National Museum of Korea seeks operational overhaul, debates paid admission

Amid a surge in visitor numbers, the National Museum of Korea announced Tuesday that the museum will improve its visitor environment and lay the groundwork for paid admission.

Starting next month, the state museum will move its opening hours up by 30 minutes, operating the museum from 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. in efforts to disperse visitor traffic with additional outdoor amenities set to be introduced in August, according to the museum.

The museum will set up the visitor management system in December as a preliminary step to paid admission, rolling out the system early next year. The management system will include on-site ticketing and QR-based information integration to gauge its visitor information.

The museum has allowed visitors to enter without holding a ticket, except for special exhibitions.

“In January alone, the museum recorded 670,000 visitors, averaging about 160,000 visitors per week. That marks a 30 percent increase from last year," said You Hong-june, director of the National Museum of Korea, at the new year’s press conference on Tuesday.

"At this pace, we estimate the total could exceed 7 million this year."

The museum saw a record-breaking number of visitors last year, 65 million, since its opening in 1945 and leading to growing complaints about the visitor environment.

“Rather than focusing on short-term fixes, we have prioritized building a framework that can manage the general visitor environment over the long term,” said Lee Ae-ryung, director of curatorial affairs.

NMK claimed earlier this year that it was surpassed only by the Louvre and the Vatican Museums in visitor numbers last year. Questions were raised, however, over the accuracy of the figure due to its reliance on a surveillance camera-based automatic counting system at security checkpoints.

Riding the continued global popularity of Korean culture, the National Museum of Korea will stage an overseas exhibition in collaboration with the Cleveland Museum of Art, examining Goryeo-era funerary culture and views of the afterlife. The exhibition, featuring works from both museums' collections, will run at the Cleveland Museum of Art from Oct. 11 to Jan. 3, 2027.

The cultural heritage of the ancient Silla Kingdom (57 BC-AD 935) will be presented through a touring exhibition at the Guimet Museum in Paris, France, in May and the Shanghai Museum in Shanghai, China, in September, led by the Gyeongju National Museum.

Silla heritage drew attention last year when six royal crowns were displayed together in one place for the first time, coinciding with the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation 2025 in Gyeongju, North Gyeongsang Province.

The state museum will also showcase special exhibitions that introduce overseas cultural heritage. This includes its first-ever large-scale exhibition introducing Thai art, bringing together 227 works of royal and Buddhist traditions from national museums in Thailand.

A special exhibition showcasing works from the collection of Switzerland's Kunsthaus Zurich is scheduled for November, followed in December by the Victoria and Albert Museum’s collection exhibition exploring the life and aesthetic tastes of Marie Antoinette.

July will bring an exhibition exploring the origins and evolution of Korean food culture, reflecting rising global interest in Korean cuisine. The museum will also expand the Children’s Museum to twice its current space in response to its popularity.

Director You added that the museum would expand visitor amenities — including new features such as a cafe and "water-gazing steps” — as it seeks to become a “stay-worthy, multifunctional cultural space.” Chronic parking shortages, he added, would be addressed through shared use of parking facilities at Yongsan Children’s Park.