Japanese vs Korean: which should you learn?

Estimates for a native English speaker, following the US Foreign Service Institute’s groupings. Languages the Institute does not rank are placed beside their closest relatives. Your own pace will differ.

• You want anime, games, travel and business with Japan, plus a spoken language with only a few sounds.
• You will use it in Japan.

Watch out for: three writing systems and verbs placed last; kanji is the long project.

• You want K-pop, dramas and a writing system you can learn in days.
• You will use it in South Korea and North Korea.

Watch out for: verb endings change with politeness, and sounds shift where words meet.

Japanese. It takes longer than European languages. You face a new writing system and an unfamiliar word order. The sounds themselves are friendly, with few of them and no tones, so speaking is a good place to start.

Korean. Longer than European languages, mostly because of grammar and vocabulary. Hangul is quick to learn, and speaking is worth practising from the start.

In both, the quickest fix for pronunciation is the same: hear a whole sentence, say it out loud and check how close you were. That is the loop 4ToSpeak runs on every sentence.

Japanese and Korean are not close relatives, so learning one saves little time on the other. Pick the one you will use soonest, get to a comfortable conversation, and add the second later.

If you cannot decide, start both for a week at 15 minutes a day. After seven days you will know which one you look forward to, and motivation matters more than the difference in hours.

Start Japanese or start Korean, both free with no card.

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