짱 (jjang)
JJANGnoun, adjectiveInformal
A Korean slang term. Browse all Korean slang.
What it means
The best; top. As a suffix it names the champion of a category: 얼짱 (best face), 몸짱 (best body).
Standalone, 짱이야 means 'that's brilliant'. Now reads as slightly older slang — a word that dates the speaker to the 1990s or 2000s.
Still perfectly understood, but a Korean teenager is likelier to say 대박 or 개좋아.
Examples with translations
우리 엄마가 최고, 진짜 짱이야.
My mum's the best — absolute legend.
그 사람 우리 학교 얼짱이었어.
He was the best-looking guy in our school.
Where it comes from
Generally traced to 장 (長), 'chief, head', reinforced with a tensed initial consonant — a common Korean way of adding emphasis, as in 쫌 for 좀.
Other forms
- Romanised as:
- jjang