The Most Famous
SWIMMERS from South Korea
This page contains a list of the greatest South Korean Swimmers. The pantheon dataset contains 709 Swimmers, 1 of which were born in South Korea. This makes South Korea the birth place of the 41st most number of Swimmers behind Slovakia, and Philippines.
Top 2
The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the most legendary South Korean Swimmers of all time. This list of famous South Korean Swimmers is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity.
1. Park Tae-hwan (b. 1989)
With an HPI of 35.92, Park Tae-hwan is the most famous South Korean Swimmer. His biography has been translated into 28 different languages on wikipedia.
Park Tae-hwan (Korean: 박태환; Hanja: 朴泰桓, Korean pronunciation: [pak̚.tʰɛ̝.ɦwan]; born September 27, 1989) is a South Korean competitive swimmer who is an Olympic gold medalist and world champion. He has four Olympic medals, five world titles, and 20 Asian Games medals. He won a gold medal in the 400-meter freestyle and a silver in the 200-meter freestyle events at the 2008 Summer Olympics. He also won two silver medals at the 2012 Summer Olympics in the 200- and 400-meter freestyle. He is the first Asian swimmer to claim a gold medal in the men's 400-meter freestyle, and the first-ever South Korean swimmer to win any Olympic medal in swimming. He also holds 3 Asian Records, all in Men's Freestyle. He is best known for his impressive range and versatility, as he is able to compete at international level in 100-, 200-, 400- and 1,500-meter freestyle.
2. Kim Seo-yeong (b. 1994)
With an HPI of 0.00, Kim Seo-yeong is the 2nd most famous South Korean Swimmer. Her biography has been translated into different languages.
Kim Seo-yeong (Korean: 김서영; born March 17, 1994, in Suwon) is a South Korean swimmer, who specialized in individual medley events. Kim broke a South Korean record of 2:13.65 to take the bronze medal in the 200 m individual medley at the 2009 East Asian Games in Hong Kong. Kim qualified for the women's 400 m individual medley at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, by clearing a FINA B-standard entry time of 4:46.56 from the Dong-A Swimming Championships in Ulsan. She topped the second heat by nearly two seconds ahead of seven other swimmers, including former bronze medalists Sara Nordenstam of Norway and four-time Olympian Georgina Bardach of Argentina, breaking her personal best of 4:43.99. Kim's overwhelming triumph was not enough to advance her into the final, as she placed seventeenth overall in the preliminary heats. She plans on competing in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. In July 2021, she represented South Korea at the 2020 Summer Olympics held in Tokyo, Japan. She competed in the women's 200 metre individual medley and 4 × 200 metre freestyle relay events. In the freestyle event, she advanced to semifinal however missed out to compete in the final. In the freestyle relay event, the team did not advance to compete in the final.
People
Pantheon has 2 people classified as South Korean swimmers born between 1989 and 1994. Of these 2, 2 (100.00%) of them are still alive today. The most famous living South Korean swimmers include Park Tae-hwan, and Kim Seo-yeong. As of April 2024, 1 new South Korean swimmers have been added to Pantheon including Kim Seo-yeong.
