GKS guide
Know whether TOPIK is required for your GKS application, the minimum level you must reach before starting your degree program, and when you can skip the one-year Korean language course.
No. A TOPIK score is not required to apply, and not having one does not disqualify you. Korean proficiency is considered in the selection evaluation, and some universities or departments may set their own requirements.
Most scholars must reach at least TOPIK Level 3 before they can begin their degree program. The 2026 GKS-G guideline names five exemptions — the research and global network programs, IRTS Korean Language Program graduates, and serving professors or R&D applicants on 100% English-taught programs. Some universities and departments require Level 4 or higher to enroll.
Yes. A valid TOPIK Level 5 or 6 at the time of application lets you enter your degree directly and skip the language year. If you reach Level 5 or 6 within the first six months of the course, you skip the remaining six months. GKS-G exempts four further groups by program type rather than by level.
Then that higher level is the one that binds you, and it is printed in the guidelines themselves. The university information published with each cycle carries a Required TOPIK for Admission column for every department, and it takes one of four values: Level 3 or above, 4 or above, 5 or above, or Level 6. Read the column for the exact department you plan to name, not just for the university.
The application form does not ask when you sat TOPIK. It asks which sitting you sat, and each track's guidelines name a closed range of sittings they will recognise — a window, not a rolling expiry. A certificate from outside that window is not accepted whatever level it certifies, and the window is republished with different numbers every cycle. GKS-G adds a second condition on top of it: the certificate must also be current as of a fixed date (2026-02-28), and that applies to the English tests exactly as it does to TOPIK. The 2027 GKS-U guidelines state the recognised session window and no separate expiry date.
The 2027 GKS-U guidelines recognise PBT certificates from session 96 to session 109. The 2026 GKS-G guidelines — still the most recent graduate set — recognise session 93 to session 105. The tracks publish different windows and both move every cycle, so a session number quoted without naming its track and its year is a number you cannot act on. And a sitting outside your track's window cannot be registered at all: the level it certifies makes no difference to that.
IBT has its own window, also per track: GKS-U 2027 recognises sessions 4–16, and the 2026 GKS-G set recognises 1–12. IBT began far more recently than the paper test, but it has both edges — a sitting before the lower edge is outside the window exactly as a sitting past the upper one is.
A language certificate is optional on both tracks — the GKS-U guidelines say so in as many words, and an application with none at all is still valid. If you do submit one it can be Korean or English: both tracks' points tables list TOEFL iBT and IELTS, at the same thresholds. Submit more than one and only the highest is counted.
One exemption is widely misread. GKS-G's optional Form 7, the “Korean Language Program Exemption Application”, is not the Level 5–6 route described above: the guidelines restrict it to serving academic professors applying to a department taught entirely in English, and GKS-U has no such form at all. But the form is not the only route that is not a level: the same guideline places the research and global network programs, IRTS Korean Language Program graduates, and R&D applicants to 100% English-taught programs outside the language year too. On GKS-U the level you hold is the only route there is.
Source: GKS-G — GKS Application Guidelines (NIIED / Study in Korea) · GKS-U — GKS Application Guidelines (NIIED / Study in Korea) · Last verified
The GKS-U numbers are from the 2027 Application Guidelines that NIIED published on 9 September 2026. The GKS-G numbers are from the 2026 guidelines, which remain the most recent graduate set published — the 2027 graduate guidelines are not out, and in recent cycles they have followed around February. Take your own cycle's numbers from its own guidelines.
At the application stage language proficiency is not a pass/fail gate. It is a scored component, and the guidelines print the conversion outright — the same bands on both tracks, with TOPIK, TOEFL iBT and IELTS on one scale. That is what lets you read an English score against a Korean one instead of guessing which is stronger.
| Points | TOPIK | TOEFL iBT | IELTS |
|---|---|---|---|
| 100% | 5–6 | — | — |
| 90% | 4 | 114+ · 6.0 | 8.0+ |
| 80% | 3 | 95+ · 5.0+ | 7.0+ |
| 70% | 2 | 72+ · 4.0+ | 6.0+ |
| 60% | 1 | 42+ · 3.0+ | 5.0+ |
| 50% | No score submitted | ||
Both guidelines state that where two or more score reports are submitted, only the highest is recognised. Sending a weaker second certificate cannot pull the first one down, and it cannot add to it either.
The guideline does not leave the row blank: submitting no score report is worth 50% of the points allocated to language, one band below TOPIK level 1 at 60%. So a weak certificate is not worth nothing — the gap between the lowest certificate and no certificate is a real ten points, and the certificate is optional in the sense that you may skip it, not in the sense that skipping it is free.
ETS changed the iBT scoring system on 21 January 2026, and the guideline converts the two separately — which is why the TOEFL column carries two values. Older results stay usable for the normal two years, and the guideline puts their expiry at 20 January 2028, so both systems are in play at once.
TOPIK aside, GKS has an academic floor. See where your GPA lands in seconds.
Source: GKS-G — GKS Application Guidelines (NIIED / Study in Korea) · GKS-U — GKS Application Guidelines (NIIED / Study in Korea)Last verified
Independent summary. The GKS-U figures come from the 2027 Application Guidelines published on 9 September 2026; the GKS-G figures come from the 2026 guidelines, the most recent graduate set. Some requirements vary by university and can change — always confirm against the published GKS Application Guidelines for your application year.
