Free tools & guides for food, travel, and daily life in Korea
Whether you are a traveler planning your first visit to Seoul, a food enthusiast curious about
Korean cuisine, or someone looking to explore Korean culture from home,
soundedfun.dev offers a growing collection of free, ad-supported tools and guides.
Every resource on this platform is built from firsthand research: real restaurant visits,
tested recipes, and original photography from across South Korea.
Every guide on soundedfun.dev is built from public data plus manual work by one person based in
Seoul. No aggregated content, no purchased listings, no user-generated reviews pasted verbatim.
Each project has a specific sourcing pipeline and quality threshold documented below.
Korea Eats scoring
Restaurants are pulled from Google Maps using a Selenium crawler that captures name, category,
address, GPS coordinates, rating, review count, and visible photos. Each restaurant receives a
composite score based on its Google rating and log-scaled review count. The minimum score for
inclusion is 7.0 out of roughly 12. Restaurants with over 1,000 reviews and a 4.9 to 5.0 rating
are excluded because experience has shown these are often marketing-driven rather than genuine
local favorites. District and cuisine category come directly from the crawled data, then mapped
to a bilingual (Ko/En) category tree.
Charim recipe sourcing
Recipes are adapted from established Korean cooking references, not scraped from blogs or
user-generated sites. Each recipe is structured with ingredients (amounts and units), step-by-step
instructions, cook and prep time, nutritional estimates, and difficulty rating. The ingredient
scaling calculator applies pure multiplication to maintain ratios across any target serving size.
English and Japanese versions are human-reviewed rather than raw machine output.
Wallpaper photography
Every wallpaper is original photography taken across South Korea: Seoul streets, Busan nights,
hanok villages, seasonal landscapes, temple grounds, cafes. Photos are cropped to both phone
(9:20) and desktop (16:9) aspect ratios, then compressed to WebP for fast loading with JPG
originals stored for full-resolution download. GPS coordinates, capture date, and dominant color
are extracted from EXIF metadata where available and displayed on each detail page.
Data updates and corrections
Restaurant data refreshes periodically from Google Maps. Because ratings and review counts change
over time, the displayed numbers may lag behind real-time values. The recommended workflow is to
use Korea Eats to discover a restaurant, then check Google Maps directly for current hours and
availability before visiting. Corrections can be emailed to
contact@soundedfun.dev
with the page URL and specific details.
Languages
Korea Eats, Charim, Korean Wallpapers, and Korean Sool are available in English, Korean, and
Japanese. Translations are reviewed for natural phrasing rather than published as raw machine
output. The goal is that a Japanese reader looking at a Seoul restaurant page and a Korean reader
looking at the same page see information written to the conventions of their own language, not
English prose awkwardly translated.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is everything on soundedfun.dev really free?
Yes. All tools and guides are completely free to use with no account required. The platform
is supported by minimal advertising through Google AdSense. There is no charge for access,
no user data is sold, and no content is locked behind paywalls.
How do you select which restaurants appear on Korea Eats?
Restaurants are sourced from Google Maps and filtered using a composite scoring system that
considers the Google rating and the logarithm of the review count. Only establishments that
meet a minimum quality threshold (score 7.0 or higher) are included. Paid listings and
sponsored placements are not accepted. Every restaurant earns its spot based on publicly
available data.
Why are some very high-rated restaurants missing from Korea Eats?
Restaurants with more than 1,000 reviews and ratings between 4.9 and 5.0 are excluded from
the listing. In practice these are often the result of aggressive marketing, review
incentives, or new-opening buzz rather than sustained local quality. The filter is
conservative rather than perfect. If you know a specific case that should be included,
please email with the restaurant name.
Are the restaurant ratings you show updated in real time?
No. Restaurant data is refreshed in periodic batches rather than live. The ratings and
review counts on Korea Eats reflect the most recent crawl, which may be days or weeks old.
For current business hours, temporary closures, or up-to-the-minute ratings, always check
the Google Maps link on the restaurant detail page before visiting.
Can I use the wallpapers for my phone or desktop?
Yes. All wallpapers on Korean Wallpapers are free for personal use. You can download them
in full resolution and use them as backgrounds on your phone, tablet, or computer. Commercial
use requires permission. Please email for licensing inquiries.
Can I use the photos in a blog post, video, or book?
Personal use (phone or desktop wallpaper) is free without attribution. For any publication,
commercial work, or redistribution, please email for written permission. Many photos are
also available through Shutterstock under separate licensing. Contact us and we can point
you to the matching stock listing.
How are the recipes on Charim tested?
Recipes on Charim are adapted from established Korean cooking references and checked for
accuracy in ingredient proportions and cooking steps. The automatic scaling feature
recalculates all quantities mathematically to maintain proper ratios across any serving
size. The scaling math is pure multiplication. It does not account for the fact that
certain ingredients (salt, spices, leavening) do not scale linearly in practice.
How many recipes and restaurants are on the site right now?
As of the most recent update: about 3,600 restaurants on Korea Eats, nearly 3,000 recipes
on Charim, over 1,300 wallpapers on Korean Wallpapers, and over 1,100 traditional drinks on
Korean Sool. These numbers grow over time as new data is added.
Is this run by a team or a single person?
A single person based in Seoul builds and maintains everything here. That is why all
guides share the same design system, the same scoring philosophy, and the same editorial
standards. There is no committee, no content farm, and no outsourced translation. It also
means response times can be slower than a professional operation, and that coverage is
necessarily biased toward the regions, cuisines, and topics the maintainer personally
prioritizes.
Do you accept guest posts, sponsored content, or paid listings?
No. No guest posts, no sponsored content, no paid listings, and no affiliate deals that
influence rankings. If a link goes to an affiliate program (for example, Coupang Partners
for cooking ingredients on Charim), it is disclosed with a "sponsored" link relation on
the link itself and labeled clearly on the page.
Where does the restaurant data come from, and is it legal to use?
Restaurant names, ratings, review counts, and addresses come from Google Maps, which is
public information. Crawling public data is permitted within reasonable rate limits. The
site does not republish Google's proprietary content such as user review text. Only
metadata like name, rating, and location, combined with an original scoring system and
curation. Google Maps itself is still the authoritative source and every restaurant
detail page links back to it.
Why is the site in English, Korean, and Japanese?
These are the three audiences that the maintainer can produce content for with reasonable
quality. Korean is the base language because the raw data (restaurants, recipes, regional
terms) is Korean. English is for international travelers and the global audience. Japanese
is added because Japan is one of the largest inbound tourist sources for Korea and the
translation workflow for Korean to Japanese produces noticeably higher quality than Korean
to most other languages. More languages are not planned in the near term.
How can I report an error or suggest an improvement?
Corrections and suggestions are welcome. Please email
contact@soundedfun.dev
with the page URL and a specific description of the issue. Typical response time is 2 to 3
business days.
Why does Korean Sool show so many products I have never heard of?
Korean traditional alcoholic beverages extend well beyond the soju and makgeolli that are
widely exported. The Korean Sool database includes regional cheongju, yakju, fruit wines,
distilled liquors, and small-batch artisanal products from breweries across the country.
Many of these are only sold in a handful of local shops. The catalog intentionally
emphasizes breadth over familiarity.
Do you have a privacy policy and terms of use?
Yes. See Privacy Policy for how
analytics and advertising cookies are handled, and
Terms of Use for the site's usage
conditions. Both are plain-language and cover everything relevant to a visitor.