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This site lays out 1,249 traditional Buddhist temples in Korea and lets you keep a stamp for each one you actually stand in front of. It is a notebook, not a devotional programme, and it does not stand in for anything a temple or an order runs.
What counts as a traditional temple
Traditional temple is a legal category in Korea. Temples in it are held on a register that the Ministry of the Interior and Safety publishes as open public data. This site is that register, checked on 2026-08-25 and filtered only for temples still listed as operating. The description on each temple page is the register's own origin and history field.
How the stamp works
Open a temple page, press the stamp button, and your browser asks for your location. If you are within 300 m of the coordinates the register holds, the stamp lands in your notebook. The radius allows for the poor signal you get in mountains. The comparison happens inside your phone and your position is never sent to us. Where the register holds no coordinates, the page says the stamp cannot work there.
There is no target number and no streak. One stamp is a complete use of this site.
Who decided the two courses
The seven Sansa monasteries are the ones UNESCO inscribed in 2018 as Sansa, Buddhist Mountain Monasteries in Korea. The inscription is recorded on the UNESCO World Heritage List and in the world heritage list published by the Korea Heritage Service.
The 33 Gwaneum sites are a pilgrimage the Cultural Corps of Korean Buddhism has run since 2009. Those temples keep real ink stamps and pilgrims carry a paper book for them. What you collect here does not replace that book.
Hyanggyo and seowon too
The same stamp method covers 120 hyanggyo and 342 seowon, local Confucian schools and academies. The source is a public register from the Academy of Korean Studies (Korean Local Culture Encyclopedia spatial data, checked on 2026-09-06), a different register from the temple one, so we kept it on a separate page. The same 300 m radius applies, and since this register has no origin text, we did not write any for these entries.
Staying the night
Templestay is the overnight programme run by the Cultural Corps of Korean Buddhism, offered in English at a number of temples. Booking is on their own site and we do not handle it.
Why the names look like this
The public register has no English column, so we do not have an English name to give you. Rather than invent one, each name is written out under the Revised Romanization of Korean, the standard set by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism in Notice 2014-42, and the Korean is printed beside it. The English name comes from the inscribing source, spelled exactly as that source spells it. That applies to the seven monasteries in the UNESCO inscription and to nothing else on this site.
Addresses stay in Korean for the same reason, and because a Korean map app or a taxi driver will read the Korean back to you far more reliably than a transcription.
Where your record is kept
Stamps are stored in this browser. There is no account, nothing is uploaded, and clearing your site data removes everything at once. The privacy policy says exactly what the server does receive.