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Gwangju Gwangsan-gu

Registered foreigners in Gwangju Gwangsan-gu number 16,146, which is 4.17% of the resident-registration population of 387,604. That is above both the national average of 3.14% and the Gwangju average of 2.04%. It ranks 71 among the 250 districts. Within Gwangju it ranks 1 of 5. Over the past 10 years, registered foreigners rose from 9,790 in 2015 to 16,146, an increase of about 64.9%. 66 nationalities are counted, and the three largest are Vietnam at 28.8%, China at 11.4%, and Uzbekistan at 8.8%. Shannon diversity (H) is 2.471, below the national 2.607, and ranks 60 of 250 districts. Within Gwangju it ranks 2. By continent of origin, diversity is 0.185, above the national 0.123. It ranks 53 of 250 districts. Southeast Asia accounts for 49.6% and East Asia for 17.3%, and the two together are 66.9%. Language demand estimated from the nationality composition is highest for Vietnamese, then Chinese, then Khmer.

Foreign residents (MOIS) numbered 26,581 in 2024, which is 6.4% of the resident-registration population of 412,447. Of these, 21,360 do not hold Republic of Korea nationality, 2,001 have acquired nationality, and 3,220 are children of foreign residents. By type, other foreigners number 7,694, foreign workers 4,403, overseas Koreans with foreign nationality 4,112, and International studentss 3,380. Children of foreign residents number 3,220, which ranks 11 among 252 districts and is 12.1% of foreign residents in this district. Among the 16,146 people with a known status of stay, the most common are Non-professional Employment (E9) with 3,563 people at 22.1%, Student (D2) with 3,018 at 18.7%, and Marriage Migration (F6) with 1,655 at 10.3%. Organizations that support immigrants number 41 in this district, or 25.4 per 10,000 registered foreigners.

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook on Immigration and Foreign Policy 2025 (registered foreigners by district, by nationality, and by status of stay), MOIS Status of Foreign Residents in Local Governments 2024, MOIS Resident Registration Population Statistics 2025. The diversity indices and location quotients were calculated from the open dataset. The list of support organizations was compiled by this site. DOI 10.3886/E249944

Table 1.Key indicators and benchmarks, 2025Unit: persons, %, index
2025
IndicatorsGwangsan-guGwangjuNationalVs national
Registered foreigners16,14628,4211,604,920National total: 1.0%
Foreign share4.172.043.141.33×
Shannon diversity (H)2.4712.4702.6070.95×
Nationalities66118192National total: 34.4%

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (registered foreigners by district), MOIS Resident Registration Population Statistics.

Note: H is the Shannon diversity index. The number of nationalities is counted from the district-by-nationality table in all three columns: the province value is the union over that province's districts and the national value is the union over the 250 districts. The yearbook began listing every nationality at the district level in 2014, so counts before that year are cut to the top 19 plus other. The national value is the sum of the 250 districts and equals the yearbook's national total.

Figure 1.Foreign share over time, 2008–2025Unit: %

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook each year.

View as table
YearGwangsan-guGwangjuNational
20081.610.841.72
20121.830.991.83
20162.711.362.25
20202.951.472.21
20254.172.043.14
Figure 2.Resident population, 2008–2025Unit: 2008=100

Source: MOIS Resident Registration Population Statistics each year.

Note: this is the denominator behind the share in Figure 1. It counts Korean residents on the resident registration and does not include registered foreigners.

View as table
YearResident populationIndexRegistered foreignersForeign share
2008320,660100.05,1621.61
2009342,936106.95,5761.63
2010363,239113.36,6061.82
2011375,509117.16,8711.83
2012385,101120.17,0541.83
2013392,875122.57,7381.97
2014397,281123.98,7932.21
2015400,753125.09,7902.44
2016403,049125.710,9072.71
2017404,131126.012,1543.01
2018404,547126.212,9543.20
2019405,315126.413,4613.32
2020405,579126.511,9782.95
2021404,221126.111,7912.92
2022400,654124.913,1423.28
2023396,741123.714,5413.67
2024391,611122.114,9573.82
2025387,604120.916,1464.17
Table 2.Registered foreigners by nationality, 2025Unit: persons, %
2025
NationalityRegistered foreignersGwangsan-gu ShareGwangjuNational
Vietnam4,64928.830.718.3
China1,84511.412.314.1
Uzbekistan1,4278.87.64.3
Cambodia1,3118.16.44.1
Kazakhstan9565.94.11.2
Nepal7184.43.75.6
Philippines6734.23.43.4
Indonesia5393.32.73.9
Russia5123.22.51.4
Sri Lanka5083.12.22.3

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (registered foreigners by district and nationality).

Note: Korean-Chinese and China together come to 59.6%. Gwangju and the national columns give the share of that nationality among registered foreigners in each area.

Table 3.Top 10 languages by estimated demand, 2025Unit: persons, %
2025
RankLanguageEstimated countShare
1Vietnamese3,97529.5
2Chinese1,87713.9
3Khmer1,3209.8
4Uzbek1,0707.9
5Russian1,0517.8
6Kazakh6985.2
7Tagalog/Filipino5844.3
8Indonesian3782.8
9Nepali3752.8
10Thai3632.7

Source: An estimate that applies the first-language shares of Ethnologue first-language shares, with Korean excluded.

Note: Only the top 20 languages are calculated for this district, so the shares are shares within those 20.

Table 4.Registered foreigners by status of stay, 2025Unit: persons, %
2025
Visa categoryRegistered foreignersGwangsan-gu ShareNational
Non-professional Employment(E9)3,56322.1-
Student(D2)3,01818.7-
Marriage Migration(F6)1,65510.3-
Visiting Cohabitation(F1)1,60810.0-
Other(G1)1,1046.8-
General Trainee(D4)1,0716.6-
Permanent Residence(F5)9465.9-
Dependent Family(F3)9285.7-
Other statuses2,25314.0-

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (registered foreigners by status of stay and district).

Note: The national column is the share the same status holds among registered foreigners nationwide in that year. Status is known for all 16,146 registered foreigners.

Table 5.Types of foreign residents, 2024Unit: persons, %
2024
TypePersonsShare
Other foreigners7,69428.9
Migrant workers4,40316.6
Overseas Koreans4,11215.5
International students3,38012.7
Marriage migrant1,7716.7

Source: MOIS Status of Foreign Residents in Local Governments 2024.

Note: Only this table follows the MOIS count, which totals 26,581, and it covers a different population from the 14,957 registered foreigners MOJ counted the same year. Adding the two counts the same people twice.

Figure 3.Composition of foreign residents by type over timeUnit: %

Source: MOIS Status of Foreign Residents in Local Governments each year.

Note: The share of each type among foreign residents in this district in that year. Table 5 gives counts for a single year and this figure gives the composition year by year. Values can break in years when district boundaries changed. Types are set by dividing the work, study, and marriage shares among foreign residents without Korean nationality by the national benchmark (38%, 16%, 15%).

View as table
Year
20080.042.09.811.121.9
20090.853.010.914.33.9
20100.849.710.815.63.9
20111.749.810.813.83.9
20123.846.310.410.86.3
20136.043.110.49.46.8
20146.841.99.69.37.4
20157.942.29.28.78.9
20169.134.08.07.023.4
201710.230.07.48.525.6
20189.827.06.99.129.8
20199.323.96.710.132.3
202010.721.47.310.031.1
202113.817.37.411.729.6
202215.716.36.912.129.4
202315.916.06.513.728.5
202415.516.66.712.728.9
Table 6.Gwangju Gwangsan-gu indicators and benchmarks, 2025Unit: index, rank
2025
IndicatorsThis district Gwangju AverageNationalRank
2.4712.472.60760 / 250
0.8250.8250.8762 / 250
0.1270.1360.099167 / 250
0.1850.1010.12353 / 250
4.172.043.1471 / 250
0.2670.1470.21665 / 250

Source: Open dataset, indicators calculated from it.

Note: Shannon diversity (H) measures how evenly nationalities are mixed, and a higher value means several nationalities of similar size. HHI moves the other way and rises as one or two nationalities dominate. Evenness rescales H to a range of 0 to 1. The rank is the position among the 250 districts ordered from the largest. The province column treats the whole province as one unit. It differs from the mean of the district values.

Figure 4.Indicators over time, 2008–2025Unit: Index
Indicators

Source: Open dataset, indicators calculated from it.

Note: This district, its province, and the national value share one axis. The province and national values are for the same year. Values can break in years when district boundaries changed.

View as table
Year Gwangsan-guGwangjuNational
20081.9111.8661.715
20092.3252.3332.136
20102.3732.3932.173
20112.4112.4052.181
20122.4432.4312.286
20132.4792.4542.322
20142.4862.4652.31
20152.5072.4782.325
20162.5132.482.381
20172.5132.4982.421
20182.5352.5032.42
20192.4982.4832.445
20202.4782.4782.464
20212.4372.4462.491
20222.4372.4692.552
20232.4322.4562.586
20242.4542.4672.604
20252.4712.472.607
Table 7.Continent of origin, composition and concentration, 2025Unit: %
2025
ContinentShare
Southeast Asia49.6
East Asia17.3
Central Asia14.8
South Asia9.2
Other5.7
Europe3.2
North America0.3

Source: Open dataset, indicators calculated from it.

Note: No nationality accounts for 30% or more of the foreigners in this district. The nationalities counted number 66.

Table 9.Multicultural marriages, 2014–2024Unit: cases, %
YearMulticulturalAll marriagesGwangsan-gu ShareGwangjuNational
20141632,3726.95.98.0
20151612,3726.85.77.4
20161532,2146.96.27.7
20171822,1318.56.78.3
20181982,0049.97.89.2
20192101,98310.69.010.3
20201471,7208.56.37.6
20211261,5368.25.57.2
20221511,50310.07.19.1
20231951,57912.39.110.6
20241671,66210.07.89.6

Source: Statistics Korea, Vital Statistics of Multicultural Families.

Note: a marriage counts as multicultural when one spouse is a foreign national or a naturalized Korean. Statistics Korea does not split the wards of a large city, so a ward carries the value for the city named in the column header.

Table 10.General indicators for the areaUnit: 10,000 KRW, %, persons
IndicatorsGwangsan-guGwangjuNational
Average wage, 20233,9874,0284,344
Share aged 65 and over, 202412.117.520.0
Fiscal independence, 202418.843.3
Jobs per 1,000 residents, 2024481478501
Share of jobs in manufacturing, 202425.811.916.2

Source: NTS National Tax Statistics, year-end wage settlement by district; Statistics Korea e-Local Indicators (share aged 65 and over, fiscal independence, jobs per 1,000 residents, manufacturing jobs).

Note: neither agency splits the wards of a large city, so a ward carries the value for the city named in the column header.

Table 11.Immigrant support organizations, count and density, 2026Unit: count
ScopeOrganizationsor, per 10,000 registered foreigners,
Gwangsan-gu4125.4
Gwangju9332.7
National1,4739.2

Source: List of immigrant support organizations compiled by this site.

Note: a count of organizations is not a measure of how much service is provided, and the size and scope of each organization are not in this list.

Table 12.Gwangju Gwangsan-gu immigrant support organizations, 2026

Source: List of immigrant support organizations compiled by this site.

Note: Only organizations with an address in this district that serve people directly, that have not closed or gone dormant, and that have a website or social media account confirmed as their own are listed. An organization missing any one of the four does not appear, so one you know of may be absent. The table above counts only the categories used for the density figure, so the two numbers can differ.