여기요 or 저기요? How to Actually Get a Server’s Attention in Korean

Look up “excuse me” in a phrasebook and you get 실례합니다 (sillyehamnida). Then you sit down in a restaurant in Seoul and hear people calling out something completely different: 여기요! or 저기요! Two phrases, both translated as “excuse me,” and no obvious rule for which one you’re supposed to shout. One learner asked exactly this — how do you politely call out to someone, whether it’s a server or a stranger on the street? The honest answer is that 실례합니다, the phrase textbooks lead with, is rarely the tool for this job. Here is what Korean speakers actually use, and the small piece of grammar that makes the choice between 여기요 and 저기요 predictable instead of random.

여기요 and 저기요 are place words with a polite ending

Neither word is a fixed politeness formula the way “excuse me” is in English. At their core, they are ordinary location words with the polite particle 요 attached:

• 여기 (yeogi) means “here” — the place where the speaker is.
• 저기 (jeogi) means “over there” — a place away from both the speaker and the listener.

So 여기요 is “here” spoken politely to the listener, and 저기요 is “over there” with the same polite ending — the 요 marks politeness toward the person you’re addressing; it isn’t a word for “please.” That location meaning is exactly what makes them work as attention-getters, and it tells you which one fits which situation.

When you call 여기요 in a restaurant, you are pointing at yourself with your voice: over here — this table needs you. When you say 저기요, you are pointing at the other person: you, over there — I’d like a word. Both routes end with someone looking at you, and both get used to flag down servers, but the logic underneath is different. 여기요 announces your location; 저기요 addresses theirs.

If you already know the demonstratives 이거 (“this one, near me”) and 저거 (“that one, away from us both”), you have seen this contrast before: 여기 is to 저기 what 이거 is to 저거. Korean pointing words actually come in three series — 이, 그, and 저 — and what this article needs is just the 이/저 ends of that larger system. So learning 여기요 and 저기요 isn’t memorizing two random restaurant phrases; it’s reusing grammar you were going to need anyway.

Why 실례합니다 doesn’t make a waiter turn around

실례합니다 is real, correct Korean. The problem is register and function. It literally means something like “I am committing a discourtesy,” and its job is to preface or apologize for a minor intrusion.

A busy restaurant is the opposite situation. The server is across the room, there is noise, and nobody expects ceremony. What you need is a short, loud signal, and 여기요 works as exactly that. 실례합니다 is a textbook expression here: not wrong, but not the tool for the job. In practice, calling out 실례합니다 to a distant server would sound oddly stiff.

One more thing that surprises learners from quieter dining cultures: calling out to a server at real volume is normal in casual restaurants in Korea. Don’t assume the server will circle back to check on your table the way you might expect in North America; the expectation is that you call when you need something. A clear, audible 여기요 is not rude — it is how the system is designed to work. Many casual sit-down restaurants have a call button (호출벨) on the table that does the same job electronically. If there’s a button, press it; if not, use your voice.

A typical exchange looks like this:

• 여기요! 물 좀 주세요. — “Over here! Some water, please.”
• 저기요, 주문할게요. — “Excuse me, we’d like to order.”

You can follow either opener with your actual request. The opener gets the attention; the 주세요/할게요 sentence does the asking.

Stopping a stranger on the street

The learner’s question also covered the street: how do you politely call out to a stranger walking past? Here the choice narrows. 저기요 is the common opener for a stranger, because 여기요 is tied to your own location — and on the street you aren’t summoning someone to your table; you’re addressing a person over there. So you say the word that points at them.

• 저기요, 뭐 좀 여쭤봐도 돼요? — “Excuse me, may I ask you something?”
• 저기요! 이거 떨어뜨리셨어요. — “Excuse me! You dropped this.”

You’ll also hear 저기요 used as a soft hesitation noise before a request, a bit like “um, excuse me…” in English. The same word covers both the shout across the street and the gentle conversation opener; volume and tone do the adjusting.

There is a second strategy worth knowing: instead of a location word, use a respectful title. 선생님 — literally “teacher” — can also serve, depending on the context, as a polite way to address an adult you don’t know. Calling out 선생님, 지갑 놓고 가셨어요 (“Sir/Ma’am, you left your wallet”) is warm and respectful in a way 저기요 alone can’t quite manage, because a title acknowledges the person rather than just their position in space. Korean has a whole ecosystem of these situational address terms, and 선생님 is only one of them.

The rule you can carry out the door

Strip everything above down to one question: am I pointing at my location or at a person?

Situation	Say	Why
Calling a server to your table	여기요 (or 저기요)	You’re marking where the service is needed: here.
Getting a stranger’s attention	저기요	You’re addressing someone over there.
Politely addressing an unknown adult	선생님	A respectful title, often better than a direct “you.”
Prefacing a formal interruption	실례합니다	An apology for the intrusion, in the register it fits.

In a restaurant the two overlap, and you will hear Koreans use both, so don’t agonize there. Outside the restaurant, the here/there logic is a useful guide: point at your own location with 여기, at the other person with 저기. And keep 실례합니다 in your pocket for the situations it actually fits: genuine interruptions, and the moments where a little ceremony is the point.

The next time you eat at a Korean restaurant, try it once at full conversational volume: 여기요! It will feel too loud the first time. Watch how instantly it works, and it will never feel too loud again.