Nearly half of respondents in South Korea reported prolonged fatigue — Korea Herald

In South Korea, 49.9% of survey participants reported prolonged fatigue during the previous month despite getting sufficient rest. The average duration of nighttime sleep among respondents was 6.3 hours, compared with 6.5 hours in 2024, Korea Herald reports, citing a report by KB Financial Group.

Sleep among top priorities

The share of respondents who sleep at least seven hours per night decreased by 8.8 percentage points to 41.6%. At the same time, 39.5% of respondents named adequate sleep as a desired way to restore psychological well-being.

Among people dissatisfied with the quality of their sleep, 45.9% named smartphone use immediately before bedtime as the main obstacle.

More current news is available on the UA.News Telegram channel Telegram.

Stress and psychological well-being

Sleep ranked first among health priorities: it was chosen by 54% of study participants, 5.6 percentage points more than in 2024. Stress management became the second priority at 51.9%, or 5.3 percentage points more than two years ago.

Psychological well-being is considered an important component of health by 90.7% of respondents, but 35.7% actively take care of it. Only 26.3% of respondents said they engaged in activities specifically aimed at emotional well-being. Another 34.8% named emotional relief as a motivation for exercising; this figure increased by 13.3 percentage points over two years.

The report is based on a survey of 2,000 people conducted from July 21 to August 5, 2026, as well as focus group interviews held on August 10–12.