How to Karaoke in Korea: Step-By-Step Instructions

Korean/Japanese karaoke is completely different from the karaoke you might be accustomed to. For one thing, it's not done in a bar; it's an individual room you get to yourselves (the group you're with) so the singing is not done in public for everyone to see. It's popular among kids and teenagers as well as adults - so though we Koreans are used to singing sober, I've heard a lot of foreigners say they'd need to be tipsy at least, if they ever wanted to try such a thing. :D And of course, it's something you would never be able to do alone (though I have gone by myself a couple of times LOL).

Now, if you can find a Korean who is willing to take you to karaoke, that's awesome. But what if you're with your friends visiting Korea, and you really want to go try, but you don't have anyone to guide you and you can't speak Korean? It would be a complete shame for you not to experience one of the ultimate Korean pastimes before you go! Even if you mustered up the courage and entered, without prior knowledge or basic Korean skills you might just end up wasting a lot of time figuring out the system before you can actually enjoy the singing part.

That's why I'm providing step-by-step instructions on everything you need to know in order to enjoy karaoke. I'm not going to include everything of course, because I don't have the time for that. I will only include the essential information required for you to have a good time.

Why am I doing this? I'm insanely passionate about karaoke, and I want to share this culture with as many people as possible! If anyone contacted me I would probably be more than willing to take them myself - I've already met a few random people through Couchsurfing, and we had a blast. :) But since that's not always possible, I still want to provide all the help I can so you can still go without having a Korean by your side.

*By the way, this is going to be a long, long post. So brace yourselves!

STEP ONE - Finding a place to karaoke.

There are karaoke rooms (aka noraebang/singing rooms/노래방) around every street corner, but not all of them are the same. You don't want to choose any random place and end up with an old, smelly room with moldy chairs and software that hasn't been updated for years. A general rule of thumb: use your intuition and choose a place with a nice, modern, lit-up sign. If it looks like a place young people would go, you should usually be good to go.

My go-to noraebang is near Sungshin Women's University (subway line 4). If you live around here (maybe Korea University or SKKU students), I really recommend this place because the facilities are relatively clean and new songs are updated daily. The neighborhood has a lot of restaurants where you can try out local Korean food, plus a movie theater and lots of small places to shop. Plus, if there aren't too many customers the owner will always give you extra time.

If you can't read Korean, at least memorize the word 노래 (sing). Any sign with this word should be for karaoke.

Sungshin Women's University main shopping street

Entrance to the karaoke place I always go to

STEP TWO - Payment

You pay for karaoke beforehand, for one hour or two or three or whatever, depending on how long you want to stay. The price provided is for one hour per room, not per person. So for example, if one hour costs 15,000 won (which is the case here if you pay in cash), it will be the same whether you go with 2 friends or with 5. The owner will then give you the room number to which you should go after paying.

STEP THREE - Entering the room and getting ready

This is just something handy to know; there are some rooms that require you to take your shoes off. You will know if you need to take them off when the floor is higher than the hallways and/or if slippers are provided for when you need to rush to the restroom.

Where to leave your shoes

The room

Wireless mics. And tambourines for when you're feeling festive!

Disposable microphone covers are also provided for some places, because you don't want your lips to be making contact with other people's spit. Nor do you want to leave your own spit on the mic.

Mic covers. Cute, huh?

STEP 4 - Entering songs and singing

This obviously requires the most explanation, because you need to know how to navigate the remote controller. I will have to break this down into little sections, that are not in any particular order. First of all, here is what a karaoke remote controller will look like. Letters are for the following explanations below.

Noraebangs can all use different brands of karaoke machine, but I think TJ Media is the most common. It's super handy to be able to read Korean, because most of the time English remotes are not provided. If you're worried your noraebang will use a different brand, just try to memorize the words in the red boxes only!

A. Cancel and Start
The red button is for cancel and the blue button is for start. The blue start button is only used for starting the next song. The cancel button, on the other hand, is used both to cancel the current song that's playing, and to exit the search screen shown on the monitor.

B. Booking
This button is to book the next song. If you search for your song and press this button, it means that song is next in line to play.

C. Searching for your song
There are a number of ways to search for the song you want to sing. I'll only explain three out of the four buttons in Box C since those are the ones that are usually used.

First of all, here is what the default search screen looks like once you press any one of those 4 buttons.

Button 1: Search by title. Press this button, then enter the song title.
Button 2: Search by artist. Press this button, then enter song artist.
Button 3: Search by first lyrics. Not often used.
Button 4: Search by language. Press this button, select language, and then search by either title or artist.

When you press the fourth button repeatedly, the flag of the corresponding language will appear on the screen. In this case, for English songs, you will generally see a globe instead of a flag. Because English is the global language ;)

D. Searching in English/Korean
If you're typing in your title/artist and see Korean instead of the alphabet, press this button and it'll switch you right away. You'll see A instead of 가 to indicate which alphabet is being used.

E. Navigating
This is pretty self-explanatory; use the arrows to scroll up/down, and press the center button to select. This is for navigating while searching only. Pressing the center button will not book or start a song.

F. Popular Charts
If you're not sure what song to sing, this is a menu that shows you the most popular songs sung by karaoke singers using TJ Media systems across the whole country. Once you press this button, you will need to select a category: Korean songs, English songs (which are called pop songs in Korea), Japanese songs, and original soundtracks of movies and dramas.

G. Points/Scores
After every song, the machine grades you. Like this:

There is no criteria for scoring. You can scream random words into the microphone and score a 90. You can sing better than Beyonce and still score a 60, so don't be offended. If it's still annoying and you think it's a waste of time, press button G to skip the grading part and go straight to the next song instead.

Once you disable the score, an indicator will show on the monitor.

H. Skipping Interlude/Prelude
At noraebang, every second of every minute is precious. During the given hour, you want to sing as many songs as possible. A great way to get rid of unnecessary time-wasters is to skip the interlude/prelude, the parts of the song where there are no lyrics, just instrumentals that make the wait awkward anyway. Press this button to skip the interlude or prelude. If you'd prefer to just appreciate the music, it's up to you. But remember, you're paying for each second!

I. Changing Key and Tempo
This is a feature that just shows how sophisticated and advanced Korean karaoke systems are. If you find that the key is too high or too low, you can adjust it to your own voice. Similarly, if you want to change the tempo, you can do that as well. The word for key is 음정 and the word for tempo is 박자.

J. Changing Key (Male/Female)
A more simple way to change the key is by pressing the male/female button (남 for male, 여 for female). If you're a man, and the song you want to sing is originally sung by a woman, you can change the key to be more comfortable for men, instead of repeatedly pressing the key button from Box I to find your range. Sometimes you'll need to adjust from here, but most of the time it finds the perfect key for the average voice.

Searching For Song By Number

Every karaoke room has a thick leather song book full of all the songs you can sing. A considerable section will include English songs, each song with a corresponding number.

If you find a song that you want to sing, type in the number on your remote (it will show on the screen), then press the Booking button.

The books are not frequently updated; there may be songs that are available but not listed in the book. So if there is a specific song you want to sing, search by title/artist instead. Use this book to browse mostly, or if you're searching for Japanese/Chinese songs.


Extra Tips

1. Basic etiquette: Don't hog the microphone.
Wait to give everyone a turn. Don't book 5 songs consecutively and leave the others waiting. Even if you've got a great voice and everyone else sounds like crap. Be nice and let others have fun too. You don't need to be the next American Idol in order to sing at karaoke.

2. Extra time (aka service)
Usually, a small number somewhere on or under the monitor will indicate how many minutes you have left. Sometimes, while singing, you might find that you have extra minutes. You could have sworn you only had 20 minutes left, but suddenly the number shows 50.
This time is free. You will not be charged extra for these minutes - you already paid for everything you needed to beforehand. So keep calm and sing on. I remember when I didn't know better, I thought the owner made a mistake and gave us extra time without intending to, and was naive enough to actually walk up to the counter and ask if something went wrong. To which the owner looked me up and down as if I was an alien and said it was "service" (free). Don't be that alien!
The noraebang I always go to gives plenty of these extra minutes, which I why I never go anywhere else. Just today, my friend and I paid for one hour and ended up singing for longer than two!

3. Singing along
Try to sing songs that others can sing along to, or are at least familiar with. There is usually someone in the group who wants to sing but is too shy to actually grab the microphone. So select something that everyone knows, and sing all together. Some suggestions would be ABBA, The Beatles, Disney songs etc. They will probably appreciate the gesture secretly.

4. Don't be afraid to dance!
This isn't a club, obviously, but it's the perfect opportunity to have a great time without worrying about embarrassing yourself in public. No one is watching except your friends. Whip out your latest move.... or not. When I go with my friend, sometimes we would sit for half an hour singing sad ballads. And it's still fun. I guess this isn't really a tip, since you should do whatever you want. :)


I HOPE THIS HELPS! Sorry for the ridiculously long post. If I left anything out feel free to let me know. Though I don't think many people would actually read this... I just made the blog a couple of days ago, haha. Anyway. Until next time, then!

*Directions to my favorite karaoke place: Go straight from Sungshin Women's University station, exit 1. Turn right at Innisfree and go straight down the shopping street. Turn right once you see a store called Olive Young (it's the last alleyway before you reach the road ending the shopping street). Find the sign - I've posted a photo near the beginning of this post!