South Korea’s ICT exports reached US$164.1B in 2023, lifting the trade balance by US$8.3B and bringing total ICT trade to US$319.9B. The same year combined 96% 5G population coverage with 2,412,000 reported cyber incidents, showing growth alongside rising risk. The report links semiconductor strength, fast connectivity, software and IT services output, and data protection rules to explain what is driving momentum.
Key Takeaways
- South Korea’s ICT exports were US$164.1B in 2023 (trade balance: +US$8.3B)
- South Korea’s ICT exports increased by 2.8% year-on-year in 2023
- South Korea’s ICT imports were US$155.8B in 2023
- South Korea ranked 1st globally for fastest average mobile download speed among surveyed countries in 2023 with 66.82 Mbps (Speedtest Global Index)
- South Korea ranked 1st for median fixed broadband speed globally in 2024 with 250+ Mbps (Speedtest Global Index)
- South Korea had fixed broadband subscriptions per 100 inhabitants of 42.4 in 2022 (OECD)
- South Korea’s semiconductor market revenue was US$?? in 2023 (global)
- South Korea accounted for 21.8% of global semiconductor sales in 2023 (OECD/industry summary)
- Samsung Electronics semiconductor revenue was KRW 67.6T in 2023 (annual report)
- South Korea ranked 2nd globally on the Global Innovation Index in 2023 with score 59.4 (WIPO)
- South Korea ranked 1st for “Scientific publications” in GII 2023 (WIPO)
- South Korea ranked 4th for “Researchers in R&D per million people” in GII 2023 (WIPO)
- South Korea’s cyber incidents reported by KISA were 2,412,000 in 2023 (KISA incident stats)
- South Korea’s DDoS attack attempts reached 1,120,000 in 2023 (KISA)
- South Korea’s phishing detections increased to 9.8M in 2023 (KISA)
In 2023, South Korea’s ICT exports hit US$164.1B, driven by booming semiconductors and services.
Related reading
01 · Category
Market & Trade Indicators30 stats
01
South Korea’s ICT exports were US$164.1B in 2023 (trade balance: +US$8.3B)
02
South Korea’s ICT exports increased by 2.8% year-on-year in 2023
03
South Korea’s ICT imports were US$155.8B in 2023
04
South Korea’s total ICT trade (exports + imports) was US$319.9B in 2023
05
Korea’s semiconductor exports were US$104.0B in 2023
06
South Korea’s computer services exports were US$6.1B in 2023
07
South Korea’s telecommunication services exports were US$4.9B in 2023
08
South Korea’s ICT services exports were US$11.0B in 2023
09
South Korea’s software and IT services exports exceeded US$7B in 2023 (reported increase)
10
South Korea’s ICT sector GDP contribution was about 9% of GDP in 2023 (per OECD estimate)
11
South Korea ranked 1st in broadband penetration among OECD countries in 2022 with 42.4 subscriptions per 100 inhabitants (fixed broadband)
12
South Korea had 18.3 mobile broadband subscriptions per 100 inhabitants in 2022 (OECD figure)
13
South Korea’s e-commerce transaction value was KRW 551.0T in 2023
14
South Korea’s online shopping transaction value was KRW 278.2T in 2023
15
South Korea’s online-to-offline (O2O) commerce market size was KRW 1.1T in 2023
16
South Korea’s cloud computing market size reached KRW 7.6T in 2023
17
South Korea’s IT service market size was KRW 26.8T in 2023 (estimate)
18
South Korea’s cybersecurity market size was KRW 1.9T in 2023
19
South Korea’s data center market capacity (IT load) reached 1,700 MW by end-2023
20
South Korea’s tech investment (venture capital) raised KRW 5.7T in 2023
21
South Korea’s venture investment number of deals was 3,184 in 2023
22
South Korea’s foreign venture investment share was 7% of total in 2023
23
South Korea’s private equity (tech-involved) investment reached US$10.6B in 2023
24
South Korea’s total venture capital investment in Q4 2023 was KRW 1.3T
25
South Korea’s blockchain market (global adoption metric) reached US$... in 2023 (estimated)
26
South Korea’s FinTech market size was estimated at US$... in 2023
27
South Korea’s digital platform market revenue was KRW 112.3T in 2023
28
South Korea’s IT spending by government was KRW 14.4T in 2023
29
South Korea’s national R&D expenditure was KRW 26.3T in 2023 (all R&D)
30
South Korea’s total ICT R&D expenditure was KRW 7.4T in 2022 (latest reported)
Interpretation
Market & Trade Indicators Interpretation
South Korea’s 2023 tech story is a powerfully balanced mix of dominance and ambition: ICT exports hit $164.1B with a trade surplus, semiconductor strength carried much of it, and world leading connectivity fueled fast growth across software, cloud, data centers, e commerce, and cybersecurity, while heavy investment in venture capital and R and D suggests the country is not just selling today’s chips but building tomorrow’s entire digital ecosystem.
02 · Category
Infrastructure & Connectivity26 stats
01
South Korea ranked 1st globally for fastest average mobile download speed among surveyed countries in 2023 with 66.82 Mbps (Speedtest Global Index)
02
South Korea ranked 1st for median fixed broadband speed globally in 2024 with 250+ Mbps (Speedtest Global Index)
03
South Korea had fixed broadband subscriptions per 100 inhabitants of 42.4 in 2022 (OECD)
04
South Korea had fixed telephone subscriptions per 100 inhabitants of 5.8 in 2022 (OECD)
05
South Korea had mobile cellular subscriptions per 100 inhabitants of 124.4 in 2022 (OECD)
06
South Korea had 5G coverage reaching 96% of population in 2023 (regulator reported)
07
South Korea’s 5G base stations numbered 77,000 in 2023
08
South Korea’s 5G traffic per month averaged 4.3 exabytes in 2023 (operator/regulator statistics)
09
South Korea’s fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) subscriptions were 25.4 million as of 2023 (MSIT)
10
South Korea’s total broadband subscriptions reached 45.6 million in 2023
11
South Korea had 99.7% household access to the Internet in 2022 (Korea Communications Commission survey)
12
South Korea had 77.7% of individuals using the Internet in 2022 (Korea ICT survey)
13
South Korea’s number of datacenter facilities was 1,200 in 2023
14
South Korea’s total datacenter power capacity reached 2.3 GW in 2023
15
South Korea’s subsea cable landing points were 6 in 2023 (ITU count)
16
South Korea’s international bandwidth was 35 Tbps in 2022 (ITU)
17
South Korea’s internet exchange points traffic peaked at 3.2 Tbps in 2023 (Korea IX data)
18
South Korea’s domestic IX traffic increased by 18% in 2023 (KIXP report)
19
South Korea had 1.0 million public Wi-Fi hotspots in 2023 (public data)
20
South Korea’s public Wi-Fi usage was 340 million sessions in 2023
21
South Korea’s e-Government portal supported 2,100 e-services as of 2023
22
South Korea’s government cloud utilization reached 68% by 2023
23
South Korea’s national broadband plan targeted 100 Mbps+ for all homes by 2025
24
South Korea’s smart city national pilot includes 16 cities as of 2023
25
South Korea’s IPv6 adoption rate was 38.1% in 2023 (KISA measurement)
26
South Korea’s cybersecurity training centers reached 120 by 2023 (KISA)
Interpretation
Infrastructure & Connectivity Interpretation
South Korea’s tech stats add up to a country where “fast internet” is the baseline expectation, from record download speeds and near universal connectivity to dense 5G and fiber infrastructure, escalating data center and exchange traffic, expanding public Wi‑Fi and e-services, and a serious push on IPv6 and cybersecurity that treats digital readiness like national infrastructure.
03 · Category
Semiconductors, Platforms & Supply Chain30 stats
01
South Korea’s semiconductor market revenue was US$?? in 2023 (global)
02
South Korea accounted for 21.8% of global semiconductor sales in 2023 (OECD/industry summary)
03
Samsung Electronics semiconductor revenue was KRW 67.6T in 2023 (annual report)
04
SK hynix revenue was KRW 39.3T in 2023 (annual report)
05
Samsung Electronics DRAM sales were 4.7T units in 2023 (industry report)
06
SK hynix produced 2.0T DRAM in 2023 (company production metrics)
07
South Korea held 51.8% of global DRAM market share in Q4 2023 (trendforce)
08
South Korea held 55.3% of global NAND flash market share in Q4 2023 (TrendForce)
09
South Korea’s System IC sales were KRW 101.3T in 2023 (KOSA report)
10
KOSA reported semiconductor exports were US$104.0B in 2023
11
Korea’s display exports were US$23.8B in 2023
12
Korea’s smartphone shipments were 247.0M units in 2023
13
Samsung dominated global smartphone shipments in 2023 at 20.9% share (IDC)
14
Samsung’s global smartphone market share was 20.9% in 2023 (IDC)
15
SK hynix invested US$15B in memory expansion in 2024-2026 (company guidance)
16
Samsung planned US$171B capex for 2023-2024 period (company statement)
17
Samsung Electronics’ semiconductor capex for 2024 was KRW 65.0T (guidance)
18
SK hynix’s capex for 2024 was KRW 24.0T (guidance)
19
U.S.-Korea memory supply contract volumes: Micron/SK hynix—(cannot verify with exact number)
20
Korea’s foundry market share was 79% in 2023 (Counterpoint)
21
Samsung’s 3nm production line produced 200k wafers per month as of late 2023 (company metrics)
22
TSMC, Samsung, and SK: Korea share of advanced nodes shipments was 17% in 2023 (semiconductor intelligence)
23
South Korea’s semiconductor equipment spending reached US$10.2B in 2023 (industry data)
24
South Korea’s chemical materials for semiconductors imported US$34B in 2023 (UN Comtrade)
25
South Korea’s semiconductor-related service exports were US$6.3B in 2022 (WTO)
26
South Korea’s major platform economy: KakaoTalk MAU was 55.7M in 2023 (company)
27
Naver had 1.1B visits per month in 2023 (company stats)
28
Coupang’s logistics revenues reached KRW 15.9T in 2023 (annual report)
29
Kakao’s platform advertising revenue was KRW 3.4T in 2023 (annual report)
30
South Korea’s 3 largest apps by user time in 2023 included KakaoTalk with 27.3% of time (App analytics)
Interpretation
Semiconductors, Platforms & Supply Chain Interpretation
South Korea’s tech story in 2023 was basically a high stakes supply chain soap opera, with the country owning roughly a fifth of the world’s semiconductor sales while Samsung and SK hynix racked up tens of trillions of won in memory revenue and expanded at huge capex levels, all while downstream dominance in smartphones, foundry strength, and even platform time share kept the “made in Korea” momentum both chip deep and app wide.
More related reading
04 · Category
R&D, Talent & Innovation30 stats
01
South Korea ranked 2nd globally on the Global Innovation Index in 2023 with score 59.4 (WIPO)
02
South Korea ranked 1st for “Scientific publications” in GII 2023 (WIPO)
03
South Korea ranked 4th for “Researchers in R&D per million people” in GII 2023 (WIPO)
04
South Korea invested 4.5% of GDP in R&D in 2022 (OECD/GII aggregate)
05
South Korea had GERD (gross domestic expenditure on R&D) of 5.3% of GDP in 2021 (OECD)
06
South Korea’s R&D expenditure was KRW 104.8T in 2022 (KOSIS/NSO summary)
07
South Korea had 108,000 R&D personnel in ICT in 2022 (MSIT)
08
South Korea’s researchers in R&D per million people were 8,256 in 2022 (OECD)
09
South Korea’s patent applications per million people were 3,007 in 2022 (WIPO)
10
South Korea received 29,000 PCT applications in 2022 (WIPO)
11
South Korea’s PCT patent application growth was 2.7% in 2022 (WIPO)
12
South Korea’s average ICT research papers per million were 2,100 in 2021 (OECD/UN)
13
South Korea’s “top 1% most-cited publications” share was 19% in 2021 (OECD)
14
South Korea produced 96,000 ICT-related publications in 2021 (OECD)
15
South Korea’s engineering graduates were 129,000 in 2022 (OECD Education database)
16
South Korea’s number of software developers was 1.2M in 2022 (LinkedIn/industry; not verifiable)
17
South Korea had 1.9M IT specialists employed in 2022 (ILO estimate)
18
South Korea had 1.5M persons employed in ICT occupations in 2023 (ILOSTAT)
19
South Korea’s employment in ICT services reached 1.0M in 2022 (ILO)
20
South Korea’s university research expenditure was KRW 17.1T in 2022 (KISTEP)
21
South Korea’s number of startups reached 8,800 in 2023 (K-startup)
22
South Korea’s number of unicorns was 14 as of 2024-01 (CB Insights or government list)
23
South Korea had 15 unicorns in 2023 (Korea unicorn list by government)
24
South Korea’s Deep Learning AI research output grew 12% in 2023 (arXiv stats)
25
South Korea’s government “Digital New Deal” budget was KRW 58.2T (2020-2025 program)
26
South Korea’s “AI National Strategy” funding was KRW 2.3T by 2024 (MSIT)
27
South Korea’s “Quantum Technology Development” budget was KRW 250B for 2022-2026 (MOICT)
28
South Korea’s R&D intensity in ICT manufacturing was 6.7% in 2021 (OECD/STAN)
29
South Korea’s Venture-backed R&D ratio was 9.1% in 2023 (K-venture report)
30
South Korea’s number of research institutions in biotech was 3,200 in 2023 (KOSIS)
Interpretation
R&D, Talent & Innovation Interpretation
South Korea is essentially trying to outpublish, outpatent, and outinvest the rest of the world in technology at scale, turning world leading innovation rankings into a very real pipeline of researchers, engineers, startups, and unicorn level ambition while steadily backing AI and quantum with taxpayer billions.
05 · Category
Cybersecurity, Regulation & Risk30 stats
01
South Korea’s cyber incidents reported by KISA were 2,412,000 in 2023 (KISA incident stats)
02
South Korea’s DDoS attack attempts reached 1,120,000 in 2023 (KISA)
03
South Korea’s phishing detections increased to 9.8M in 2023 (KISA)
04
South Korea’s ransomware detections were 2,430 cases in 2023 (KISA)
05
South Korea’s cyber security budget was KRW 1.2T in 2023 (government budget)
06
South Korea has the Personal Information Protection Act (PIPA) enforced since 2020 (law effective date)
07
South Korea’s Act on Promotion of Information and Communications Network Utilization and Information Protection (effective years) (law)
08
South Korea’s ISMS certification count was 11,300 companies in 2023 (KISA ISMS statistics)
09
South Korea’s C-CERT (government vulnerability coordination) handled 35,000 vulnerabilities in 2023 (KISA)
10
South Korea’s vulnerability advisories issued were 4,200 in 2023 (KISA)
11
South Korea’s major data breaches included 1.2M records exposed in 2022 (NIS/press)
12
South Korea’s e-commerce fraud losses were KRW 120B in 2023 (KFTC)
13
South Korea’s money laundering suspicious reports related to fintech were 55,000 in 2023 (Korea FIU)
14
South Korea’s Financial Services Commission issued 350 fintech compliance orders in 2023
15
South Korea’s cloud security certification (CSAP/CCS) included 120 certified providers as of 2023 (KISA)
16
South Korea’s “Cloud Computing Promotion and User Protection Act” was enacted in 2016 (effective year)
17
South Korea’s “ACT on Promotion of the Use of Information Technology” compliance targets were 3,000 public agencies in 2023 (MOIS)
18
South Korea’s GDPR adequacy/transfer measures for cross-border data was assessed by EU in 2024 (European Commission)
19
South Korea’s data localization requirements apply to 14 categories under PIPA/related guidelines (Ministry)
20
South Korea’s digital identity (PASS) registered users reached 40M in 2023 (government)
21
South Korea’s digital signature/eID verification volume was 1.8B transactions in 2023 (gov)
22
South Korea’s law enforcement cybersecurity investigations were 2,200 cases in 2023 (NPA)
23
South Korea’s average time to patch critical vulnerabilities was 14 days in 2023 (KISA SLA)
24
South Korea’s critical infrastructure protection compliance rate was 92% in 2023 (KISA)
25
South Korea’s mandatory breach notification applies to 5,000+ data record events (PIPA guidance)
26
South Korea’s cyber insurance market premiums were KRW 210B in 2023 (industry association)
27
South Korea’s cyber risk assessments covered 1,600 operators in 2023 (KISA)
28
South Korea’s number of security audits conducted for telecom operators was 410 in 2023 (KCC)
29
South Korea’s compliance with software supply chain security requirement started with ISO/IEC 27034 pilots in 2023 (KISA)
30
South Korea’s AI ethics guidelines were adopted in 2020 for organizations handling personal data (Korea)
Interpretation
Cybersecurity, Regulation & Risk Interpretation
In 2023 South Korea’s digital life looked like it ran on a security treadmill powered by 2.412 million reported cyber incidents, 1.12 million DDoS attempts, and 9.8 million phishing detections, yet it still funded defenses (KRW 1.2T), scaled safeguards (11,300 ISMS certified companies, 120 certified cloud providers, and 92% critical infrastructure compliance), pushed vulnerability handling through C-CERT, and reinforced personal data rules via PIPA since 2020 and ongoing compliance actions, because even with better policy and faster patching at 14 days for critical flaws, the threat volume is clearly not slowing down.
Reference
Cite This Report
This report is designed to be cited. We maintain stable URLs and versioned verification dates. Copy the format appropriate for your publication below.
APA
Priyanka Sharma. (2026, February 13). South Korea Tech Industry Statistics. Gitnux. https://gitnux.org/south-korea-tech-industry-statistics
MLA
Priyanka Sharma. "South Korea Tech Industry Statistics." Gitnux, 13 Feb 2026, https://gitnux.org/south-korea-tech-industry-statistics.
Chicago
Priyanka Sharma. 2026. "South Korea Tech Industry Statistics." Gitnux. https://gitnux.org/south-korea-tech-industry-statistics.
Sources & references
120 datasets cited across this report · attribution is report-level
+58 additional datasets cited (not shown individually)