What language is spoken in Seoul?

Korean, specifically the Seoul dialect that became the national standard. The writing system is Hangul — and here's the thing that surprises most first-time visitors: it's not like Chinese characters or Japanese kanji. King Sejong commissioned it in the 1440s as a rational phonetic alphabet, and the shapes of the consonants literally map to tongue and mouth positions. You can learn to sound out signs in a single afternoon with a free app like LingoDeer or even just a YouTube tutorial. Worth it. Being able to read "치킨" and realise it says "chi-kin" (chicken) or "커피" says "keo-pi" (coffee) removes a surprising amount of street-level anxiety. Menu boards at places like Tosokchon samgyetang near Gyeongbokgung or the tteokbokki stalls lining Sindang-dong suddenly become navigable instead of decorative.

English proficiency splits hard by age and neighborhood. Under-30 Koreans in Gangnam, Hongdae, and Itaewon tend to speak conversational English — many studied abroad or at hagwons (cram schools) since elementary school. Over-50, the drop-off is steep. At Namdaemun Market, the ajumma selling gimbap from a steel cart will gesture at prices on a calculator screen rather than speak them. Taxi drivers are the weakest link: most speak zero English, and Seoul's address system confuses even Korean GPS apps. Your best move is to have your destination written in Hangul on your phone — screenshot the Naver Map result and show it. The subway, by contrast, is forgiving: every station name appears in Hangul, English, and Chinese on platform signs, and the automated announcements run in Korean, English, and sometimes Japanese.

Politeness levels are the hidden architecture of Korean. Every verb has at least two registers: casual (반말, banmal) and formal (존댓말, jondaenmal). As a visitor, default to the formal "-yo" ending on everything. "Juseyo" (please give me) instead of "jwo." "Kamsahamnida" instead of "gomawo." Getting this wrong won't start a fight, but it does land oddly — like addressing a stranger as "dude" in a business meeting. Mind you, most Koreans extend enormous patience to foreigners trying. The warmth you get back from a stumbled "mashisseoyo" (delicious) at a Jongno-3-ga pojangmacha, steam from the budae-jjigae fogging your glasses and soju bottles clinking on the folding table, is genuine and immediate.

A few practical notes that guides tend to skip. Google Translate's camera mode works on Hangul but sometimes garbles grammar — Papago, made by Naver, handles Korean-to-English with noticeably better accuracy for menus and signs. Download it before you land. T-money cards, which you'll tap on every bus and subway ride, have their top-up instructions only in Korean at convenience store kiosks — but the clerks at GS25 or CU will do it for you if you hold up your card and say "chungjon" (recharge). One more: if you hear someone shout "jeogiyo!" in a restaurant, they're calling the server. It's not rude here. It's how it works. No little bell, no waiting to make eye contact. You raise your hand and call out. The volume of a Korean BBQ spot in Mapo-gu at 9 PM — metal tongs scraping on grills, exhaust fans roaring, conversations pitched above it all — makes this the only practical option.