Korean Cooking Measurement Converter
A cup in a Korean recipe is 200 ml, not the 240 ml cup in your kitchen drawer. That is a 20% difference, and it is why the recipe did not work.
The cup is the problem
Cup measures are not international. A Korean recipe cup holds 200 ml, an American cup 240 ml and the metric cup used in baking 250 ml. Reach for a US cup where a Korean recipe wanted its own and you have added a fifth more of everything.
For rice or stock that is survivable. For sugar, salt or gochujang it is the difference between a dish that works and one that is inedible, and it compounds: a recipe calling for two cups of liquid and a cup of sugar goes wrong in three places at once.
| Measure | Volume | Where you meet it |
|---|---|---|
| 컵 kuhp (Korean cup) | 200 ml | Korean recipes, savoury cooking |
| 종이컵 johng-ee-kuhp (paper cup) | 180 ml | Home recipes with no measuring cup to hand |
| US cup | 240 ml | American recipes |
| Metric cup | 250 ml | Baking, and most Korean baking recipes |
| 큰술 kuhn-sool (tablespoon) | 15 ml | Standardised, same as elsewhere |
| 작은술 jah-guhn-sool (teaspoon) | 5 ml | Standardised, same as elsewhere |
| 소주잔 soh-joo-jahn (soju glass) | about 50 ml | Improvised measuring in home recipes |
Spoons are the reliable part
Good news: 큰술 and 작은술 are properly standardised at 15 ml and 5 ml, the same as a tablespoon and teaspoon anywhere else. If a Korean recipe is written in spoons, your own measuring spoons will do.
The exception is 밥숟갈 (bahp-sut-gahl), the rice spoon people actually eat with. Korean recipes use it constantly and it has no standard size at all — it varies with the manufacturer and the design. The usual convention treats a heaped rice spoon as roughly one tablespoon, which is what this converter assumes. To find your own, fill a measuring cup using only that spoon and count how many it takes.
Why the paper cup shows up in recipes
종이컵 (johng-ee-kuhp), the paper cup from the water cooler, is a standard 180 ml in Korea, and because every home and office has a stack of them it became an informal measure. Recipes that say 종이컵 mean exactly this cup, not any paper cup. It is 10% smaller than the Korean measuring cup and 25% smaller than an American one.
Weight beats volume for dry ingredients
Volume is unreliable for anything powdery. Flour is the worst offender: scooped straight from the bag it packs down and weighs noticeably more than the same cup spooned in loosely. The gram figures here use a Korean cup of flour at about 100 g, the figure Korean recipe sites use, but treat any flour conversion as approximate and weigh it if the recipe is fussy.
Liquids are the opposite — water, stock, milk and oil convert cleanly, because their density barely moves. Soy sauce is denser than water and gochujang and doenjang denser still, which is why a tablespoon of paste weighs more than a tablespoon of water.
Related tools
Convert plain volumes with the volume converter and weights with the weight converter. Read Korean quantities aloud with the Korean numbers converter, and set a cooking timer while you are at it.
Frequently asked questions
How many ml is a Korean cup?
200 ml. That is smaller than the 240 ml US cup and the 250 ml metric cup, so using an American cup for a Korean recipe adds about 20% to every quantity.
Is a Korean tablespoon the same as a US tablespoon?
Yes. 큰술 is standardised at 15 ml and 작은술 at 5 ml, the same as a tablespoon and teaspoon elsewhere. Only the cup differs.
How much is 밥숟갈, a rice spoon?
There is no official size — rice spoons vary by manufacturer. The usual convention treats one heaped rice spoon as about one tablespoon, or 15 ml. Measure your own by filling a measuring cup with it if precision matters.
What is 종이컵 in a recipe?
The standard Korean paper cup, 180 ml. It became an informal measure because every home and office has them. It holds 10% less than a Korean measuring cup.
How many grams is a cup of flour in Korean recipes?
About 100 g for a 200 ml Korean cup, the figure Korean recipe sites use. Flour is unreliable by volume because scooping packs it down, so weigh it when a recipe is precise.
How many tablespoons in a Korean cup?
About 13 and a third, since 200 ml divided by 15 ml is 13.3. An American cup holds 16 tablespoons.
Do Korean baking recipes also use the 200 ml cup?
Often not. Baking recipes commonly use the 250 ml metric cup while savoury Korean cooking uses 200 ml. Check which one the recipe states before scaling anything up.