When should you use formal titles and name forms in Korean in 2026?

-ssi (씨) is the everyday respectful name tag after a full name or family name when you do not share a close relationship. -nim (님) raises the respect further and often attaches to roles: seonsaengnim (선생님) for teachers and many professionals, sajangnim (사장님) for a business owner or boss in small-shop talk, gogaengnim (고객님) for customers. Family name plus title is safer than a bare given name with people you just met.

Job titles often replace personal names inside offices, hospitals and schools. Calling a manager by role can be more natural than inventing an English first-name habit that only your multinational Zoom team uses. Workplace KakaoTalk threads still expect polite titles toward older teammates and administrative staff even when the meeting language is English: Korean for work.

Default formal with strangers, counter staff, bank clerks, immigration windows, apartment managers and anyone whose role outranks yours. If you only know an English business card name, ask how they prefer to be addressed in Korean rather than guessing a casual short form.

Age hierarchy still shapes address because Korean social grammar uses relative age to choose honorifics and titles. A birth-year question can appear early in making friends or dating contexts, and it is often about speech and titles rather than curiosity alone. Answer briefly, keep polite endings, and do not demand someone’s exact age in a cold professional setting just to copy drama banter.

Given names become appropriate after a clear invitation, repeated contact in a peer group, or an explicit “call me X” cue. Even then, older relatives, in-laws, professors and senior managers may never want your casual short form. Children, close friends and some dating relationships move faster; clinics, contracts and government desks do not.

If you are unsure, use the title you heard others use, or ask eotteoke bulleudeurilkka? (how should I address you?) once, then stick to the answer. Switching to a nickname because English speakers around you do so can read as intimacy you were not offered.