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Gwangju Seo-gu

Registered foreigners in Gwangju Seo-gu number 2,916, which is 1.06% of the resident-registration population of 275,063. That is below both the national average of 3.14% and the Gwangju average of 2.04%. It ranks 223 among the 250 districts. Within Gwangju it ranks 4 of 5. Over the past 10 years, registered foreigners rose from 1,700 in 2015 to 2,916, an increase of about 71.5%. 58 nationalities are counted, and the three largest are Vietnam at 34.2%, China at 14.2%, and Myanmar at 6.2%. Shannon diversity (H) is 2.345, below the national 2.607, and ranks 105 of 250 districts. Within Gwangju it ranks 3. By continent of origin, diversity is 0.055, below the national 0.123. It ranks 206 of 250 districts. Southeast Asia accounts for 51% and East Asia for 24.9%, and the two together are 75.9%. Language demand estimated from the nationality composition is highest for Vietnamese, then Chinese, then Khmer.

Foreign residents (MOIS) numbered 4,804 in 2024, which is 1.7% of the resident-registration population of 278,639. Of these, 3,319 do not hold Republic of Korea nationality, 540 have acquired nationality, and 945 are children of foreign residents. By type, other foreigners number 1,217, International studentss 708, foreign workers 662, and Marriage migrants 468. Children of foreign residents number 945, which ranks 137 among 252 districts and is 19.7% of foreign residents in this district. Among the 2,916 people with a known status of stay, the most common are Student (D2) with 732 people at 25.1%, Marriage Migration (F6) with 420 at 14.4%, and Non-professional Employment (E9) with 339 at 11.6%. Organizations that support immigrants number 14 in this district, or 48 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
IndicatorsSeo-guGwangjuNationalVs national
Registered foreigners2,91628,4211,604,920National total: 0.2%
Foreign share1.062.043.140.34×
Shannon diversity (H)2.3452.4702.6070.90×
Nationalities58118192National total: 30.2%

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
YearSeo-guGwangjuNational
20080.380.841.72
20120.440.991.83
20160.551.362.25
20200.561.472.21
20251.062.043.14
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
2008304,885100.01,1500.38
2009299,82598.31,1740.39
2010303,21999.51,1980.40
2011317,936104.31,3940.44
2012316,545103.81,3780.44
2013315,276103.41,4490.46
2014310,317101.81,6680.54
2015305,028100.01,7000.56
2016309,579101.51,7020.55
2017306,957100.71,6340.53
2018304,17299.81,6980.56
2019300,97598.71,6910.56
2020296,57697.31,6470.56
2021291,23195.51,6060.55
2022287,40194.31,8810.65
2023283,99193.12,3250.82
2024279,05091.52,7140.97
2025275,06390.22,9161.06
Table 2.Registered foreigners by nationality, 2025Unit: persons, %
2025
NationalityRegistered foreignersSeo-gu ShareGwangjuNational
Vietnam99734.230.718.3
China41314.212.314.1
Myanmar1806.22.93.6
Nepal1475.03.75.6
Cambodia1374.76.44.1
Korean-Chinese1304.53.315.6
Uzbekistan963.37.64.3
Mongolia953.32.82.6
Thailand822.82.22.9
Russia792.72.51.4

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
1Vietnamese85236.2
2Chinese44719.0
3Khmer1466.2
4Burmese1144.9
5Russian893.8
6Mongolian833.5
7Nepali773.3
8Thai773.3
9English763.2
10Uzbek723.0

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 foreignersSeo-gu ShareNational
Student(D2)73225.1-
Marriage Migration(F6)42014.4-
Non-professional Employment(E9)33911.6-
General Trainee(D4)2879.8-
Other(G1)2869.8-
Permanent Residence(F5)1655.7-
Visiting Cohabitation(F1)1645.6-
Job Seeker(D10)1013.5-
Other statuses42214.5-

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 2,916 registered foreigners.

Table 5.Types of foreign residents, 2024Unit: persons, %
2024
TypePersonsShare
Other foreigners1,21725.3
International students70814.7
Migrant workers66213.8
Marriage migrant4689.7
Overseas Koreans2645.5

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

Note: Only this table follows the MOIS count, which totals 4,804, and it covers a different population from the 2,714 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
20080.016.528.62.620.7
20093.726.925.34.611.0
20104.524.523.34.09.9
20115.421.024.03.38.9
20125.723.221.02.29.6
20137.120.719.71.911.1
20148.418.618.21.812.8
20159.520.416.82.513.9
20166.718.015.81.423.1
20176.915.615.11.622.7
20186.515.613.02.526.2
20195.913.512.62.529.6
20206.512.613.64.025.9
20217.111.713.05.224.4
20227.312.611.78.323.9
20236.412.410.510.326.8
20245.513.89.714.725.3
Table 6.Gwangju Seo-gu indicators and benchmarks, 2025Unit: index, rank
2025
IndicatorsThis district Gwangju AverageNationalRank
2.3452.472.607105 / 250
0.7830.8250.87113 / 250
0.160.1360.099106 / 250
0.0550.1010.123206 / 250
1.062.043.14223 / 250
0.0830.1470.216223 / 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 Seo-guGwangjuNational
20081.8081.8661.715
20092.1882.3332.136
20102.2782.3932.173
20112.2532.4052.181
20122.2952.4312.286
20132.342.4542.322
20142.3222.4652.31
20152.3182.4782.325
20162.2722.482.381
20172.292.4982.421
20182.3532.5032.42
20192.3952.4832.445
20202.4142.4782.464
20212.4172.4462.491
20222.4162.4692.552
20232.4062.4562.586
20242.3912.4672.604
20252.3452.472.607
Table 7.Continent of origin, composition and concentration, 2025Unit: %
2025
ContinentShare
Southeast Asia51.0
East Asia24.9
Other8.1
South Asia7.1
Central Asia4.2
Europe2.7
North America2.1

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 58.

Table 9.Multicultural marriages, 2014–2024Unit: cases, %
YearMulticulturalAll marriagesSeo-gu ShareGwangjuNational
2014911,7025.35.98.0
2015821,6415.05.77.4
2016931,6735.66.27.7
2017841,5465.46.78.3
2018731,3085.67.89.2
20191071,2808.49.010.3
2020571,0565.46.37.6
2021469195.05.57.2
2022539055.97.19.1
2023711,0007.19.110.6
2024751,1136.77.89.6

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
IndicatorsSeo-guGwangjuNational
Average wage, 20234,2104,0284,344
Share aged 65 and over, 202418.117.520.0
Fiscal independence, 202418.643.3
Jobs per 1,000 residents, 2024592478501
Share of jobs in manufacturing, 20246.311.916.2

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,
Seo-gu1448.0
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 Seo-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.