월요일 Monday · 화요일 Tuesday · 수요일 Wednesday · 목요일 Thursday · 금요일 Friday · 토요일 Saturday · 일요일 Sunday. Each is one Hanja + 요일: moon, fire, water, wood, metal, earth, sun. Learn those seven meanings and the week is done. Then watch two traps: June is 유월 and October is 시월, and what date is spelled 며칠.
Most learners memorise the Korean week as seven random sounds — wol, hwa, su, mok, geum, to, il — and then spend weeks mixing up 수요일 and 목요일. But those syllables are not random. Each is a Chinese character with a meaning you already know, and the seven of them tell a story about the sky.
Seven characters, seven heavenly bodies
요일 itself is 曜日 — roughly shining-body day. The first two are obvious: Monday is the moon's day (as in English), Sunday the sun's. The five in between are the five elements of East Asian cosmology — fire, water, wood, metal, earth — which are also the traditional names of the five planets you can see with the naked eye:
| Day | Element | Planet in Korean | Planet | European echo |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 화요일 | 火 fire | 화성 | Mars | French mardi (Mars' day) |
| 수요일 | 水 water | 수성 | Mercury | mercredi |
| 목요일 | 木 wood | 목성 | Jupiter | jeudi |
| 금요일 | 金 metal | 금성 | Venus | vendredi |
| 토요일 | 土 earth | 토성 | Saturn | Saturday |
So the Korean and European weeks are the same seven bodies in the same order — the ancient world named its days after what it saw in the sky. If you know that Saturday is Saturn's day, you already know why 토요일 is Saturday.
Memory hooks for each character
Picture the shape, then say the day
| Hanja | Hook | Day |
|---|---|---|
| 月 월 | A crescent moon on its side, with two lines of shadow across it. | 월요일 — Mon |
| 火 화 | A bonfire: flames leaping up, sparks flying off both sides. Tuesday burns. | 화요일 — Tue |
| 水 수 | A stream splitting around a rock in the middle. Midweek, the water flows. | 수요일 — Wed |
| 木 목 | A tree: trunk, branches, roots. Thursday, the week grows tall. | 목요일 — Thu |
| 金 금 | Gold nuggets under a roof. Friday = payday gold — and 불금, “fire Friday”, is Korean slang for a big Friday night. | 금요일 — Fri |
| 土 토 | A sprout pushing out of the ground. Saturday, you're back to earth. | 토요일 — Sat |
| 日 일 | A sun with a line through the middle. Sunday. | 일요일 — Sun |
How to pronounce them
Korean links a final consonant to a following vowel (연음), so the written and spoken forms differ for four of the seven days:
| Written | Said as | Romanised |
|---|---|---|
| 월요일 | [워료일] | woryoil |
| 목요일 | [모교일] | mogyoil |
| 금요일 | [그묘일] | geumyoil |
| 일요일 | [이료일] | iryoil |
This is exactly the liaison rule explained in batchim: final consonants — and it is why beginners who only ever read the days often fail to catch them in TOPIK listening.
Months: number + 월, with two traps
Months are the Sino-Korean numbers (일, 이, 삼…) + 월 (月, moon again). Ten of them are completely regular. Two are not:
Dates: 며칠, never 몇 일
The question word for which day of the month is spelled 며칠. Even many Koreans are tempted to write 몇 일, but the standard spelling is 며칠 in every use — it is how the word is actually pronounced, and the National Institute of Korean Language treats 몇 일 as a misspelling.
Yesterday, today, tomorrow — and this week
| Korean | Romanisation | English |
|---|---|---|
| 지난주 | jinanju | last week |
| 이번 주 | ibeon ju | this week |
| 다음 주 | daeum ju | next week |
| 주말 | jumal | weekend (週末, “week-end”) |
| 평일 | pyeongil | weekday |
| 매일 / 매주 | maeil / maeju | every day / every week |
✓ 월요일에 만나요. — See you on Monday.
✓ 내일 만나요. — See you tomorrow.
✗ 내일에 만나요.
Relative time words (오늘, 내일, 어제, 모레, 지금) already point at a time, so they take no particle.
Check yourself
Days, months and dates.
水 수 water → 수요일, Wednesday.
土 earth — Saturn → 토요일.
6월 is read 유월.
10월 is read 시월.
Date = 몇 월 며칠. (무슨 요일 asks the day of the week.)
Relative time words take no 에.
Learn the roots, not just the words
Hanguljo starts with Foundation lessons — Hangul, stroke order and native audio — and carries you through the TOPIK 1–6 lessons of vocabulary, grammar and particles, with Hanja roots and memory hooks that turn one character into a dozen words. A 7-stage SRS engine times every review; the conversation track with shadowing, dictation and lessons from any Korean video you paste in train your ear; the on-device OCR scanner reads calendars, signs and menus; and home, lock screen and quiz widgets keep you learning all day — calm by design.
Learn Korean with Hanguljo - FreeQuick reference
- Days
- 월요일 Mon (月 moon) · 화요일 Tue (火 fire) · 수요일 Wed (水 water) · 목요일 Thu (木 wood) · 금요일 Fri (金 metal) · 토요일 Sat (土 earth) · 일요일 Sun (日 sun).
- Why these elements
- Fire, water, wood, metal, earth = Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn (화성, 수성, 목성, 금성, 토성) — the same seven bodies as European weekday names.
- Pronunciation
- [워료일], [모교일], [그묘일], [이료일] — liaison.
- Months
- Number + 월. Irregular: 유월 (June), 시월 (October).
- Dates
- 몇 월 며칠이에요? — 9월 22일 (구월 이십이 일). Spell 며칠, never 몇 일.
- Relative days
- 그저께 · 어제 · 오늘 · 내일 · 모레. Weeks: 지난주 · 이번 주 · 다음 주. 주말 weekend, 평일 weekday.
- Particle
- 월요일에, 5월에, 3시에 — but 오늘/내일/어제 without 에.
Frequently asked questions
What are the days of the week in Korean?
월요일, 화요일, 수요일, 목요일, 금요일, 토요일, 일요일 — moon, fire, water, wood, metal, earth, sun.
Why fire, water and wood?
They are the five elements that name the five visible planets; with the sun and moon they make the same seven heavenly bodies as the European week.
How do you say June and October?
유월 and 시월 — not 육월 or 십월.
How do you ask the date?
오늘 몇 월 며칠이에요? Spell 며칠, never 몇 일.
Do you use 에 with days?
With named days and dates yes (월요일에); with 오늘, 내일, 어제 no.
- National Institute of Korean Language, Standard Korean Language Dictionary (표준국어대사전) — entries for 요일, 유월, 시월 and 며칠, with their Hanja.
- National Institute of Korean Language, korean.go.kr — the body that sets Korean orthography, including the standard spelling 며칠.
- National Institute of Korean Language, Revised Romanization of Korean.