What are the best ways to send money from Korea to my home country?

Sending money home from Korea is cheapest through an online remittance service and most expensive through a counter wire at a bank. The right answer depends on your corridor and how often you send.

Wise (formerly TransferWise) is the usual default for transparency. You sign up with your alien registration card, link a Korean bank account, and send at the mid-market rate with the fee shown up front. Transfers typically land in one to two business days and the app is in English.

GME Remit is a Korean fintech built around corridors to Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia, Nepal, Sri Lanka and India, and for those destinations it frequently beats the general-purpose services. It operates online and through branches in districts with large migrant communities such as Ansan. E9pay serves a similar role and is oriented toward E-9 workers. SentBe and WireBarley are the other Korean services worth comparing on an Asian corridor, and Hanpass is used for the same routes.

Kakao Pay and Toss both offer international transfer to a limited country list, which is convenient if you already use them for everyday payments here.

Cash pickup through MoneyGram or Western Union is the fastest way to get physical cash to someone but the most expensive per won sent. Use it for urgency, not for a monthly transfer.

Korean banks — Hana, Shinhan, Woori, KB — all do international wires. Note that Korea Exchange Bank merged into Hana Bank in 2015 and the KEB Hana brand was retired in 2021, so there is no separate KEB Hana; ask for Hana Bank, which still runs the foreign-exchange desks that inherited that business. A bank wire carries a flat fee plus an exchange margin, which only makes sense for a large one-off amount, and a foreign currency account (외화통장) lets you hold the currency and choose when to convert.

Limits and reporting. Korea''s foreign exchange rules set thresholds above which you must show documents for the source and purpose of funds, and those thresholds have been revised more than once. Rather than quoting a number that may be out of date, ask your own bank''s foreign exchange desk, or the Bank of Korea, what applies to your transfer before you send a large amount. Keep salary records and tax documents; they are what the bank asks for.

Tax. Money you send home is generally already-taxed income in Korea, but your home country may tax the receipt. The National Tax Service English helpline can clarify the Korea side. Keep your transfer records.

Practical advice: compare two services on your own corridor for one month and keep whichever delivers more. Fees and rates move, so check on the day you send.

Last verified: 2026-09-28