Pointing to the primary data
All numbers on this site are based on the public data of the primary statistics agencies below. The base date for every interpolated estimate is 2026-01-01. Always consult the primary data for decision-making.
| Indicator | Source | Link |
|---|---|---|
| National Debt | MoEF National Debt (provisional) | www.moef.go.kr |
| Total Household Debt | Bank of Korea Household Credit Statistics | ecos.bok.or.kr |
| Mortgage Debt | BoK Household Credit (mortgage) | ecos.bok.or.kr |
| Credit Card Debt | BoK Household Credit (revolving / credit card) | ecos.bok.or.kr |
| GDP | Bank of Korea National Accounts (nominal GDP) | ecos.bok.or.kr |
| Population | Statistics Korea KOSIS Population Projection | kosis.kr |
| Government Revenue | MoEF Total Revenue (main budget) | — |
| Government Spending | MoEF Total Expenditure (main budget) | — |
| Total Exports | Korea International Trade Association (K-stat) | stat.kita.net |
| Total Imports | Korea International Trade Association (K-stat) | stat.kita.net |
| Current Account Balance | Bank of Korea Balance of Payments | ecos.bok.or.kr |
| Foreign Reserves | Bank of Korea FX Reserves | — |
| External Debt | Bank of Korea External Debt Statistics | — |
| Unemployment Rate | Statistics Korea Labour Force Survey | — |
| Inflation Rate | Statistics Korea Consumer Price Index | — |
| Interest Rate | Bank of Korea Base Rate | — |
| FX Rate (USD ↔ Local) | Bank of Korea Market Mid-Rate (USD/KRW) | — |
Primary source, base date and supporting sources by indicator
The Korea pages use Ministry of Economy and Finance national debt (D1) as the headline and Bank of Korea household credit as the household series, drawing on the Bank of Korea national accounts, Statistics Korea and the Korea International Trade Association as primary sources per metric. The IMF, BIS and World Bank appear only as supporting sources for international comparison.
| Metric | Primary source | As of | Supporting |
|---|---|---|---|
| National Debt | MoEF National Debt (provisional) | 2026-01-01 | IMF Global Debt Database |
| Total Household Debt | Bank of Korea Household Credit Statistics | 2026-01-01 | BIS Total Credit to Households |
| Mortgage Debt | BoK Household Credit (mortgage) | 2026-01-01 | — |
| Credit Card Debt | BoK Household Credit (revolving / credit card) | 2026-01-01 | — |
| GDP | Bank of Korea National Accounts (nominal GDP) | 2026-01-01 | World Bank GDP (current LCU) |
| Population | Statistics Korea KOSIS Population Projection | 2026-01-01 | World Bank population, total |
| Government Revenue | MoEF Total Revenue (main budget) | 2026-01-01 | — |
| Government Spending | MoEF Total Expenditure (main budget) | 2026-01-01 | — |
| Total Exports | Korea International Trade Association (K-stat) | 2026-01-01 | — |
| Total Imports | Korea International Trade Association (K-stat) | 2026-01-01 | — |
| Current Account Balance | Bank of Korea Balance of Payments | 2026-01-01 | — |
| Foreign Reserves | Bank of Korea FX Reserves | 2026-01-01 | — |
| External Debt | Bank of Korea External Debt Statistics | 2026-01-01 | — |
| Unemployment Rate | Statistics Korea Labour Force Survey | 2026-06-30 | — |
| Inflation Rate | Statistics Korea Consumer Price Index | 2026-06-30 | — |
| Interest Rate | Bank of Korea Base Rate | 2026-07-16 | — |
| FX Rate (USD ↔ Local) | Bank of Korea Market Mid-Rate (USD/KRW) | 2026-10-19 | — |
| Debt per Citizen | Derived (computed from base series) | 2026-01-01 | — |
| Household Debt per Citizen | Derived (computed from base series) | 2026-01-01 | — |
| Debt to GDP | Derived (computed from base series) | 2026-01-01 | — |
| Fiscal Balance | Derived (computed from base series) | 2026-01-01 | — |
| Trade Balance | Derived (computed from base series) | 2026-01-01 | — |
How to read this table
The sources divide into primary and secondary. National debt comes from the Ministry of Economy and Finance’s Open Fiscal Data, household debt from the Bank of Korea’s household credit statistics, and population from Statistics Korea estimates — these are the primary sources. IMF and OECD material is cited only as secondary, to add international context; the headline figures are never replaced by those institutions’ values, because the domestic official series and the international series cover different perimeters even for the same Korean debt.
The differing release schedules across series drive the size of the extrapolation error. National debt mixes monthly and annual publication, household credit is quarterly, and population estimates are monthly. Live values start from each series’ most recent official release, so the estimated interval is short and the error small just after a release, growing as the next one approaches. For ratios such as debt per person, the numerator and denominator may carry different base dates.
When citing, carry the base date and the series name along with the value. Using baseAsOf and citeAs from the API response verbatim lets a third party reproduce the same figure. If you need an exact point-in-time value, follow the links in the table to the original release. Nothing on this site replaces the official statistics.
Series by series: publisher, cadence, revisions and how to check
Government debt and the budget
Published by the Ministry of Economy and Finance. Monthly central government debt appears in the Monthly Fiscal Review, the confirmed D1 including local government in the settlement-of-accounts documents each April, and annual series can be downloaded from the Open Fiscal Data portal. Total revenue and expenditure are on a main-budget basis, so they diverge from actual execution once a supplementary budget is passed. Revisions here mostly run one way, from provisional to confirmed; the D1 of a year whose accounts are closed rarely changes afterwards.
Base dates and source data
- National Debt — MoEF National Debt (provisional) · 2026-01-01 · moef.go.kr
- Government Revenue — MoEF Total Revenue (main budget) · 2026-01-01
- Government Spending — MoEF Total Expenditure (main budget) · 2026-01-01
Household debt
Released quarterly in the Bank of Korea’s household credit (preliminary) press release, with household loan and sales credit series available quarter by quarter in the Economic Statistics System (ECOS). Each release is marked preliminary and may be revised slightly the following quarter, so keep the press release date when citing. Mortgage and card balances are line items of the same release and share its base date.
Base dates and source data
- Total Household Debt — Bank of Korea Household Credit Statistics · 2026-01-01 · ecos.bok.or.kr
- Mortgage Debt — BoK Household Credit (mortgage) · 2026-01-01 · ecos.bok.or.kr
- Credit Card Debt — BoK Household Credit (revolving / credit card) · 2026-01-01 · ecos.bok.or.kr
Denominators: GDP and population
Nominal GDP comes from the Bank of Korea national accounts and population from the Statistics Korea population projections (KOSIS). The national accounts are revised from the quarterly flash to provisional and final figures, and the projections are redrawn every few years to reflect census results, so the population for the same year can differ depending on the projection vintage. Debt per person and the debt-to-GDP ratio inherit every revision to these two series.
Base dates and source data
- GDP — Bank of Korea National Accounts (nominal GDP) · 2026-01-01 · ecos.bok.or.kr
- Population — Statistics Korea KOSIS Population Projection · 2026-01-01 · kosis.kr
External accounts, prices and rates
The Bank of Korea publishes external debt quarterly and foreign reserves and the balance of payments monthly. Exports and imports are monthly statistics from the Korea International Trade Association’s K-stat, reprocessed from Korea Customs Service clearance data. Unemployment and consumer prices come from the monthly Statistics Korea employment and CPI releases, and the base rate from the Bank of Korea Monetary Policy Board, which meets eight times a year. Rate and ratio series are not interpolated, so the value on screen is simply the last release.
Base dates and source data
- External Debt — Bank of Korea External Debt Statistics · 2026-01-01
- Foreign Reserves — Bank of Korea FX Reserves · 2026-01-01
- Current Account Balance — Bank of Korea Balance of Payments · 2026-01-01 · ecos.bok.or.kr
- Total Exports — Korea International Trade Association (K-stat) · 2026-01-01 · stat.kita.net
- Total Imports — Korea International Trade Association (K-stat) · 2026-01-01 · stat.kita.net
- Unemployment Rate — Statistics Korea Labour Force Survey · 2026-06-30
- Inflation Rate — Statistics Korea Consumer Price Index · 2026-06-30
- Interest Rate — Bank of Korea Base Rate · 2026-07-16
- FX Rate (USD ↔ Local) — Bank of Korea Market Mid-Rate (USD/KRW) · 2026-10-19
How we estimate
Official statistics arrive on a monthly, quarterly, or annual schedule, so they are never live. To bridge the gaps, this site fixes the most recent official snapshot as a base value and compounds the published annual growth rate g forward. Written out, that is value(t) = base × (1 + g)^((t − t₀) / 1 year), where t₀ is the moment of the base snapshot and t is the instant shown on screen.
The figure on screen is therefore a smooth estimate drawn between releases, not the next confirmed official number, and the two will rarely match down to the digit. Each time a fresh official reading lands, we reset the base and the growth rate so the line snaps back onto it. For anything that demands precision, read the confirmed value at the primary source.
Reliability tiers
Not every indicator rests on a source of the same quality. Some figures are confirmed and released directly by a statistics agency, others have to be estimated by combining several series, and a few have no clean primary source and are filled in from auxiliary data. Rather than hide that gap, this site labels each number with one of three tiers.
official marks a value published directly by the responsible agency, estimate marks a value assembled from several series, and proxy marks a value patched from a supporting source where the primary one runs dry. Two indicators on the same screen can carry different tiers, so it is worth checking which tier applies before you quote a number.
How to cite
When you carry a figure from this site into an article or a study, prefer the snapshot API over the live value. A live value shifts with every read, while a snapshot returns the same number for the same t, which keeps the citation reproducible. A reference only earns its place if a reader can retrace it.
Rather than capturing the screen as an image, keep the citeAs string and the base date (baseAsOf) alongside the number. With those two in hand, anyone can later see exactly which base value the figure was interpolated from, and how.