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Market Guides8 min read

How to Launch Your Game in South Korea: The 2026 Guide

By Jan Rojek

Seoul skyline at night with N Seoul Tower and a traditional palace roof

South Korea is the world's fourth-largest games market and one of the most demanding. Korean players spend heavily, expect a game to feel made for them, and compare every new release with polished local titles. Since 2024, Korea has also introduced some of the strictest rules anywhere on loot boxes and foreign publishers. This guide covers what a publisher needs to know before launching a game in South Korea in 2026.

Key takeaways

  • Korea's games market reached KRW 23.85 trillion in 2024 (about US$17 billion), up 3.9% — fourth in the world with a 7.2% global share (KOCCA White Paper, 2026).
  • 59% of revenue comes from smartphone games, 25% from PC, a segment kept strong by Korea's PC bangs (gaming cafés).
  • RPGs take about half of smartphone game revenue, and strategy is the fastest-growing genre, led by Chinese 4X titles.
  • Since March 2024, loot-box odds must be disclosed in the game, on the website and in every ad.
  • Since October 2025, larger foreign publishers without a Korean office must appoint a domestic agent.
  • Naver and KakaoTalk are as important as Google and YouTube. Twitch left Korea in 2024; streaming now runs on CHZZK and SOOP.

How big is the South Korean games market?

The Korea Creative Content Agency (KOCCA) puts the 2024 market at KRW 23.85 trillion, up 3.9% on the year. Its 2025 White Paper, published in March 2026, is the latest official full-year figure (Digital Today, 2026).

Segment (2024)RevenueShareChange
Smartphone gamesKRW 14.07 tn59.0%+3.4%
PC gamesKRW 6.01 tn25.2%+2.0%
ConsoleKRW 1.18 tn5.0%+4.8%
ArcadeKRW 0.28 tn1.2%−3.2%

Korean smartphone game revenue kept rising in 2025, reaching US$2.8 billion in the second half of the year alone, with three quarters of it spent on Android (Sensor Tower, via Digital Today).

Who plays games in Korea?

Korea's player base is shrinking while spending holds up. In 2025, 50.2% of Koreans played games, almost ten points fewer than a year before (KOCCA, 2025). Among players, 89% play on smartphones, 58% on PC and 29% on consoles. KOCCA's reading: the market is concentrating on fewer, more committed players.

For user acquisition, that means competition for the same high-value players. Winning them takes creatives and funnels good enough to pull players away from games they already spend in.

Which genres and games lead in South Korea?

RPGs — above all MMORPGs — have long dominated Korea, taking 52% of smartphone game revenue in 2024. Strategy was the fastest-growing genre, up 69% (Sensor Tower, 2024).

The top-grossing smartphone games of 2025 show both sides (AppMagic, via Udonis):

  1. Lineage M (NCSoft)
  2. Whiteout Survival (Century Games)
  3. Last War (FunFly)
  4. Mabinogi Mobile (Nexon)
  5. Roblox

Local MMORPGs such as Lineage M, Odin and RF Online Next still lead — but Chinese strategy games such as Whiteout Survival, Last War and Kingshot now sit right beside them. That proves a foreign game can reach the very top in Korea, if it is localised and marketed as seriously as a local one. Subculture games (anime-style games such as Nikke and Blue Archive) are the third big genre, and in 2026 the idle RPG MapleStory: Idle RPG has led the chart.

On PC, League of Legends holds about 36% of PC-bang play time, followed by FC Online, PUBG, Valorant and MapleStory (Korea Herald, 2025).

How do Korean players pay?

In Korea, Google Play accepts cards, carrier billing (SKT, KT, LG U+), KakaoPay, Naver Pay, Toss and PAYCO (Google Play Help). Korea also has its own app store, ONE Store, which says it holds around 12.6% of game spending. Korea was the first country to require app stores to allow third-party payment systems, in effect since March 2022.

What rules apply when launching a game in South Korea?

Loot-box probability disclosure

Since 22 March 2024, every game with paid random items must publish the exact odds — in the game, on its website and in its advertising (Kim & Chang, 2024). Ads, including streamer and social ads, must state that the game contains paid random items. Of 266 games found in breach by mid-2024, 60% were foreign (Game World Observer, 2024). Since August 2025, players can claim up to three times their damages, and the publisher must prove it did nothing wrong.

For a campaign, this means every ad creative and landing page for a game with gacha or loot boxes needs the right notice — checked before launch.

Domestic agent for foreign publishers

Since 23 October 2025, foreign game companies without a Korean office must appoint a domestic agent if they have KRW 1 trillion+ in global revenue, or an average of more than 1,000 new Korean downloads a day, or if the government finds they have caused harm (Shin & Kim, 2025). The agent handles ratings and odds disclosure. A successful launch can cross the download threshold quickly, so this belongs in the launch plan.

Ratings, privacy and ad labels

  • Ratings: games are rated All, 12, 15 or 19 by the GRAC; for app-store games under 19, the stores rate through IARC.
  • Privacy: Korea's Personal Information Protection Act also requires a local representative for large foreign companies (since October 2025).
  • Influencer ads: sponsored content must be marked "#광고" (advertisement) at the start of the title or post.

What do Korean players expect from localisation?

Korean players expect a game to feel native: a full Korean version, Korean customer support, and fast responses on community channels. Common parts of a Korean launch include:

  • a pre-registration campaign of several weeks, with rewards for signing up early;
  • coupon codes shared through community and creator channels;
  • a well-known face in the ads — celebrity endorsements are far more common in Korean game marketing than in Europe;
  • a steady rhythm of updates and events after launch.

Which marketing channels work in South Korea?

Korea's online world is its own. Naver holds about 63% of search, Google about 30% (Korea Times, 2026). KakaoTalk is used by 48 million people a month — more than YouTube (47 million) (Seoul Economic Daily, 2025). A Korean launch typically combines:

  • Naver and Kakao ad products, for search and messenger reach.
  • YouTube, Google and Meta, for video and broad reach.
  • Streamers on CHZZK and SOOP (formerly AfreecaTV) — Twitch left Korea in February 2024, and Naver's CHZZK has since overtaken SOOP in hours watched.
  • Outdoor and subway advertising for major launches.
  • G-Star, Korea's biggest games fair: 19–22 November 2026 at BEXCO in Busan.

How Nomads Digital approaches a Korean launch

South Korea is one of Nomads Digital's core markets. For RAID: Shadow Legends, we ran for 20 months in some of the most competitive RPG markets in the world, including Korea, Japan and Taiwan. For Stormshot, the campaign ran from the DACH region to the US and Korea.

For a Korean launch we:

  1. Study the chart before we spend. Which RPG and strategy games buy traffic, which angles and characters they lead with, and what players there already know.
  2. Build Korean creatives and funnels that meet local expectations — and carry the required notices for games with paid random items. Every interactive funnel ships in 20+ languages, with Korean written to sound local.
  3. Test characters and angles side by side. In an RPG-led market, which hero opens the funnel can decide who registers.
  4. Measure every step, from click to registration, install, retention and paying player — in Korea, where players spend heavily, what matters is who pays, not how many install.

Read more about how we run game user acquisition.

Launch checklist for South Korea

  1. Localise the game, store pages, ads, landing pages and support into native Korean.
  2. Publish loot-box odds in the game, on the website and in every ad.
  3. Check whether the domestic-agent rule applies — and whether it will after launch.
  4. Get the rating (GRAC or IARC) and check privacy obligations.
  5. Plan a pre-registration campaign with rewards.
  6. Offer the local payment methods — KakaoPay, Naver Pay, Toss, carrier billing.
  7. Consider ONE Store alongside Google Play and the App Store.
  8. Plan Naver and Kakao alongside Google, YouTube and Meta.
  9. Label all sponsored creator content with "#광고".
  10. Set up tracking from click to paying player, and judge Korea on its payers.

Frequently asked questions

How big is the South Korean games market?

KRW 23.85 trillion (about US$17 billion) in 2024, according to KOCCA — the fourth-largest games market in the world. Smartphone games make up 59% of it.

Do games in Korea have to disclose loot-box odds?

Yes. Since March 2024, the exact odds of paid random items must be shown in the game, on the website and in advertising, and ads must state that the game contains them.

Do foreign game publishers need a Korean representative?

Since October 2025, foreign publishers without a Korean office must appoint a domestic agent if they have KRW 1 trillion+ in global revenue or more than 1,000 new Korean downloads a day on average.

Can foreign games succeed in Korea?

Yes. Chinese strategy games such as Whiteout Survival and Last War ranked second and third in Korea's top-grossing smartphone games in 2025, right behind Lineage M.

Which channels matter most for game marketing in Korea?

Naver (Korea's leading search engine), KakaoTalk, YouTube and Google — plus streamers on CHZZK and SOOP. Twitch no longer operates in Korea.

More market guides

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