Horse Racing in South Korea

Horse racing in South Korea runs at four racecourses, LetsRun Park Seoul, Busan-Gyeongnam, Yeongcheon and Jeju, plus around 20 off-course betting shops and online betting through the KRA site. The Korea Racing Authority (KRA) holds exclusive rights over racing operations at the Seoul, Busan-Gyeongnam and Jeju parks, and it sells the tickets, runs the off-course network and operates the online betting site⁷. Everything on this page, from the racecourses to the phone numbers, runs through the KRA. For how racing fits alongside the country's other legal gambling options, see gambling in South Korea.

The four racecourses

South Korea currently has four racecourses, all branded LetsRun Park¹.

LetsRun Park Seoul is the flagship. It sits on a 280-acre site in Gwacheon, just south of Seoul, built between 1984 and 1988, and the first race was held there on September 1, 1989¹. The address is 107 Gyeongma Kongwondaero, Gwacheon-si, Gyeonggi-do⁹. The park has two grandstands, Lucky Ville and Happy Ville, each with one basement floor and six floors above ground; the public can go up to floor 6 in Lucky Ville and floor 5 in Happy Ville¹⁰. Betting is spread across the buildings: staffed and unmanned ticket offices sit on floors 1 to 3 and on floor 6 of Lucky Ville, with unmanned machines on floors 4 and 5 of Happy Ville¹⁰. There is a Foreigner Information Center on floor 1, which is the natural first stop for a visitor¹⁰. A members room with about 880 seats occupies floor 6 of Lucky Ville¹⁰.

LetsRun Park Busan-Gyeongnam opened on September 30, 2005, on the site of the 2002 Asian Games equestrian venue in Busan². The betting and operations side sits at 929 Garak-daero, Gangseo-gu, Busan, while the grandstand is in Suga-dong and Jangyu-dong in Gimhae, Gyeongsangnam-do¹¹. The park is family friendly by design: alongside the grandstand, betting windows and VIP facilities there is a free pony riding experience, a mini soccer field, a children's playground, a horse riding experience hall and a free tour program¹¹. Entry is free on public holiday race days¹².

LetsRun Park Yeongcheon is the newest venue, opened on September 11, 2026, the first new LetsRun Park since Busan-Gyeongnam in 2005⁴. It is at 1 Gyeongmagongwon-ro, Gumho-eup, Yeongcheon-si, Gyeongsangbuk-do⁴. The site covers 1,475,000 square meters, with two racecourses and a grandstand built for 10,000 people¹³. In its opening period it ran 72 races over 12 days¹³. It races once a week, on Sundays, with six races per Sunday¹⁴.

LetsRun Park Jeju is on Jeju island, in Jeju-si, Jeju Special Self-Governing Province². It is the smallest of the four, but it has an interesting feature: since 1997 its races have been relayed to LetsRun Park Seoul and the KRA Plaza, and since 2005 also to Busan-Gyeongnam, as "cross races", two to four per day¹⁵.

Race days, times and simulcasts

Racing in Korea is mostly a weekend activity, and the schedule is published in advance by the KRA.

LetsRun Park Seoul holds its meetings on Saturday and Sunday only¹⁶. The published schedule covers the whole circuit: Friday racing, with 16 races and an 11:00 first race, takes place at Busan and Jeju¹⁶. First race post times for day racing are 10:35 on Saturday and 10:35 on Sunday at Seoul; for night racing, 14:00 on Friday at Busan and Jeju, 12:30 on Saturday and 10:35 on Sunday¹⁴. The last race of the day goes off by 18:00¹⁶. An average race day at Seoul carries about 12 races, with 30 to 35 minutes between each one, so a full day at the track runs from late morning to early evening¹.

The number of races released per day varies: 16 races on Friday and 17 on Saturday and Sunday in the published schedule¹⁶. Yeongcheon, as noted above, races only on Sundays¹⁴.

Jeju's cross races mean that even on a day when your local park has no live meeting, you can watch and bet on two to four Jeju races relayed in¹⁵. The parks also close for holidays: Busan-Gyeongnam, for example, closed September 21 to 29, 2026 for Chuseok, and did not run its weekday refund service on September 23 and 24 that week¹².

Race tickets: prices, limits and refunds

Race tickets (경주권) are pari-mutuel, which means the payout depends on how much money is in the pool and how many people picked the winner. A ticket can have a maximum face value of 100,000 won¹.

The basic numbers:

• Minimum bet: 100 won, and tickets are sold in units of 100 won³
• Maximum bet: 100,000 won per person per race, whatever the bet type³
• Sales window: tickets go on sale once the runners for a race are confirmed and stop before the race starts, at times set by the operator¹⁷
• Cancellation: an issued ticket can be canceled until the finishing order of the immediately preceding race is confirmed¹⁷

Payouts work like this: the operator takes the total sales for the race, deducts its margin and taxes, and divides the rest evenly among the winning units. You collect by presenting the winning ticket¹⁷. If a race is not constituted, has no winner, or only one or no runner starts, the vote is void and the purchase amount is refunded on request; a bet on a listed runner that does not start is also void¹⁷.

Refunds have a deadline. The right to claim a refund on a winning ticket, or the return of the purchase price on a void ticket, expires one year from the date the ticket was sold¹⁷. So do not tuck a winner away in a drawer for too long.

Admission is separate from betting. Adult entry to a LetsRun Park costs 2,000 won, and by law the entry fee cannot be paid by credit card or transport card, so bring cash⁴. LetsRun Park Seoul is closed every Monday and Tuesday⁹.

Bet types: quinella and account voting

Korean horse racing offers eight bet types: win, place, quinella, quinella place, exacta, tierce, trifecta, and special betting¹⁸. In plain terms:

• Win: pick the first-place horse
• Place: pick a horse that finishes in the top places
• Quinella: pick the first two finishers in either order
• Exacta: pick the first two finishers in the exact order
• Tierce and trifecta: pick the first three, with the trifecta requiring the exact order
• Quinella place: pick two horses that both finish in the top places

The unit bet is 100 won regardless of the type of betting, so a quinella costs the same per unit as a win bet¹.

Besides buying paper tickets at the windows, you can bet through an account, called account voting (계좌투표). The rules are strict and worth knowing before you open one:

• One account per person, opened in your real name as a permanent "real-name account"¹⁷
• You can only bet within your deposited balance¹⁷
• No interest is paid on deposits¹⁷
• The operator may set per-deposit and maximum deposit limits¹⁷
• Each deposit through a bank virtual account carries a bank fee, deducted from the amount deposited¹⁷
• If there is no activity for a year or more, the account may be managed as dormant and can be terminated or suspended after notice; after five years of inactivity it is terminated without notice¹⁷
• A claim to get your deposit back expires five years from your last transaction¹⁷

Account applications are refused for third-party or false-name applications, corporate or joint names, and people restricted from buying race tickets under the relevant racing laws¹⁷.

Off-course betting shops and the Let's Run Culture Empathy Center

You do not have to go to a racecourse to bet. The KRA runs about 20 off-course betting shops nationwide, known as Let's Run Culture Empathy Centers, for fans who find it hard to visit a racing park¹. These branches sell betting tickets and pay refunds based on relays of the races held at the racecourses²⁰. The Walkerhill branch, for example, offers betting ticket sales and race viewing with guides on bet types and how to fill in a purchase slip²¹.

A Wikipedia list dated June 2018 shows branches spread across the regions as follows, a total of 30 offices¹⁹:

The KRA describes its branch network as 26 offices in total, 21 in the capital area and 5 in the provinces²⁰.

The Culture Empathy Centers operate a reserved seating system, with a minimum charge of 5,000 won, and you can reserve a seat from the day before a racing day through the internet homepage or the My Card app¹⁹. A share of the leisure tax on betting purchases at a branch goes to the local government where the branch sits and to the local government of the park holding the race¹⁹.

Online betting through the KRA official site

The KRA is allowed to sell betting tickets in electronic form through information and communications networks, at places other than the racecourses and off-course betting centers, which is the legal basis for betting online through the official KRA site¹⁸. This is the only online horse racing betting channel in the country.

One thing you cannot do is bet on overseas horse races. The law prohibits running electronic betting in Korea on horse races held overseas and distributing goods or property interests to the winning ticket holders¹⁸. So if you are used to betting on races in Japan or Hong Kong, that is not available through the KRA.

For the wider picture of what is and is not available online, see online betting sites in South Korea.

The Korea Cup and big race days

The biggest race on the Korean calendar is the Korea Cup. The 9th running, a Grade 1 race held on September 6, 2026, carried 800 million won for the winner, with 320 million for second place and 160 million for third, from a total purse of 1,600 million won²². It is an international invitational, so foreign horses and jockeys come to Korea for it, which makes it a good day to visit even if you do not bet.

Race programs list where each horse was produced, using codes such as 한국 for Korea and 미국 for the USA, so you can see the import mix in each field²⁴.

Beyond the racing, the parks host seasonal events. LetsRun Park Seoul ran an autumn festival from October 2 to 11, 2026, on the Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday within that span, a total of seven days⁴. A One-Day Pass free entry event ran through September 21, 2026, with passes issued by September 20 usable until December 13, 2026; after the event ended, free entry remained available by signing up on the DerbyOn app⁴.

Who can bet

Horse racing is one of the legal gambling products in South Korea, alongside casinos, cycle racing, motorboat racing, lotteries, sports promotion voting tickets and bullfighting²⁵. The KRA holds exclusive rights over the racing operations at the Seoul, Busan-Gyeongnam and Jeju parks⁷.

Anyone buying tickets, whether a citizen, foreign resident or visitor, bets under the same KRA rules: 100 won minimum, 100,000 won maximum per race, one real-name account per person for account voting³. Foreigners have a dedicated information center at LetsRun Park Seoul on floor 1¹⁰. English commentary is available only for Seoul and Busan races, so a visitor at Jeju or Yeongcheon will hear Korean commentary⁵. For the age rules that apply across all gambling in the country, see gambling age in South Korea.

Useful phone numbers

• KRA main sales helpline: 1566-3333, the number to call for ticketing and general racing questions⁶
• Automated race information (ARS): 1566-9977⁶
• Busan-Gyeongnam race office: also reachable on 1566-3333²⁶
• Korea Problem Gambling Agency: 02-740-9000²⁷
• Helpline 1336: the Korea Center on Gambling Problems counseling line²⁸
• Travel Hotline: 1330 (+82-2-1330), offering help in Korean, English, Japanese and Chinese, useful for visitors asking about transport to the parks²⁹

For help with problem gambling more broadly, see gambling help in South Korea.