stem. From it, drop the ㅂ.

          쉽 – ㅂ = 쉬

Finally, you add the syllable 운.

          쉬 + 운 = 쉬운 , which means “easy.”

When the verb stem ends in ㄹ, drop it and add ㄴ.

For example, like the verb 길다 , which is “to be long.”

First, drop the 다.

          길다 – 다 = 길

Then, drop the ㄹ.

          길 – ㄹ = 기

Finally, add ㄴ.

          기 + ㄴ = 긴 , which means “long.”

How to Conjugate Korean Adjectives According to Tense

So far, we’ve only been talking about the present tense conjugation of adjectives.

Since Korean adjectives are technically verbs, they can also be conjugated according to tense.

That’s why we can just put nouns and adjectives/verbs next to each other without any intervening words.

Again, with tense, it’ll involve looking at the last vowel in the stem.

Past Tense

For adjective stems that have the vowels ㅗ and ㅏ, you add -았어요.

For example, the past tense conjugation of 좋다 (good) would be 좋았어요 (was good).

For adjective stems that have the vowels other than ㅗ and ㅏ, you add -었어요.

So for 맛있다 (delicious), you add -었어요 and end up with 맛있었어요 (was delicious).

Future Tense

To conjugate in the future tense, you simply add -ㄹ 거예요 or -을 거예요 to the verb stem.

If the verb stem ends with a vowel, we add -ㄹ 거예요.

So for the stem 예쁘 (pretty), the future tense of this would be 예쁠 거예요 (will be pretty).

If the verb stem ends with a consonant, we add -을 거예요.

So, for the stem 늦 (late), we end up with 늦을 거예요 (will be late.)

And there you have it—the core basics you need to know about using Korean adjectives, plus 70 of them to instantly add more color to your conversations!

Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)

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