Hangul titles vs. English titles: 10 chart songs where the two say different things

Today is Hangul Day, Korea's celebration of its alphabet. We sorted the titles of the 100 songs on the Bugs weekly chart for the last week of September (September 21–27) by script. 41 titles are written only in Hangul and 57 only in the Latin alphabet. The other 2 are numbers. The ratio flips with the release year. Of the 37 songs released this year, 24 have Latin-alphabet titles, twice as many as the 12 with Hangul titles; among the 23 songs from 2023 or earlier, it's the reverse, with 15 Hangul titles. Most Hangul-titled songs also carry a separate official English title on international streaming services. We set the English titles listed on Apple Music next to the Hangul ones and picked ten where the two differ quite a bit. They're ordered from most recent release, not ranked.

이 별로부터 → Unknown Planet · IU

A single released on September 10. Written with a space, '이 별' means "this star," as in this planet; written without one, '이별' means "farewell." The album notes even repeat the title right underneath as '이별로부터' ("from farewell"). The English title, 'Unknown Planet', picks the "star" side of the pun. Apple Music

퇴사할게여 → I'm gonna TOESA · SOYEON

The number one song on the Bugs weekly chart for the last week of September. Even the spelling is playfully Korean: '퇴사할게여' bends the polite ending of '퇴사할게요' ("I'm quitting my job"). The English title leaves '퇴사' (quitting a job) untranslated, romanized as "TOESA." It's from the full album '끝내주는 인생' ('What a Wonderful Life'), released September 7, whose album notes describe this song with a diary entry that begins, "Today, I just went ahead and quit." Apple Music

푸른 산호초 → Blue Lagoon · LEE SUHYUN

A Korean-language cover of '青い珊瑚礁' (Aoi Sangosho), which Seiko Matsuda released on July 1, 1980. The Korean title, '푸른 산호초', translates the Japanese title word for word ("blue coral reef"), but the English title chooses "Lagoon" instead of "coral reef." It's the third song in 'J-POP REMAKE', a project planned by singer and TV personality Kangnam, and it came out on August 18 in both Korean and Japanese versions. Apple Music

만찬가 → Bansanka · TAEYEON

The first song in the same 'J-POP REMAKE' series, released June 29. It's '晩餐歌', a 2023 song by Japanese singer-songwriter tuki., sung with Korean lyrics. Read in Korean, the characters 晩餐歌 are "manchanga"; read in Japanese, "bansanka." The English title, 'Bansanka', simply spells out the Japanese reading in the Latin alphabet. The music video's title includes all three forms. Apple Music

고민중독 → T.B.H · QWER

The title track of the mini album 'MANITO', released April 1, 2024. The Korean title means "addicted to overthinking." The English title, 'T.B.H', is the familiar shorthand for "to be honest." The album notes describe the song as "the words I worried over and practiced every day." The official music video is titled 'T.B.H(고민중독)', with the English title first. Apple Music

첫 만남은 계획대로 되지 않아 → plot twist · TWS

The debut song, released January 22, 2024. The Hangul title is a full sentence of 12 syllables, not counting spaces ("first meetings don't go as planned"), while the English title is two lowercase words: 'plot twist'. A sentence about plans going wrong gets folded into a single word for a surprise turn. Apple Music

사랑하게 될 거야 → Landing in Love · HANRORO

A song on the EP '이상비행', released August 29, 2023. The album notes open with "The take-off of six paper planes that burned away their shyness. Whose heart will they land in?" The EP's English name is 'Take-off', and this song's English title is 'Landing in Love'. The Hangul title ("I'm going to fall in love") has no plane in it, but in English, the plane touches down. Apple Music

사랑인가 봐 → Love, Maybe · MeloMance

Released in February 2022 as a special track from the soundtrack of the drama 'A Business Proposal'. The English title packs the Korean ending '-인가 봐', a soft guess ("it must be"), into a single word: "Maybe." The song also appears on the soundtrack of the 2025 Netflix animated film 'KPop Demon Hunters', listed under a two-language title, '사랑인가 봐 Love, Maybe'. Apple Music

그대 작은 나의 세상이 되어 → My whole world · Car, the garden

A song on the EP '부재' ('Absence'), released January 28, 2021. The Hangul title is a sentence about you becoming my "small" world, but in the English title, "small" disappears and "whole" takes its place. Crossing into English, the small world becomes the whole world. Apple Music

한 페이지가 될 수 있게 → Time of Our Life · DAY6

A song on the mini album 'The Book of Us : Gravity', released July 15, 2019. With an album named for a book, the Hangul title ("so it can become one page") goes with a page, while the English title goes with the idiom 'Time of Our Life'. Apple Music

Some songs go the other way and put Hangul and English side by side in one title, like BLACKPINK's '뛰어(JUMP)' and Paul Kim's '모든 날, 모든 순간 (Every day, Every Moment)'. And Lim Hyun Jung's 2003 song '사랑은 봄비처럼... 이별은 겨울비처럼' keeps its Hangul title even on the US Apple Music store.