Ryu 류 — Korean last name
Is Ryu a Korean last name?
Yes. Ryu (Hangul: 류, Hanja: 柳) is a Korean family name recorded in the 2015 South Korean census with 163,994 holders, making it the #41 most common of the 191 surnames counted. Roughly one in every 303 South Koreans is a Ryu. It is a well-established name you will meet regularly in Korea and in Korean communities abroad.
How to write Ryu in Korean
In Hangul, Ryu is written 류. The same Hangul syllable is used by 2 different Hanja (Chinese characters): 柳, 劉. Each character is technically a separate surname with its own clans and ancestry, even though they sound identical and are romanized the same way. The most common by far is 柳.
What does Ryu mean?
The character 柳 means willow tree. As with most Korean surnames, the meaning comes from the Chinese character rather than from the Korean sound, so it says something about how the name was first written down (often a place, a virtue, an object or a Chinese dynasty) rather than describing the family. Koreans rarely think about the literal meaning of a surname in daily life, but it matters for genealogy and for choosing given names that pair well with it.
Major Ryu clans (bon-gwan)
Korean surnames are subdivided by bon-gwan — the ancestral hometown of the clan founder. Two people named Ryu from different bon-gwan are considered unrelated. The best-known Ryu clans are: Munhwa Ryu, Jinju Ryu. The place name comes first (for example "Gimhae Kim" means the Kim clan whose founder settled in Gimhae).
How common is Ryu?
Ryu is common Korean surname. Just above it in the rankings is Min (171,799) and just below it is Na (161,015). For comparison, Kim, the most common surname, has 10,689,967 holders. All figures come from Statistics Korea's 2015 Population and Housing Census, which only counts surnames held by five or more people.
Spellings and romanization
Ryu is the spelling most Korean families use on passports and in English. The official Revised Romanization (used by the South Korean government since 2000) is Ryu, and the older McCune–Reischauer system gives Ryu. Other spellings you will see in real life include Yoo, Ryoo, Yu, You, Lyu. The variety exists because Korean passport rules let each family choose its own romanization, so spellings drifted over generations of emigration; in Korean, every one of these is the same 류.
How to pronounce Ryu
Ryu is pronounced "ryoo" (류), one syllable with a tapped r.
Is Ryu Chinese or Korean?
Both, in a sense — the character is shared, the family is not. Korean surnames were written with Chinese characters for over a thousand years, so nearly every Korean surname has a Chinese (and Vietnamese) reading: 柳 is Liǔ in Mandarin and Liễu in Vietnamese; 劉 is Liú in Mandarin and Lưu in Vietnamese. A Korean Ryu and a Chinese family with the same character are not related; they simply adopted the same character at different times and places. If someone spells their name "Ryu" they are almost certainly Korean, because the Chinese and Vietnamese romanizations look different. See our full guide to Korean vs Chinese last names.
Related Korean surnames
Frequently asked questions about Ryu
Is Ryu a Korean or Chinese last name?
Ryu as spelled is Korean (류). The Hanja 柳 is also used as a surname in China and Vietnam, but with different romanizations (Liǔ in Mandarin, Liễu in Vietnamese). The families are not related.
How many people have the last name Ryu?
163,994 people in South Korea had the surname Ryu (류) in the 2015 census, or 0.33% of the population. That makes it the #41 most common Korean surname.
How do you write Ryu in Korean?
Ryu is written 류 in Hangul. In Hanja it is 柳 or 劉, which are separate lineages sharing one pronunciation.
What does the Korean last name Ryu mean?
The Hanja 柳 means "willow tree". Korean surname meanings come from the Chinese character the name is written with, not from the Korean sound.
Source: Statistics Korea (KOSIS), 2015 Population and Housing Census, surnames by Hangul with five or more holders (total population 49,705,663). Hanja meanings from standard Hanja dictionaries. Check another surname.