How to buy a cell phone in Korea . Getting a smartphone in Korea in the cheapest way.

 If you are from another country, getting a cell phone in Korea might be an annoying thing. In this article, I'm not going to talk about buying a simcard for an unlocked phone because it is too easy and the price of buying a simcard is almost same at most of the cell phone dealerships in Korea.


 If you are a Korean citizen or have a valid resident visa such as working visa or permanent visa, you will be able to buy a flagship smartphone with a contract in Korea.  However, how could you buy a new cell phone with a two year contract without getting ripped off in Korea? Many cell phone dealers in Korea try to rip you off even if you are a Korean. It might be much harder to deal with them if you are a foreighner.

1. What should I ask to a cell phone dealer?

할부원금  (hal boo won gum)

It literality means installment principal. It is the core price of your device. Yes. hal-boo-won-gum is the only word you need to remember if you are trying to buy a smartphone with a contract in Korea.

If you want to buy an iphone or an Android phone in Korea, go to a dealer and ask how much the hal-boo-won-gum on the cell phone is.

Say like:

아이폰5s 할부원금 얼마에요? (Iphone5s hal-boo-won-gum earl ma eyo?)

갤럭시 노트 할부원금 얼마에요?  (Galaxy note hal-boo-won-gum earl ma eyo?)

Or just slowly say "How much is the hal-boo-won-gum on the iphone5s?" in English. Remember that you have to say very slowly when you say this as they don't understand English very well.

Believe me. I have worked for a KT Olleh dealership. If you ask a cell phone dealer in Korea about hal-bu-won-gum, he will think like "omg, this guy knows something. I have to be careful."

If he doesn't tell you the hal-boo-won-gum on that phone, LEAVE that store. Chances are that he is trying to rip you off.

Don't be confused with other words like 실구매가 or 할부기계값. If he tries to use another word other than hal-boo-won-gum, LEAVE that store.

If he doesn't tell you hal-boo-won-gum and tries to tell you how much you have to pay monthly and the discount or cashback they are trying to give you, LEAVE that store.

Believe me. The discounts and paybacks are ALL same at EVERY store because it is their carrier's policy, not the dealership's policy.

 Here is an example. Click the image if it is not big enough. You will see that hal-boo-won-gum is the core price of your device and it actually determines your monthly bill. In this case, the hal-boo-won-gum of this LG G2 is 578,000 Korean won. If you don't mention about hal-boo-won-gum, they will try to charge you like 800,000 or 900,000 and tells you only the price of your device AFTER the discount. Even many Koreans get ripped off by these cell phone dealers.

 Also, never be confused with FREE phones. If they say a free phone, that means the price AFTER the discount is zero. So that means the hal-boo-won-gum on the free phone is actually 17,600 mohtly discount x 24 = 422,400 Korean won if you choose the LTE 620 plan.

 So when you buy a smartphone in Korea, ask the hal-boo-won-gum of the phone you want to buy.


2. Where to buy

 I would suggest you that you avoid local dealerships. They are your biggest enemies. They try to rip you off even if you are a Korean and dealing with them as a foreighner would be unimaginable.

 If you speak Korean very well, the best place to buy a smart phone would be the websites called ppomppu.com or ppuang.com. They are way much cheaper than offline dealerships and you can save hundreds of dollars.

 However, many of these online dealers don't accept your application if you are a foreighner. so if you want to buy a smart phone offline, go to the BIG 3.


 The big three are :

-Hi mart

-Digital Plaza (Samsung)

-Best Shop (LG)

 Hi mart is a very decent place to buy a cell phone. It is like a Korean version of Best Buy. Their prices are usually better than the small local dealers and they sometimes have very good deals. So check out them when you buy a smartphone in Korea.

Samsung Digital Plaza could be your choice if you want to buy a Samsung Galaxy smartphone or a Pantech Vega smartphone. Their prices are same in every branch so you can just visit just one of the Digital Plazas and you will know their great deals.

Best shop is your exclusive dealership of LG products. If you want to buy an LG G2 or LG Optimus series, I would recommend them.


After all, there are much more to say about buying a smartphone but I will end here. Just remember these things.

1. Ask for hal-boo-won-gum

2. If they don't tell you the hal-boo-won-gum price and try to tell you something else, don't buy a phone from them.

3. There is no free phone. Free smartphone means it is zero after the discount so the actual core price of your phone will be your monthly discount x 24 months.