Seoul Travel Guide 2025: Best Eats, Sights & Hidden Gems
Keen on cheap eats, awesome cafes, city views, vintage shopping and taking a peek at North Korea? You might be drawn to visit Seoul, South Korea.
With 10 million people living in the sprawling metropolis, trains or taxis are typically the best way to navigate the multitude of markets, shopping districts and malls, with karaoke studios, claw machine arcades and photo booths scattered around. And you won’t struggle to find a decent dining spot.
What To Do In Seoul At A Glance
- Jump To Feasting
- Jump To Cafe Culture
- Jump To Shopping Scene
- Jump To Convenience Stores
- Jump To Baseball
- Jump To Sightseeing
- Jump To Entertainment
- Jump To Where To Stay
Feasting
Image Credit: Kkanbu Chicken | Supplied
For around 20 bucks, you can eat well. Locals recommend Kkanbu Chicken (there’s one in Myeongdong), with crispy yet juicy fried chicken as a specialty. It’s a chain, so there are quite a few.
Image Credit: Kyochon Pilbag | Supplied
Kyochon Pilbag in Yongsan District might feel a bit gimmicky as you pull on a doorbell disguised as a giant levered paintbrush to enter, but it delivers on taste, service and ambience. You literally paint the different sauces onto your fried chicken pieces with teeny brushes at the table. It’s so fun and so delicious. And if the special says it’s spicy, it’s guaranteed volcanic.
For Korean BBQ, there are countless options. Head to Hongdae in Mapo District, near Hongik University. And don’t forget to grab the self-serve all-you-can-eat side dishes (aka pickles, salads, veggies, homestyle kimchi and so on) that come with the meat.
Image Credit: Dosan Butcher | Supplied
By the way, Hongdae is heaving with bars, clubs, an indie music scene, street art and independent designers. While Korean BBQ is usually a cook-it-yourself situation, occasional celeb-haunt Dosan Butcher in Gangnam District is all about quality meat and experience, as it sends a server to your table to cook up a veritable feast before your eyes.
Café Culture
Image Credit: Compose Coffee | Supplied
Compose Coffee has K-pop’s V (Kim Taehyung) from BTS as its ambassador and a couple of cutesy mascots. Its mantra is “very good coffee.” They serve a range of hot and cold drinks including Sweet Potato Latte, Busan Sea Salted Latte and Grain Latte through to smoothies and milk teas.
Image Credit: Cafe Onion | Supplied
If you’re hankering for pastries, cakes, and similar delicacies, head to Cafe Onion in Anguk in Jongno District, built in a rustic, traditional Korean home, with multiple rooms to dine in and a middle courtyard begging to be photographed. The café’s signature is a surprisingly excellent Pandoro (Italian-style pastry dusted with powdered sugar).
It’s a self-serve setup with a huge selection of sweet and savoury offerings including sun-dried tomato, pork and beef quiche and cream cheese garlic baguette, paired with an array of hot and cold drinks including tomato latte (tomato, green pepper, beet, lemon, celery and dill).
Image Credit: Twosome Place | Supplied
Elsewhere, there’s an impressive selection of cakes including a wicked cheesecake and excellent coffee at Twosome Place, at various locations.
There are several Blue Bottle cafes across the city. And the coffee is good. Very, very good.
While iced drinks are the go-to at Milky Shop in Seongsu, where the menu boasts such magnificence as iced Pink Milky Latte, Melon Latte and Green Grape Ade.
Vintage Shopping
Image Credit: Dongmyo Flea Market | Supplied
Dongmyo Flea Market, by the river in Sungin-dong in Jongno District, is massive.
You can spot anything from a knight’s helmet and chain mail to boxes and boxes of sunnies, manicure sets and streetwear. Leather jackets can go for as little as 10 bucks.
Image Credit: Vintage Market Lane | Supplied
Turn the corner and you’ll see assorted clothing like knitted vests, blouses and jeans piled high on the footpath, fruit and veggie stands, bronze statues, kettles or even a violin.
Hongdae is also peppered with vintage stores that can take a little effort to hunt down—appearing in street nooks, down basements or at the end of tiny laneways.
Shopping Scene
Image Credit: SinJoongAng Market | Supplied
SinJoongAng Market has a Vic Market feel. There are meals, foodstuffs and ingredients in ready-to-go plastic bags alongside stacks of shoes, socks and jocks, spices and packs of bickies.
Image Credit: Lotte World Mall | Supplied
There are several slick shopping malls to choose from if that’s your scene. The Lotte World Mall, filled with the usual suspects and a selection of Korean brands, has a Gordon Ramsay Burger joint that delivers on its premium dish promise.
Appearing in various shopping districts is eyewear brand Blue Elephant, which has all the finesse, style, and coolness of Gentle Monster without the hefty price tag. Sunnies can be snapped up for as little as 50 Aussie bucks, and they are show-stoppers.
Convenience Stores
Check out brightly lit, packed-to-the-rafters convenience stores that sprout nearly every fifty metres. There are reportedly 17,000 in South Korea.
Image Credit: Convenience store meal | Supplied
Shelves are bursting with lollies (Squid Game sweet packs fly out the door), flavoured ice drinks, vitamins, beauty and hair products, and ready-to-heat in-store bountiful meal deals that are not only flavourful but dirt cheap (average cost around 10 bucks). Look out for end-of-day discounts on selected fresh foods and late dinners.
Image Credit: Nice to CU | Supplied
The stock list doesn’t end there. And if a Nice to CU doesn’t have what you’re after, a 7 Eleven, E Mart, or GS 25 probably will. There seem to be just as many Olive Young stores as convenience stores, always bustling with people seeking to nab the best in a seemingly exhaustive range of beauty, pampering and spa products. Anyone for snail slime face masks?
Baseball
Image Credit: Jamsil Baseball Stadium | Website
You don’t have to be a sport nut to appreciate the spectacle of going to a baseball game at Jamsil Baseball Stadium, with a near 70,000 person capacity.
The crowd sings, chants, and screams support for the entire three or more hours of the game—non-stop. There are typically cheerleaders and adorable mascots, while some games have a post-match DJ and fireworks.
It’s a raucous, exhausting day out with a side of hot-dog, fried chicken and beer. The stadium also has its own food delivery service to your seat, so you don’t miss any of the action.
Sightseeing
Image Credit: Seoul Sky Observatory | Supplied
You’ll find Seoul Sky Observatory, the tallest building in Korea, in Lotte World Tower. Witnessing the sunset over tens of thousands of buildings from such a height is impressive.
Image Credit: Demilitarised Zone | Supplied
So, you want to see North Korea? Can do. The only way is to jump on a half or full-day bus tour to the Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) and don’t forget your passport. Depending on the options taken, you see barbed wire and high fences, a fake village built by dictator Kim Jong Un, as well as two ridiculously tall flag poles, rolling hills and a souvenir shop where you can even buy a bit of barbed wire.
There’s access to one of the so-called infiltration tunnels built by the North to facilitate an invasion. South Korea has found four of them, the most recent in the 90s, but isn’t sure exactly how many exist.
Just rememeber: Don’t try to take a pic of North Korea. You may get whisked away and fined. There’s even the threat of going to jail for up to three years.
Image Credit: The Gyeongbokgung Palace Gardens | Supplied
A meander in the grounds of The Gyeongbokgung Palace, after watching the changing of the guards, is a welcome change of pace. You can hire and wear Hanbok (traditional Korean garb) for your outing and get into the palace for free after taking a pic with a guard.
There’s a gorgeous lake, huge gardens and the serenity of several temples to absorb. The changing of the guards happens at 10 and 2 pm daily. No ticket required.
Image Credit: COEX Mall Psy Statue | Supplied
Head to COEX Mall for shopping but also to check out the enormous golden sculpture just outside - dedicated to Psy’s viral song Gangnam Style that has had 5.7 billion YouTube views and 604 million Spotify streams. Pose for a pic and have a little dance as the catchy song pours out of a nearby speaker.
Entertainment
Photobooths are everywhere. You can play dress-ups with wigs, silly glasses or other quirky accessories (think hamburger bun hats, hot dog spectacles and so on), and take souvenir snaps for a few dollars. The same goes for tiny Karaoke zones, some of which you can hire by the hour for around ten bucks. Practically everywhere.
Image Credit: Theme Park Everland | Supplied
Theme Park Everland has the T Express roller coaster—the sixth longest wooden roller coaster in the world - at nearly 1800 metres long with a 77-degree decline. There are multiple zones that include a panda enclosure, Magic Land, Zootopia, Global Fare and European Adventure.
Image Credit: A Knack Salon | Supplied
For a head spa, haircut, or trending “down perm,” A Knack salon in Seongdong-gu has the ultimate pamper-me-for-hours menu. You may leave styled like a K-pop idol after a half day of next-level service and styling.
Late-night activities can lead you to having a hit of baseball at a batting cage in Hongdae. It’s two dollars for 20 balls.
Where To Stay
Image Credit: President Hotel | Supplied
The foyer of the President Hotel in Jung District shares a door with a Tim Hortons (Canadian coffee house chain), so you can slink right in to grab a cappuccino, donut, bagel or egg muffin. The accommodation, in the bowels of a retro skyscraper, is near Seoul Plaza—a giant city square with a massive lawn—adjacent to the City Hall and Library.
Image Credit: Myeongdong Night Market | Supplied
It’s also just down the road from Myeongdong Night Market, the famed tourist-heavy market where you get viral eats like sugar-coated fruit bites on a stick and Squid Game cookies.
A serve of glass noodles and veggies at the Japchae stall, while comparatively pricey, is delicious.
Or you could have a look into Temple Stay, where, exactly as it sounds, you experience life in a Buddhist temple.
Main Image Credit: IStock | Website