South Korea Withholding tax rates
South Korea Withholding tax rates: no single figure applies. The reason is set out below, cited to the governing instrument. Last checked against the official source on 10 Aug 2026.
The withholding taxes South Korea levies on Korean-source payments to foreign corporations and non-resident individuals without a Korean permanent establishment - dividends, interest and royalties - each at its domestic statutory rate before any tax treaty relief. National withholding under Corporate Tax Act art. 98 / Income Tax Act art. 156 carries a local income tax surtax of 10% of the tax withheld. Administered by the National Tax Service.
Compare withholding tax rates across all 28 Asian countries →
| Current value | structured — see the API |
|---|---|
| In force from | — |
| Official source | National Tax Service (국세청), withholding-tax rate table for domestic-source income of non-residents and foreign corporations where no treaty applies (비거주자 및 외국법인의 국내원천소득, 조세조약이 없는 경우): 이자 (interest) 20% - 채권이자 (bond interest) 14%; 배당 (dividends) 20%; 사용료 (royalties) 20%. Statutory basis: 법인세법 제98조 (Corporate Tax Act art. 98) and 소득세법 제156조 (Income Tax Act art. 156). |
| Last verified | 2026-08-10 |
| Verification | primary — No verification limitation recorded — read from the official source cited. The national rates (20%, bond interest 14%) are verified from the National Tax Service's own rate table in Korean. The local income tax surtax - 10% of the withheld national tax, under the Local Tax Act (지방세법) special collection rules - is verified from secondary professional sources (PwC Worldwide Tax Summaries: 'In addition to this, there is a local income tax of 10% on the WHT liability'); the Local Tax Act text itself was not retrieved. The combined 22%/15.4% figures served as the rates therefore rest on a primary national component and a secondary-confirmed local component. |
| Provenance | source fingerprint |
What this value means
THERE IS NO SINGLE WITHHOLDING TAX RATE, WHICH IS WHY value IS NULL. Korea withholds at a combined 22% on dividends, interest and royalties (15.4% on bond interest) paid to foreign corporations and non-residents without a Korean permanent establishment. A caller wanting a number must name which payment type; read withholding_rates rather than expecting a headline figure. ALL RATES ARE DOMESTIC STATUTORY RATES, BEFORE TREATY RELIEF. A tax treaty can reduce any of them, and whether relief is available depends on the recipient's residence, beneficial ownership and (for reduced rates) Korea's application procedures; recipients in designated low-tax jurisdictions face the domestic rate unless pre-approved. We do NOT serve treaty rates: they are bilateral, run to many country pairs, and applying one is a legal determination rather than a lookup. RATE COMPOSITION: each served rate is the NATIONAL withholding rate under Corporate Tax Act art. 98 / Income Tax Act art. 156 (20%, or 14% for bond interest) PLUS local income tax of 10% OF THE NATIONAL TAX under the Local Tax Act: 20% x 1.1 = 22%; 14% x 1.1 = 15.4%. Sources quoting '20%' are quoting the national component only. Since 1 January 2023, interest and capital gains on prescribed Korean government bonds and monetary stabilization bonds held by qualifying non-residents are exempt from withholding.
Get it programmatically
curl https://asiaref.dev/v1/kr/withholding-tax
# $0.005 per call — x402 on Base (USDC). No key, no signup.
# History: curl https://asiaref.dev/v1/kr/withholding-tax/history?from=2020-01-01
# Provenance: curl https://asiaref.dev/provenance/kr/withholding-taxOther South Korea series: Bank of Korea Base Rate · Statutory interest (법정이율) · Value-Added Tax (부가가치세) standard rate · VAT registration threshold · National minimum wage (최저임금) · Public holidays · Consumer price inflation (소비자물가 상승률) · Corporate income tax (법인세) top rate · Personal income tax (종합소득세) schedule · Statutory social-insurance contributions
The same figure elsewhere: Sri Lanka · Taiwan · Thailand · Türkiye · United Arab Emirates · all 28