Visitor data / 2025 surveys
What Visitors Do in Korea: Official Survey Data
Official visitor survey figures for food, shopping and Seoul sightseeing, with the sample, source tables and limits behind our guide choices.
Food and shopping are practical parts of a Korea trip worth preparing for. Here is the public evidence we use to decide which questions to cover, and how to turn those broad findings into your own plan.
Sources checked September 7, 2026. English category names below are our translations of the Korean reports. The two surveys have different populations and should be read separately.
Korea-wide: food and shopping participation
The 2025 International Visitor Survey completed 16,110 interviews. It covers departing foreign-national visitors aged 15 or older, staying 90 days or less, with exclusions including transit-only overnight stays. Results are weighted survey estimates.
What shopping visitors bought
| Product category | Share of visitors who incurred shopping expenditure |
|---|---|
| Perfume and cosmetics | 71.3% |
| Food products | 56.2% |
| Clothing | 49.7% |
The shopping table uses visitors with shopping expenditure, not all visitors, as its base; multiple responses were allowed. The report’s shopping tables do not state this subgroup’s sample size separately. Perfume and cosmetics is a combined category, not a skincare-only measure. Source: Table 3-132, printed p.282 (PDF p.310); Appendix Table 168, printed p.493 (PDF p.521).
Official report and download: 2025 International Visitor Survey, published May 26, 2026; the listing records a July 28 expenditure-data correction. We checked the revised report. Survey scope and sample: printed p.4 (PDF p.32).
Seoul: a separate visitor survey
Seoul’s 2025 tourism survey interviewed 6,067 international visitors to Seoul, through five face-to-face survey rounds in May, June, August, October and December. The Seoul Tourism Organization and Consumer Insight conducted the research.
| Selected activity in Seoul | Reported share |
|---|---|
| Shopping | 83.1% |
| Food / gastronomy | 81.7% |
| Palaces and historical sites | 45.2% |
These activities overlap; the percentages are not slices of a total. The annual summary does not reproduce the full question wording. This is a Seoul visitor sample, not an English-speaking visitor subgroup or a national estimate.
Source: Seoul Tourism Annual Report for 2025, issued April 2026, PDF pages 5–6, survey overview and results table.
Turn the findings into a useful plan
The following connections are our editorial choices. A survey category does not endorse a specific market, shop or attraction.
| If this is part of your trip | Prepare this decision | Start here |
|---|---|---|
| Eating at restaurants | Whether one serving is possible, how to order and when to pay | Korean restaurant ordering |
| A market food stop | Which section opens when, what a portion includes and how to pay | Gwangjang Market food guide |
| Buying cosmetics or gifts | The exact branch and product, applicable price, and packing liquids | Korea beauty shopping |
| Visiting a palace | Closure days, admission and any separate reservation | Gyeongbokgung or Changdeokgung Secret Garden |
For example, a shopping afternoon creates questions that outlast the purchase: will the bottles fit cabin-baggage rules, and do refund goods need to remain accessible at the airport? That is why the shopping guide connects to the tax-refund departure sequence.
Use the figures as context, then choose what you enjoy. You do not need to fit every popular activity into a short trip.
What these numbers cannot tell us
Activity participation does not measure English Google searches, unanswered questions, or this website’s audience. It also does not establish that a named chain or market is the best choice. The shopping percentages do not represent the share of total shopping revenue.
We use the surveys to choose broad areas to explain. Operator information supplies the practical details, and each guide records when its sources were checked. See how we research for our approach to uncertainty and corrections.