Students from abroad experience the traditional way of washing hair at the National Folk Museum of Korea in Jongno district in central Seoul on June 5, 2024. (YONHAP)

The number of foreign students coming to Korea exceeded 200,000 in the first half of this year, setting a record for a six-month period, according to data from the Korea Tourism Organization on Monday.

The number of foreigners visiting Korea to attend school or learn Korean rose 50.6 percent to 204,000 compared to the same period last year.

The largest proportion were Chinese students, who made up 55.2 percent of the total, followed by students from Vietnam (33,000), Japan (6,900), Mongolia (6,700) and Uzbekistan (5,000). In addition, more than 3,000 students came from France (3,500) and the United States (3,100). More than 1,000 students also came from countries such as Taiwan (2,600), Myanmar (2,300), Germany (2,000), Indonesia (1,900), Russia (1,500) and Hong Kong (1,200).

The number of foreign students coming to Korea had been rising steadily until the Covid-19 outbreak, reaching 191,000 in the second half of 2019 but then falling to just 30,000 in the same period the following year.

In 2022, student numbers began to recover, with 55,000 and 97,000 students reported in the first and second half of 2022, respectively, and 136,000 and 178,000 in the first and second half of 2023, respectively.

BY LEE JIAN ([email protected])