Russian → Korean
Korean uses 34 sounds. You already own 17 of them from Russian. The other 17 are the work — and 16 of those are the dangerous kind: close enough to something you already say that you will substitute them without hearing yourself do it.
The silent swaps
Your mouth has something close enough to reach for. These survive for years precisely because they sound right to you — the fix is hearing the difference first, not trying harder.
the move: retroflex → alveolo-palatal
Korean: time · written "ㅅ before i, y-vowels"
The sh of Japanese shi, not the sh of English ship — tongue flat.
Your /ʂ/ is the one in шко́ла (school).
the move: aspirated
Korean: arm; eight · written "ㅍ"
Aspirated — a strong puff of air. The p of English 'pot'.
Your /p/ is the one in по́чта (post).
the move: close, but not identical
Korean: bread · written "ㅃ"
Tense: the throat stiffens, the release is sharp and there is no puff at all. The third kind of p. Also what plain ㅂ becomes after an obstruent (입구 ipk͈u).
Your /p/ is the one in по́чта (post).
the move: close, but not identical
Korean: strawberry · written "ㄸ"
Tense t. 달 tal 'moon', 탈 tʰal 'mask', 딸 t͈al 'daughter' — one triplet to hear the three-way contrast on.
Your /t/ is the one in там (there).
the move: close, but not identical
Korean: flower · written "ㄲ"
Tense k. Also what plain ㄱ becomes after an obstruent: 학교 hakk͈jo.
Your /k/ is the one in кот (cat).
the move: aspirated
Korean: tea; car · written "ㅊ"
Your /t͡ɕ/ is the one in час (hour).
the move: close, but not identical
Korean: to be salty · written "ㅉ"
Tense ㅈ.
Your /t͡ɕ/ is the one in час (hour).
the move: close, but not identical
Korean: uncooked rice · written "ㅆ"
Tense s: longer, harder, no breath. 살 sal 'flesh; to live' against 쌀 s͈al 'rice'.
Your /s/ is the one in сон (sleep).
the move: unrounded
Korean: that; he · written "ㅡ"
Say /u/ and spread the lips. Romanised eu. The same vowel as Japanese u and Vietnamese ư.
Your /u/ is the one in рука́ (hand).
the move: voiced
Korean: very · written "ㅈ (between vowels)"
Your /t͡ɕ/ is the one in час (hour).
the move: close, but not identical
Korean: why · written "ㅘ ㅝ ㅙ ㅞ ㅚ ㅟ (the w-)"
The w-vowels are written as two vowel letters stacked: ㅘ = ㅗ + ㅏ. ㅚ and ㅙ and ㅞ have all become /we/.
Your /j/ is the one in я (I).
the move: plosive → nasal
Korean: river · written "ㅇ (final)"
ㅇ is /ŋ/ at the END of a syllable and silent at the start — a placeholder that lets a vowel have a block to itself (아, 이, 오).
Your /ɡ/ is the one in год (year).
the move: trill → tap
Korean: we; our · written "ㄹ (initial, between vowels)"
A tap, like Spanish single r or the t in American 'water'.
Your /r/ is the one in рука́ (hand, arm).
Words you may say identically
Two or more Korean sounds landing on one sound of yours. Until the ear separates them, the mouth cannot — which is what the ear trainer is for.
Genuinely new
Nothing in Russian sits close to these. They sound foreign in your mouth — which is the good news: you can hear that you are not saying them yet.
one
Often faint between vowels (좋아 t͡ɕoa has none left). Merges with a following plain stop into an aspirate: 좋다 t͡ɕotʰa.
Closest thing you own: — but labiodental → glottal.
Rhythm and pitch
The layer spelling never records, and the one that makes a correct sentence still sound foreign.
| Russian | Korean | |
|---|---|---|
| Rhythm | Stress-timed, heavily reduced | Syllable-timed, phrase melody |
| Stress | Contrastive, and NOT written. За́мок is a castle and замо́к is a lock. Worse, it moves within a word’s own declension — рука́ but ру́ку, окно́ but о́кна — so knowing the word is not the same as knowing where to hit it. Dictionaries mark it; native writing does not. | None at word level. No syllable is reduced and no vowel becomes a schwa; every syllable is said in full. What an English ear hears as stress is the phrase-initial rise. |
What you have that Korean doesn't
29 sounds with no job in Korean. They are not mistakes — but they are where an accent leaks in, because a sound you own is easy to use when a hard one is due.
The honest caveat
This is a prediction from the shape of two sound systems, not a recording of you. It says what your inventory makes likely — it cannot know that your Russian has a regional variety that already owns one of these, or that you learned Korean from someone whose accent you copied. A teacher listening to you beats it. Use it to know what to listen for.
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