Seoul Olympic Main Stadium
The bowl that held 70,000 people for the 1988 Opening Ceremony now sits quietly in Songpa District — walk it on a weekday and you have the scale almost to yourself.
Coming soon on iOS — be first to walk Seoul offline.
South Korea's largest stadium, designed by Kim Swoo-geun, hosted the 1988 Summer Olympics and 1986 Asian Games — athletics, football finals, and both Opening and Closing Ceremonies. It served as the national football team's home ground for 16 years. No major world sporting event has used it since, though it hosted the 2013 EAFF East Asian Cup, which makes the scale feel all the more striking.
What to look for
- The stadium's curved roofline profile, which architect Kim Swoo-geun deliberately shaped to echo the elegant curves of Joseon white porcelain
- The two-tier seating bowl with roughly 70,000 seats, only half-covered — notice how exposure and shade divide the stands
- The Seoul Sports Complex setting in Songpa District, south of the Han River, where the whole Olympic precinct spreads around the centrepiece stadium
Located in Songpa District in southeast Seoul, south of the Han River; reach it via Jamsil Station on lines 2 and 8.
Seoul Olympic Main Stadium is one of 28 sights worth the detour in Seoul, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the Seoul pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in Seoul
- ChangdeokgungThe kings kept skipping the official palace to live here instead — and they had centuries to prove the point.
- Seoul Metropolitan SubwayLine 1 launched in 1974 tracing Tokyo's blueprint; today 24 lines stretch over 100 km beyond the capital into rural Chungnam and Gangwon provinces.
- JongmyoSpirit tablets of Joseon kings still receive ritual offerings here, exactly as they have since 1394.
- Blue House (Cheong Wa Dae)South Korea's seat of presidential power since 1948 — a 62-acre compound so secure it was once called one of Asia's most protected official residences, until the gates briefly opened to everyone.
- Namdaemun (Sungnyemun)Built in 1398, burned by an arsonist in 2008, and painstakingly restored by 2013 — Seoul's southern gate has a complicated relationship with fire.
- National Museum of KoreaDuring the Korean War, staff packed 20,000 objects and moved them to Busan — that collection now fills the flagship museum of Korean history and art in South Korea.