있어요 / 없어요: How to Say a Thing Exists, or You Have It (or Don't)

You just learned to say what something is — 커피예요, 학생이에요. Now you land in Korea and need to say something else: “Is there wifi?” “Do you have this in a large?” “There’s no seat.” None of those are “it is” sentences — they’re exists / have sentences, and Korean uses a completely different word for them.

I grew up speaking Korean. This is the word beginners reach for wrong more than almost any other — because English hides two different ideas inside one tiny word: is.

The whole rule, up front

이에요/예요 = “it is ___” (naming what something is) 있어요 = “there is ___ / I have ___ / it exists” 없어요 = the opposite of 있어요: “there isn’t / I don’t have / it’s gone”

English blurs these. “There is wifi” and “It is wifi” both use is — but they’re totally different jobs. Korean keeps them apart: naming a thing is 이에요, but saying a thing exists or is possessed is 있어요. Mix them up and you’ll say “it’s a bathroom?” when you meant “is there a bathroom?”

Say you sit down at a café and want to get online:

The one pair that unlocks it — hear the switch

있어요 and 없어요 are a matched pair: there is ↔ there isn’t. Same sentence, flip the meaning. Tap them back to back until the difference is automatic:

있어요.🔊 ↔ 없어요.🔊 (There is. / I have it. ↔ There isn’t. / I don’t have it.)

That’s genuinely most of what you need. Picture a café counter — you’d rather pay in cash, so you check what you’re carrying:

(In Korea almost every café takes cards, so you rarely have to ask — but 있어요/없어요 is how you’d tell someone what you do or don’t have.)

🔊 Try shadowing it: tap 있어요 ↔ 없어요, then say them out loud right after, three times. The rhythm sticks faster than the spelling.

💡 Words

• 있어요 — there is / (I) have · 없어요 — there isn’t / (I) don’t have
• 현금 — cash · 카드 — card · -으로/-로 할게요 — “I’ll go with / pay by ___”

Where it actually shows up

Almost every “do you have…?” or “is there…?” question is just noun + 있어요? Here’s a shop, hunting for your size:

See the pattern? You never build a complicated sentence — you name the thing, add 있어요?, done. The answer comes back as bare 있어요 or 없어요. (Korean stores use 라지 / 미디움 / 스몰 — just say the size you want.)

💡 Words

• 라지 — large (Korean uses XS·S·M·L·XL — 스몰·미디움·라지) · 검은색 — black (color) · -도 — too / also

The mix-up that lasts (이에요 vs 있어요)

This is the trap. Both feel like “is” in English, so beginners swap them. Watch how they split in a real moment — you walk into a restaurant and the staff greets you:

See the split? 두 명이에요 names something (how many people). 자리 있어요? asks whether a seat exists. Reach for 이에요 when you’re naming, 있어요 when you’re asking if something’s there. Say 자리예요? and you’ve named a seat instead of asking for one — that’s the mix-up.

(Want to book ahead instead of walking in? 예약 가능해요?🔊 — “Can I make a reservation?”)

💡 Words

• 명 — the counter for people (두 명 = two people) · 자리 — a seat / table
• -세요 — a polite ending staff use (몇 분이세요? = the polite “how many?”); you don’t need to build it yourself here, just recognize it

Quick check: you want to ask if the bathroom exists. Which word?

있어요 → 화장실 있어요?🔊 — you’re asking whether one exists, not naming a door in front of you.

Now say your own

You’re traveling. Ask for three things you’d actually want — out loud, in Korean:

Notice you reused one pattern — (thing) 있어요? — for all three. That’s the whole trick: learn the frame, swap the noun.

💡 Words

• 메뉴판 — menu (the physical one) · 영어 메뉴 — English menu

Quiz yourself

Say it out loud before opening each answer.

Q1. At a café, you want to ask “Is there wifi?”

answer

와이파이 있어요?🔊 — noun + 있어요? Not 와이파이예요 (that would just be naming the wifi).

Q2. The staff checks and the black one is sold out. How do they say “We don’t have it”?

answer

없어요.🔊 — the opposite of 있어요. Bare, no extra words needed.

Q3. (from last lesson) Your name is Tom. How do you introduce yourself?

answer

제 이름은 톰이에요.🔊 — 톰 ends in a consonant → 이에요. (This is naming, so it’s 이에요, not 있어요.)

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You can now do two huge things: say what something is (이에요/예요) and whether it exists or you have it (있어요/없어요). Between them, you can already find, order, and ask for almost anything.

30-second self-check

Say each one out loud before you move on.

• I can ask if a shop has something, and understand the answer either way
• I know 있어요 = it exists / I have it, and 없어요 = it doesn’t / I don’t
• I don’t reach for 이에요 when I mean 있어요 — “it IS a thing” vs “there IS a thing”

📌 Pocket cheat sheet: 이에요 names it. 있어요 says it’s there.

From here, two paths open up. You’ll keep adding grammar — the little particles and verb endings that make sentences flow. But there’s also a quieter skill that separates learners from natural speakers: knowing the small word choices Koreans notice but never correct out loud. The first one catches almost everybody — the “you” that feels polite in English but lands wrong in Korean →.

Every Korean example here was written from scratch and reviewed by a native speaker before publishing.