Zodiac Signs in Korean: All 12 Names & Meanings

Every one of the zodiac signs in Korean ends in the same word: 자리 (jari), meaning “seat” or “place”. Aries is the ram’s seat, Leo is the lion’s seat, Pisces is the fish’s seat. Learn that one syllable pair and you have learned a third of every name on the list.

One disambiguation first. 별자리 (byeoljari) is the Western zodiac — literally “star seat”, the twelve signs tied to your birthday. 띠 (tti) is the twelve-year animal cycle tied to your birth year, and it is deeply embedded in Korean life. Asking someone their 띠 is a polite way of working out their age. This page is 별자리.

All 12 Zodiac Signs in Korean

The Division Running Through the Korean Zodiac Signs

Korean vocabulary comes in two layers. Native Korean words are the older stock, used for everyday things. Sino-Korean words were borrowed from Chinese, are written with the same underlying characters, and carry a more formal, technical register — roughly the way Latin words sit above Anglo-Saxon ones in English.

The zodiac list splits almost evenly between the two, and the split is not random. The animals Koreans have always kept are native. The exotic and abstract ones are Sino-Korean.

The native Korean names

양 (sheep), 황소 (ox), 게 (crab), 염소 (goat), 물병 (water bottle), 물고기 (fish), 쌍둥이 (twins). Farm animals, seafood, containers — the vocabulary of daily life.

The Sino-Korean names

사자 (lion), 처녀 (maiden), 천칭 (balance), 전갈 (scorpion), 궁수 (archer). No lions or scorpions in Korea; no reason for a native word. 천칭 and 궁수 are technical terms rather than household ones.

This is a genuinely useful pattern, because it predicts the register. If you are writing casual Korean, the native names sound completely ordinary. The Sino-Korean ones always carry a faint formality.

The Two Korean Star Signs Worth Looking At Closely

Aquarius in Korean: 물병자리

물병 is a water bottle — 물 (water) plus 병 (bottle). Not a jar, not an urn, not a man carrying anything. A bottle.

Korean sits here with Chinese 水瓶座 and Japanese 水瓶座, all three making Aquarius the container. Every European language on this site makes it a person: German Wassermann, Finnish Vesimies, French Verseau, the water-pourer. East Asia dropped the human and kept the vessel — and Korean picked the most everyday vessel of the three. See the Aquarius profile.

Pisces in Korean: 물고기자리

물고기 is literally “water meat” — 물 (water) plus 고기 (meat or flesh). That is simply the standard Korean word for a live fish, distinguished from 생선 (saengseon), which means fish as food. The zodiac correctly uses the living animal. See the Pisces profile.

The Remaining Ten, Briefly

• 양자리 — 양 covers both sheep and goat in Korean, so Aries and Capricorn are closer relatives here than in most languages. The Aries profile.
• 황소자리 — 황소 is specifically a bull or a large ox, from 황 (yellow) plus 소 (cattle). The Taurus profile.
• 쌍둥이자리 — 쌍둥이 is the ordinary word for twins, built on 쌍, “pair”. The Gemini profile.
• 게자리 — 게 is a crab, one syllable, the shortest name in the list. A crab, not a crayfish. The Cancer profile.
• 사자자리 — three 자 syllables in a row, which makes it the most awkward name to say quickly. The Leo profile.
• 처녀자리 — 처녀 means a young unmarried woman or a virgin, the same word behind Chinese 处女. The Virgo profile.
• 천칭자리 — 천칭 is a balance scale, from the characters for “heaven” and “scale”, matching Chinese 天秤. The Libra profile.
• 전갈자리 — 전갈 is a scorpion. Korea has no native scorpions of note. The Scorpio profile.
• 궁수자리 — 궁수 is an archer, from 궁 (bow) plus 수 (hand) — the same construction as Chinese 射手, “shooting hand”. Korean kept the bow. The Sagittarius profile.
• 염소자리 — 염소 is a goat. No fish tail, no Makara: Korean went with Japanese rather than Chinese here. The Capricorn profile.

Reading the Hangul

Hangul is the easiest writing system on this entire site to learn — it was designed in the fifteenth century to be learnable in a morning, and it is close to phonetic. A few notes that will get you through these twelve words:

• 자리 is ja-ri, with the r soft, closer to an English l between vowels.
• ㅆ in 쌍둥이 is a tensed consonant — a harder, sharper s than the ordinary ㅅ. Korean has three-way consonant distinctions that English does not.
• ㅓ and ㅗ (as in 전갈 and 물고기) are different vowels: roughly “uh” and “oh”. Mixing them up changes words.
• 천칭 ends in the -ng sound, written ㅇ at the bottom of the block.

Talking About Zodiac Signs in Korean

The phrases:

• 별자리가 뭐예요? — Byeoljariga mwoyeyo? — What’s your star sign?
• 저는 전갈자리예요. — Jeoneun jeongal-jari-yeyo. — I’m a Scorpio.
• 무슨 띠예요? — Museun tti-yeyo? — What’s your animal sign? (The other question.)
• 완전 처녀자리다. — Wanjeon cheonyeo-jari-da. — Totally a Virgo.

Byeoljari, Tti and MBTI in Korea

Korea runs three personality systems at once and the newest one has largely won. 별자리 is present but modest. 띠 is culturally embedded and practically useful, since knowing someone’s animal narrows their birth year to a twelve-year window and Korean speech levels depend on relative age. And then there is MBTI, which since the early 2020s has become the dominant framework in Korean social life — asked on dating apps, listed on profiles, discussed the way star signs are discussed in the West.

If you are writing Korean-language astrology content, this matters. 별자리 competes for the same attention that MBTI now occupies, and the copy tends to be lighter and more playful than an equivalent Brazilian or Indian horoscope.

Frequently Asked Questions

Zodiac Signs in Korean Beside Its Neighbours

Korean, Chinese and Japanese built the same twelve signs three ways. The zodiac signs in Chinese use 座 where Korean uses 자리, and kept the Sanskrit Makara at Capricorn. The Japanese list marks the sex of the ram and the bull, which Korean does not. The Vietnamese names take the Chinese characters wholesale.

All languages: zodiac signs in different languages.