Survey puts 'fair' royal palace admission fee at $7, royal tombs at $5.40
Admission fees for Korea's royal palaces and Joseon-era royal tombs have remained unchanged for 21 years and now cost less than a single hamburger, according to an analysis presented at a public forum.
As interest in Korea's traditional culture grows alongside the global popularity of K-culture, there are growing calls to find a reasonable way to bring admission fees in line with the times.
The Korea Heritage Service has announced that it will unveil new admission fee guidelines for royal palaces and tombs in November, with the revised fees set to take effect Jan. 1, 2027.
Against this backdrop, the KHS' Royal Palaces and Tombs Center held a public forum to discuss how admission fees should be adjusted.
Admission to Gyeongbokgung and Changdeokgung is currently set at 3,000 won ($2.24) for adults, while tickets to Changgyeonggung and Deoksugung are just 1,000 won. An additional fee is charged for Changdeokgung's Secret Garden. Admission to Joseon royal tombs ranges from 500 won to 2,000 won for adults.
Admission is free, however, for Koreans ages 24 and younger or 65 and older; foreign visitors ages 18 and younger or 65 and older; independence activists and their spouses; national merit honorees; pregnant women; and other eligible groups. Visitors wearing hanbok — traditional Korean clothing — are also admitted free of charge.
About 17.81 million people visited the four major royal palaces along with the shrine Jongmyo and Joseon royal tombs in 2025. Of those, about 12.29 million, or 69 percent, entered free of charge.
"Compared with 2024, the total number of visitors increased by 12.9 percent, while the number of paying visitors fell by 5.2 percent and admission revenue declined by 4.1 percent," said Kim Jae-gyu, head of the Korea Performance Evaluation Institute, a private research and consulting firm specializing in academic research and policy projects related to national heritage.
Kim said admission fees for Korea's palaces and royal tombs remain low compared with those at major World Heritage sites in Korea and abroad.
To illustrate the disparity, he compared admission prices with the cost of a Big Mac, McDonald's signature burger.
With a Big Mac priced at 5,700 won in Korea, a 3,000 won ticket to Gyeongbokgung is the equivalent of just half a Big Mac. By comparison, admission to Nijo Castle in Japan is about 6,860 won, or 1.2 Big Macs. The Palace of Versailles in France charges visitors from outside the European Economic Area 35 euros ($41, or roughly 54,000 won) during the peak season from April through October — or nine Big Macs.
The forum also presented the results of a survey on what the public considers an appropriate admission fee.
A survey of 6,635 people found that respondents considered an average of 9,203 won an appropriate admission fee for royal palaces. For Joseon royal tombs and Jongmyo, they put the figure at 7,196 won.
That is more than three times the current 1,000 to 3,000 won admission fees for the major palaces.
Some participants called for fees to be raised gradually.
Na Myeong-ha, who served as the inaugural head of the Royal Palaces and Tombs Center from 2019 to early 2021, said the key question was whether visitors would accept fees several times higher than current levels.
"I believe it would be best to raise them gradually," Na said.
The 45-member citizen discussion panel that took part in the forum agreed that raising admission fees was inevitable, while offering suggestions for improving the visitor experience.
One participant proposed different rates for peak and off-peak seasons, while another suggested piloting a reservation system during periods of heavy visitor traffic. Some also called for changes to the free-admission policy for hanbok wearers, suggesting it be replaced with a discount of, for example, 50 percent.
"It is time to take a serious look at the current admission fee system to ensure the sustainable preservation and use of these sites," a Royal Palaces and Tombs Center official said, adding that the agency would "carefully consider a wide range of perspectives and opinions."
According to the Royal Palaces and Tombs Center, more than 7.41 million people visited the four major palaces and Jongmyo in the first half of this year, continuing an upward trend.
hwangdh@heraldcorp.com
