20 Best Korean Manhwa for Beginners

Manhwas are the less mainstream siblings of anime and manga, but we love them because they have color (we’re looking at you manga), make Asian comics worth reading, and have given us so many sensational and award-winning K-Drama series over the years from W (Two Worlds) to All of Us Are Dead.

However, if you’re just a beginner manhwa reader, you may find navigating the sheer number of manhwas and Korean webtoons out there daunting, and that’s where we come in.

In this list, we’ll cover the 20 best Korean manhwa for beginners and newcomers to manhwa to check out today.

1. Solo Leveling

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.66/5

• Author: Chugong
• Other Genres: Action, Fantasy, Dungeon, System
• Status: Completed

Low-level hunter Sun Jinwoo can’t catch a break until he stumbles on great power and supernatural abilities that catapult him from one of the weakest in the world to the strongest. 

The story is set in a fictional earth with Gates that are connected to other worlds. It also has monsters to be defeated, strong people who are abusing their powers, and a protagonist who needs to use his power to save the world from eventual doom. 

It has everything that makes the dungeon genre worth paying attention to, and if you like bad people getting their comeuppance and a satisfactory ending, this one might be the one for you. 

Be careful, though; we don’t want you to get glued to the story and spend days not sleeping because of it. 

Easter Egg: It’s being adapted into an anime.

2. Tower of God

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.37/5

• Author: S.I.U
• Other Genres: Action, Drama, Adventure, Fantasy
• Status: Ongoing

This fantasy manhwa is set in a world where there’s a mysterious tower that summons people called Regulars to climb it and achieve their dreams. In the same tower, there are irregulars who ignore the tower’s rulesand enter without invitation.

In this world, a boy called Twenty-Fifth Bam lives in darkness under the tower until he meets his friend Rachel. 

Unlike Bam, Rachel doesn’t always live under the tower, and while she stays with him, she tells him stories about the outside world, and he grows attached to her until one day, the tower suddenly invites Rachel, and she leaves him alone. 

Once again, Bam vows to follow Rachel, and just like that, he is able to open the tower by himself as an irregular. 

3. The Breaker

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.33/5

• Author: Geuk-Jin Jeon, Jin-Hwan Park
• Other Genres: Action, Comedy, Adventure, Supernatural
• Status: Ongoing

The Breaker is one of the old South Korean manhwas that made us interested in manhwas, to begin with. It has been around since 2007, when it was first serialized, and has three installations. 

The Breaker follows the story of a boy named Chunwoo Han, a martial artist who is part of a secret martial arts society and has earned the title of the Nine Arts Dragon because of how good he is at fighting. However, he doesn’t have a good relationship with the Martial Arts Alliance because they killed his teacher, and he plans to take his revenge. 

As part of a mission, he transfers to a fictional school in Seoul, where he meets Shiwoon Yi, the protagonist, and they embark on an adventure together.

4. Noblesse

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.27

• Author: Gwang-Su Lee, Je-Ho Son
• Genre: Action, Supernatural, Comedy, Fantasy
• Status: Completed

Cadiz Etrama Di Raizel has a problem. He’s a high-ranking vampire who has just woken up to an entirely different world after sleeping for 820 years. He now wants to live a normal life but must maintain the balance between ordinary society and the supernatural world. 

It has a school setting, which makes it absolutely sensational, and it’s also one of those you can’t go wrong if you start with these stories. It was one of my first stories as a manhwa lover, and I was completely hooked by the first chapter.

5. All of Us Are Dead

Anime-Planet Rating: 3.7/5

• Author: Dong-Geun Joo
• Genre: Horror, Thriller, Mystery, Action, Fantasy
• Status: Completed

You’ll love this manhwa if you love stories with horror and drama that keep you on your tippy toes from the beginning to the end. 

All of Us Are Dead is a zombie horror story that takes place in a high school in South Korea after a mentally deranged science teacher creates and releases a virus that has the capacity to turn people into zombies by accident.

What follows is a tale of survival by a group of students who try to escape the situation without becoming zombies as the virus spreads from the school to neighboring towns, and everyone they know becomes monsters.

Just like any story about the apocalypse and the world ending, the situation tests the wits of the students and focuses on the finicky nature of humans when they’re faced with situations they can’t control. 

The story has been adapted into a live-action series, and you can watch it on Netflix. 

6. Lookism

Anime-Planet Rating

• Author: Tae-Jun Park
• Genre: Comedy, Fantasy, Slice of Life
• Status: Completed

Lookism is a manhwa that takes a critical look at the Korean beauty standard and its superficial nature.

The main character, Park Hyung Suk, is an insecure high school student who is often bullied for his weight and, as a result, wants to shed it off. 

In a twist of fate and through some supernatural intervention, he wakes one day to find the shell of his old skin beside him right as he is about to resume at a new school. Now, he can be as popular as he wants, and no one will bully him for what he looks like, but he’s about to discover that being the beauty standard comes with its own fair share of trouble and drama. 

You can read this interesting manhwa on Webtoon.

Easter Egg: Lookism got an anime adaptation in 2022, and you can watch the anime on Netflix.

7. True Beauty

Anime-Planet Rating: 3.71/5

• Author: Yaongyi
• Genre: Comedy, Fantasy, Slice of Life, Romance
• Status: Completed

True beauty is just like Lookism, but instead of any supernatural change to the way she looks, she spends hours online learning hour to do the perfect makeup until she is unrecognizable.

Just like Lookism, this beginner-friendly manhwa criticizes the superficial nature of the Korean beauty standard and follows the main characters as they discover that their self-esteem isn’t tied to the way they look. 

True Beauty has a lot of hilarious scenes because the main character spends so much time trying to protect her secret that she becomes very self-conscious when she’s wearing makeup. 

The manhwa has been adapted to K-Drama and is available on Netflix.

8. Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint 

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.44/5

• Author: Yaongyi
• Genre: Comedy, Fantasy, Slice of Life, Romance
• Status: Completed

Kim Dokja of Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint could have been any of us if we lived in a fantasy world on the brink of extinction. He’s an ordinary office worker who has been addicted to a manhwa with the title Three Ways to Survive the Apocalypse for over ten years and has been waiting for the story to end.

However, when the story ends, Kim gets a message from the writer, and the novel promptly comes to life. Kim now has the knowledge of everything that’s going to happen in the future and knows that there’s an actual main character who has been regressing over and over again, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to have an easy time.

With the world in shambles (yes, that’s a one Piece reference), he’ll definitely need more than his knowledge to survive.

9. Mercenary Enrollment

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.35/5

• Author: YC, Rakyeon
• Genre: Webtoon, Action, Drama, Manhwa
• Status: Ongoing

Mercenary Enrollment follows the story of young Yu Ijin, who, after a plane crash, got stranded in a war-ravaged country. To survive, he had to hone his combat, marksmanship, and other mercenary skills. Ten years later, he becomes one of the best mercenaries in the country and runs into Korean soldiers. Finally, he’s able to return home to his sister and grandfather. 

The manhwa explores the themes of family, loyalty, and protection. The main character goes back to high school, but he has to deal with bullies, protect his family, and foil some terrorist and kidnapping attempts to secure his happy ending. If you like intense action, you’re definitely going to love this manhwa. 

11. Cheese in the Trap

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.15/5

• Author: Soonkki
• Genre: School Life, Drama, Romance
• Status: Completed

Cheese in the Trap is the story of Hong Seol, a university student from a poor background who takes the opportunity many people thought was meant for her perfect senior, Yu Jeong. From then on, she becomes popular even though she doesn’t want to be and to make matters worse, Yu Jeong seems to want to get close to her, but Hong Seol doesn’t entirely trust him.

This manhwa has been adapted into a K-Drama series and a movie. It maintains a reasonable level of romance throughout, so if you like really cheesy romance (pun intended), this one may not be for you.

12. Purple Hyacinth

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.4/5

• Author: Ephemerys, Sophism
• Genre: Action, Drama, Assassins
• Status: Ongoing

Purple Hyacinth is a slow-burn mystery story set in the fictional city of Ardhalis. The story officially begins when police officer extraordinaire Lauren Sinclair partners with the worst person ever, notorious assassin Kieran White, to take down an equally notorious criminal organization in the city called the Phantom Scythe.  

While Lauren can’t trust Kieran because of her ability to detect lies, she understands that their strategic partnership would pan out in the long run and help her protect her beloved city of Ardhalis.

Although the genre of the series is a mystery, the tension between the main characters as they work together eventually reduces as they learn about each other’s motivations and begin to trust each other. 

13. The Boxer

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.37/5

• Author: Jung Ji-Hoon
• Genre: Sports, Action, Drama
• Status: Ongoing

Yu of the Boxer is a teenager who becomes emotionally numb and distant because of constant bullying. Even though he has the rare ability to dodge any punch coming his way, he lets his bullies beat him and lives a very obscure life until he meets K, an old boxing trainer who has successfully trained five champion boxers and immediately recognizes Yu’s gifts.

Despite Yu’s reluctance, K does everything within his power to train him and make him into a champion. If you like stories about underdogs, you’re going to like Yu’s journey as he takes the boxing world by storm. 

14. Nano Machine

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.37/5

• Author: Hanjung Wolya
• Genre: Action, Martial Arts, Adventure, Fantasy
• Status: Ongoing

Technology meets classic martial arts in this Webtoon series and gives birth to something that’s in a different league from other martial arts series entirely. 

Nano Machine is the story of how Yeo-un, one of the sons of the High Priest at the Mashin Academy, defies his fate of untimely death when one of his descendants suddenly appears before him to inject him with nanotechnology which allows him to access more power than was currently available during his time.

What follows is the tale of how he overcomes his enemies and rises to the top through resilience. If you like martial arts, you’re going to love this story.

15. The Greatest Estate Developer

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.49/5

• Author: BK_Moon, Manggi
• Genre: Adventure, Fantasy, Isekai, World Building
• Status: Ongoing

Civil engineering student Kim Suho has a problem; he just woke up in a fantasy novel he was reading as one of the characters and not one of the impressive ones (I know, that’s just an average Tuesday for some of us). 

Suho is now Lloyd Frontera, a popular lazy novel with a mountain of debt and zero prospects, but things aren’t completely hopeless. Suho has knowledge of civil engineering that’s way advanced for the medieval setting he’s found himself, and with the help of a knight and a magical hamster, he sets out to change Lloyd Frontera’s fate. 

Follow him on his journey as he creates inspirational constructions across the continent and makes a name for himself. 

16. A Business Proposal 

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.27/5

• Author: Jung Ji-Hoon
• Genre: Romance, Comedy, Drama
• Status: Completed

This manhwa has a web novel and a series on Netflix, so you already know how interesting it is. It’s the classic office romance with a rich CEO and a normal employee. 

The story begins when Ha Ri agrees to go on a blind date in her friend’s place and pretend to be a super-vixen to end all her marriage setups. Unknown to her, the date happens to be her company’s hot new CEO, Taemu, and instead of a one-time thing with some money on the side, she ends up with a headache and someone she can’t shake off. 

However, Taemu has a proposal for her. He wants her to keep pretending to be his girlfriend to stop his family from setting him up with other women. It’s a romantic comedy with many facepalm moments that could only end one way: with love. 

17. What’s Wrong With Secretary Kim?

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.3/5

• Author: Jung Kyung Yoon
• Genre: Comedy, Romance
• Status: Completed

This interesting manhwa started as a Korean Web novel before it was adapted into a visual format on KakaoPage and eventually became a K-drama series. 

The story follows the eponymous character, Kim Mi Soo, who, for many years, has been the perfect secretary for a narcissistic boss but suddenly decides to quit her job. 

This comes as a shock to her boss, Lee Young Joon, who can’t seem to figure out why his secretary is suddenly quitting when everything about their work relationship seems to be going well. 

However, because he has come to depend on her over the years, he finds it difficult to find a replacement and comes up with new ways to get her to stay.

The story is a classic romantic comedy that becomes even more emotional as the main characters discover their unsavory parts and try to fix them. 

The character development in this manhwa is really good, and even though it’s obvious the characters will end up with each other in the first chapter, their escapades throughout the story make it worth reading.

18. The God of High School

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.05/5

• Author: Yong-Je Park
• Other Genres: Action, Fantasy
• Status: Completed

Jin Mori has a dream, he wants to win the God of High School tournament and be recognized for being strong. Unknown to him, the competition is more than what it seems to be, and he’s not actually who he thinks he is. 

The story is straightforward. The world-building is solid, and you’re going to like his relationship with the other main characters and his constant facepalm encounters. 

It’s also a modern take on the journey to the West tale, and if you know the story, you already know whose shenanigans Jin Mori will be displaying.

Easter Egg: It’s being adapted into an anime, and you can find it on Webtoon.

19. Reminiscence Adonis

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.0/5

• Author: Gudang, Kyeol Jeong, Team Adonis
• Other Genres: Action, Fantasy, Romance, Fated Lovers, Isekai
• Status: Ongoing

Reminiscence Adonis is one of the most intense romance webtoons I’ve ever read. It opens with a war that has gone on for too long and is about to destroy the continent between the main characters, Ianna and Arhad. Even though there seems to be some emotional connection between the two, they want different things, and that has led them down the path of war.

Just as Ianna dies, she wakes up again in the past with most of her memories intact, and this time, she vows that things will be different. 

Reminiscence is a tale of love, betrayal, and war with one of the strongest female heroines in the history of illustrated literature. It’s an essential manhwa for a beginner.

20. Seoul Station Necromancer

Anime-Planet Rating: 3.7/5

• Author: Yununi (Story), Taewan (Art)
• Other Genres: Action, Fantasy, Sci-Fi, System
• Status: Ongoing

Seoul Station Necromancer follows the story of Kang Woo Jin, who returns to Earth after spending 20 years on Alphen, a planet of power and magic nearing its extinction, only to discover that the being trying to destroy the planet is already making his way to Earth. 

As if that isn’t bad enough, Kang Woo Jin is in for another surprise. His fearsome powers as a necromancer and one of the most powerful beings in Alphen don’t seem to have properly transported to Earth with him, and he has to recover it before the main attacks on Earth begin. 

While he recovers his power and tries to find the truth behind dungeons and how to save the world, he meets interesting characters and makes new connections that change him from a mass murderer to a slightly morally gray character. 

Bonus: Reaper of the Drifting Moon

Anime-Planet Rating: 4.0/5

• Author: Woogack, Inkyo
• Genre: Martial Arts, Action, Fantasy
• Status: 96+ Episodes (Ongoing)

The Reaper of the Drifting Moon is a great manhwa to start your manhwa reading journey if you like action and martial arts.

Unlike most martial arts stories, the story doesn’t follow a character from a prestigious family who’s looked down on because he can’t do martial arts. Rather, it follows Pyo Wol, a beggar child who is unlucky enough to get kidnapped by a stranger and is forced to learn martial arts for assassination underground with a group of other kids in a kill-or-be-killed setting. 

What follows is a tale of injustice, survival, and intense action that will leave you excited and anxious for the outcome. 

We also like that the main character is morally gray.