Us, Japan, China And Other Nations Boost South Korea’s High-speed Rail Travel With Nearly Three Million Foreign Passengers In 2025: Everything You Need To Know

Tuesday, July 22, 2025

The request for riding connected trains successful South Korea is expanding greatly successful 2025 pinch nan railway web being utilized by immoderate 3 cardinal overseas passengers, either connected high-speed aliases accepted services. An unthinkable complaint of growth, led by visitors from nan US, Japan, China and more, is suggestive of a patient post-pandemic betterment and expanding affinity for recreation by train. Better accommodation specified arsenic drinking water, multilingual services, counters and an easier measurement to scope celebrated destinations, has made Metro much user-friendly and overseas visitors friendly. With specified initiatives, South Korea’s railway strategy has been capturing nan eyes of overseas visitors arsenic a must-see action for recreation crossed nan country.

South Korea’s railway web is experiencing a singular emergence successful overseas rider numbers, pinch astir 3 cardinal world travelers utilizing high-speed and accepted trains successful nan first half of 2025. This surge represents almost double nan number from 2 years ago, highlighting a important rebound successful recreation request post-pandemic.

Data from KORAIL, which manages South Korea’s superior obstruction services, and SR, nan usability of nan Suseo High-Speed Rail (SRT), reveals that 2.84 cardinal world passengers utilized nan country’s trains betwixt January and June 2025. This fig accounts for 3.3% of South Korea’s full 85 cardinal obstruction passengers during this period. Compared to nan aforesaid timeframe successful 2023, overseas ridership has accrued by 98.8%, signaling a robust betterment successful obstruction tourism. This surge marks a 13.3% year-on-year growth, pinch overseas travelers showing an accrued liking successful obstruction transport, peculiarly for long-distance recreation crossed nan country.

Data from nan Korea Tourism Organization reinforces this increasing trend. Between January and May 2025, South Korea welcomed 6.28 cardinal world visitors, pinch astir one-third choosing nan obstruction web arsenic their preferred mode of transport. KORAIL’s high-speed KTX and location ITX-Saemaeul services were nan superior options for overseas travelers, collectively serving 2.79 cardinal passengers. Meanwhile, SR’s SRT services, which run connected a different way network, attracted astir 47,000 world passengers. The higher overseas ridership connected KORAIL services is mostly attributed to nan convenience of nonstop connections to Seoul Station, easy accessible from some Incheon and Gimpo airports. In contrast, SRT’s terminal astatine Suseo Station presents a much distant entree constituent for galore world travelers.

This maturation reflects much than conscionable an summation successful tourism; it highlights nan targeted efforts of South Korea’s obstruction operators to heighten their services for overseas visitors. KORAIL has rolled retired a scope of caller initiatives to heighten accessibility for overseas travelers. These see specialized summons counters exclusively for world passengers astatine cardinal stations, AI-driven translator services successful 13 languages, and a revamped booking level featuring multilingual options to streamline nan recreation experience. This level allows overseas travelers to conveniently book tickets, prime seats, put for baggage delivery, and moreover rent cars, offering a broad work acquisition that enhances nan wide recreation journey.

A study conducted by KORAIL successful May 2025 astatine Seoul and Busan stations revealed that 96.7% of nan 301 world travelers surveyed expressed a beardown liking successful utilizing nan train services again successful nan future. Furthermore, 97% of those surveyed said they would urge nan work to others, reflecting a precocious level of restitution pinch nan easiness and convenience of obstruction recreation successful South Korea.

Not to beryllium outdone, SR besides introduced its ain initiatives aimed astatine improving overseas rider accessibility. In May 2025, SR introduced a caller mobile ticketing strategy offering multilingual support successful English, Chinese, and Japanese. This inaugural intends to cater to nan divers world market, providing a much streamlined and user-friendly acquisition for overseas visitors walking connected nan SRT network.

If existent trends persist passim nan 2nd half of 2025, South Korea’s obstruction web is connected way to transcend six cardinal overseas passengers by year’s end, surpassing nan erstwhile year’s full of 5.61 cardinal and importantly outperforming 2023’s 3.49 cardinal overseas obstruction riders. This maturation inclination underscores nan expanding domiciled of obstruction recreation successful South Korea’s tourism assemblage and nan continuing fame of train journeys arsenic a convenient, comfortable, and businesslike measurement to research nan country.

Who Else is Visiting South Korea?
For galore years, countries from East and Southeast Asia person consistently topped nan database of world visitors to South Korea. The United States remains a important contributor to nan influx, while caller years person witnessed a emergence successful visitors from Europe and South America.

China: 4.6 million
Japan: 3.2 million
Taiwan: 1.5 million
United States: 1.32 million

In short, nan obstruction web of South Korea is group to beryllium an moreover greater portion of nan tourer acquisition arsenic caller amenities lure much overseas riders. This maturation not only represents nan revival of post-pandemic tourism but besides nan improvement of South Korea’s railway recreation that is now some precocious and convenient, an appealing proposition for world visitors wishing to acquisition nan country’s rich | taste and earthy treasures.