Hey everyone! For today’s phrase, we will be talking about how to say beautiful in Korean.
We did an earlier post on how to say pretty here, so you can check that one out as well.
Let’s start with the dictionary form for the word beautiful:
아름답다 (a-reum-dab-da)
The pronunciation might look difficult at first, but it’s actually quite easy. Like all verbs and adjectives, you must conjugate them in order to use them in sentences and phrases. The word beautiful is conjugated as 아름다워요 in standard polite form.
You can use this as a general way to say someone is beautiful or even scenery on a trip. Like English, this is typically used towards women. You would rarely hear a guy called beautiful.
The formal version of beautiful is 아름답습니다 (a-reum-dab-seum-ni-da). Like all formal versions of words and phrases, you would use this towards someone older or in professional settings, but it might sound kind of awkward so sticking to the standard form is probably best.
Finally, if you are really close to someone, you can just drop the ‘요’ and say 아름다워 (a-reum-da-weo). You can say this version to your wife or girlfriend.
Some Koreans also have names like 아름 which means ‘beauty’.
Finally, if you want to use this word to describe something, it changes to 아름다운. This is a basic grammar rule that you will learn as you study more, but for now, you can use this form to say something like:
아름다운 꽃 (a-reum-da-un kkot) = beautiful flowers
아름다운 하늘 (a-reum-da-un ha-neul) = beautiful sky
Example sentences:
와 그 여자는 너무 아름다워. (wa geu yeo-ja-neun neo-mu a-reum-da-weo) = Wow, that girl is so beautiful.
롯데타워에 전망이 진짜 아름다워 (lot-te-ta-weo-e jeon-mang-i jin-jja a-reum-da-weo) = The view from Lotte Tower is really beautiful.