This guide is packed with information on shipping your motorcycle to and from South Korea by sea and air freight. And it also explains how to ferry your motorcycle or car from Russia to South Korea.
This guide is based on our motorcycle ride through South Korea during our round the world trip. The guides on this website are constantly updated by us and with info from contributors to keep them current, up-to-date and as helpful as possible.
Contents
Shipping a Motorcycle In and Out of South Korea
By Andy Davidson
Mad or Nomad - RTW motorcycle travellers
Welcome to the South Korea Shipping and Ferry Guide. The aim of this guide is to provide you with information on shipping your motorcycle, car or overland vehicle in and out of South Korea by air and sea as well as a ferry service from Vladivostok. The guide is also filled with links to more in-depth articles on customs, ferry services and paperwork.
South Korea Ferry Services
How to get the ferry from Russia to South Korea
DuWon Ferries takes passengers with their motorcycles or cars on a service between Russia, South Korea and Japan.
We have a dedicated guide explaining the entire process. Please have a read of the Russia to Japan Guide as it explains the entire process along with contact info.
READ MORE: Russia to Japan Ferry Guide
Leaving Russia for South Korea
You will need to arrange customs in Vladivostok, Russia before sailing. We recommend contacting Yuri from Links Ltd to arrange your paperwork in Vladivostok.
Entry into Donghae, South Korea
For entry into South Korea, the DuWon Donghae office will assist with customs clearance. Travellers are required to contact them regarding their reservation at least four weeks prior to departure.
In addition, all required documents, including the three documents listed below, must be submitted no later than 10 days before arrival.
- Letter of Promise
- Temporary Import application
- List of personal belongings (in vehicle)
The DuWon contact will help explain and organise these documents with you. Please email Chloe.
- Name: DuWon Shipping Co.,Ltd
- Address: Annex of Donghaeport Int’l Passenger Terminal, 210, Daedong-ro, Donghae-si, Gangwon-do, Korea
- Google Maps: DuWon, Donghae
- Booking email: booking@dwship.co.kr / sbson@dwship.co.kr
Ferry service between Japan and South Korea
You have two options for ferries between Japan and South Korea.
DuWon
The DuWon ferry service operates between Vladivostok, Donghae and Sakaiminato. You can take the ferry and join or exit at any of the destinations. For info, have a read of this guide.
READ MORE: Russia to Japan Ferry Guide
Camellia Lines
The other ferry service is between Hakata, Japan and Busan South Korea. For info, have a read of this guide.
READ MORE: South Korea to Japan Ferry Guide
Motorcycle Paperwork in South Korea
Once you land in South Korea, you will need to take out insurance, get a guarantee (known as a Warranty Fee in South Korea) for your vehicle and a temporary import/export document.
Expect to pay 184,000 Won for one month of motorcycle insurance and 160,000 Won for the guarantee (which lasts the same amount of time as your insurance).
You will need your passport, vehicle registration document, International Driver’s Permit and driver’s licence.
You will need to purchase:
- Vehicle liability insurance – Vehicle insurance (cash only in Korean won)
- Warranty fee – this is what they call a Temporary Import (cash only in Korean won)
Both documents are very expensive. For 7 days of insurance (assuming you are 30+ years old) expect to pay 80USD (same for motorbike or car). For 1 month it’s 180USD.
The warranty fee is not much better. See below.
The important thing to note here is that your ‘warranty fee’ will last as long as your insurance. If you buy one week’s worth of insurance then that’s how long your temporary import is for.
Customs will want to know that you are leaving the country again. If you are planning on shipping your vehicle out of South Korea then you may need to provide them with your agent’s details for them to confirm.
You do not need an agent to get through customs in South Korea. It is very straightforward.
If you are shipping out of the country then consider how long you need insurance for carefully. Once your vehicle has been crated then it will be moved to a customs bonded warehouse. Once there, you don’t need insurance, even though the bike is technically still in the country.
For example, I purchased one week’s insurance and entered on a Monday. On Friday my bike was crated and on Tuesday the following week it was loaded onto the ship. But, the crating and shipping was all pre-booked and pre-planned before even entering South Korea. You don’t want to arrive and then arrange it otherwise you may need to return to customs to purchase another week.
Customs may also want to see you again before you leave the country if they believe your bike wasn’t crated before the expiry of your insurance. Your shipping agent will be able to handle this before you leave customs for the first time over the phone.
You will eventually get your insurance, warranty and a big yellow sticker. These papers are gold dust, don’t lose them. You’re now free to go!
Shipping a Motorcycle To and From South Korea
How to ship your vehicle to or from South Korea
Your car or motorcycle can be shipped from South Korea to nearly anywhere in the world by ro-ro, ship container, carrier or by airplane. The most common destinations to and from South Korea are: Malaysia, Cambodia, Indonesia, New Zealand, Australia, Vancouver, Chile, Argentina and Colombia.
To get a shipping quote, Mr Youn will need the dimensions of your car or bike, the destination, your nationality and when you want to ship. A personal quote can then be issued to you via email. Whether you are shipping in or out, importing or exporting, Mr Youn’s services include helping with customs clearance.
Shipping a motorcycle via sea or air
Consider that port fees can be expensive when shipping by boat, but the initial cost of flying is more expensive.
Remember, when shipping via boat the crate cost is based on volume. When shipping via airplane, the crate cost is based on weight.
Book your shipment in advance and before arriving in South Korea. It will make customs run far more smoothly as you can prove how you will be exiting the country. This is important for customs.
Your agent can only handle the costs involved in South Korea and isn’t responsible for fees at the other end.
For more information on the differences between air and sea freight and top tips check out the below guide.
READ MORE: The Ultimate International Motorcycle Shipping Guide
Crating your motorcycle in South Korea
The only tricky part is making sure your insurance, guarantee and temporary import are in effect until the crating date. Once your vehicle is crated, it will be taken to a custom bonded warehouse ready to be placed on the ship. Once it’s in the customs bonded warehouse, then it doesn’t matter if your insurance and temporary import expires (within reason of course).
If you are crating up a motorcycle:
- Disconnect the battery
- Drain most of the fuel (I usually leave one litre in the tank)
- Get your bike as small as possible.
In South Korea, the guys at the crating yard will pack your crate up for you. The price is usually included. You roll up, disconnect the battery, take what you want off the bike and then leave them to it. You will need to give them the Yellow sticker you received from customs and the paperwork. Get in touch with your agent to confirm all is well before leaving.
South Korea Motorcycle Shipping Agent
Assured Sea and Air with Mr Youn
Assured Sea and Air is a South Korean freight forwarder run by the very helpful Mr Youn. His company handles commercial cargo and help with importing and exporting cargo like motorcycles, cars, trucks and overlander vehicles.
Mr. Youn specialises in helping motorcycle travellers and overlanders transport their vehicles to and from South Korea and has been in this field since 2014.
His services are on our Recommended International Motorcycle Shipping Companies Finder page below.
- Web: www.assured.co.kr
- Email: uhy@assured.co.kr
- WhatsApp: +821024742658
Note: At the Busan International Ferry Terminal, you can buy a prepaid South Korea SIM card for 60.000 Won for 20 days. This will make getting in touch with Mr Youn easier once you land.
Read more on motorcycle travel in South Korea and Japan
Thanks for checking out South Korea Motorcycle Shipping and Ferry Guide. We hope it helped. Here’s a few more articles on Motorcycle Shipping that we recommend you read next.
Try these next…
Are you planning on a motorcycle trip in South Korea? If you have any questions, suggestions or update, please let us know in the comments below. We’d love to hear from you!
“insurance, guarantee and temporary import are in effect until the crating date ”
Here our experience differs (June 2023) due to a lack of reactivity by our shipper (despite the 10 weeks of discussion)-
Our shipping date was extended to the ‘next ship’ due to ‘availability’. We were required to extend our Insurance and TIP for the minimum 15days possible to cover the time the motorcycle was in country/not on the ship- even as our packing date was 3 days before insurance was expired (12 days before shipping)
Hi Chris,
Ah, that must have been very frustrating for you. Who was your shipper?
However, in the article it states: “The only tricky part is making sure your insurance, guarantee and temporary import are in effect until the crating date. Once your vehicle is crated, it will be taken to a custom bonded warehouse ready to be placed on the ship. Once it’s in the customs bonded warehouse, then it doesn’t matter if your insurance and temporary import expires (within reason of course).”
So are you saying you had your bike crated up, it was taken to a bonded warehouse and then you still had to reinsure and extend the TIP?
Cheers,
Andy
So, are you saying
Exactly. Crating before insurance/TIP expired. Still needed to pay for extension until container was loaded onboard the ship. The indult was minimum extension was 15 days. Fun!
Crated AND taken to a custom bonded warehouse? That’s incredibly strange – once taken to a bonded warehouse it shouldn’t need TIP/insurance. Either way, that must have been very annoying and difficult for you. Glad you got it sorted now though!
To clarify, the shipper required me to extend the TIP because the motorcycles would not exit before the end of the TIP date.
The Customs staff required that I extend the Insurance, fully understanding that the packing would occur BEFORE the expiration date of the insurance. They insisted that the insurance must cover the period ‘in country’ even if we were NOT driving the motorcycles as they were -in fact- packed in the container in the yard. No successful arguments to dissuade them.
All these arrangements and payments happened before packing the container – once packed we walked away so who knows what happened to the container after I put the seal on it.
Maybe it’s important to clarify the shipping situation post COVID- and how it is much more complicated in these early days of return to travel.
From our shared experience from Russia to Japan to Korea to elsewhere, it’s clear that things have changed over the last 3 years.
The break in continued transport services from all the lock-downs, the diminished travel and tourism affecting the quantity and availability of available modes of shipping have made the hurdles of motorcycle shipping regress to the olden days.
In 2019, before we decided to overwinter the bikes in Japan, we were in contact with Wendy Choi (like everyone else) who provided us an air shipping quotation to Vancouver for our two small bikes (advantage small bike) about 2000 USD each.
In the spring of 2023, after Japan finally let us back into the country to recover the motorcycles, we reconnected with Wendy Choi for another quotation to Vancouver. She is still in business in a new address so has survived COVID for better or worse. The estimated price in 2023 now was raised to slightly more than 7000 USD per motorcycle. She explained to us that COVID had changed the number and availability of planes, affected the amount of cargo being moved thus changed the price per kilogram and ultimately because of COVID probably the shipping systems and processes were changed (or at the very least atrophied from lack of use). Clearly she had a hard time connecting with her previous suppliers because it took a long time to get this information to us.
Well with this shocking information we decided to go to sea shipping route. In 2023 we contacted no less than 8 different shipping agencies that we have good sources of contact, and ultimately we only received one response.
The downside of sea shipping, as you understand well, is the transport time and the extra cost associated with recovery and customs clearance at the other side.
This additional time and expense to get us to Canada and then eventually to find transport from Canada back to Europe was just too big a problem, just too stressful for us, it is just not worth it and so we ship directly from Korea to Europe; we have lots of other plans to realize.
Coincidentally on the latest podcast from Adventure Rider Radio, the guest speakers made note of this additional complexity post COVID transport from their south -american perspective.
Hi Chris,
Thank you very much for posting this invaluable comment. I’m sure other travellers will find this information very useful.
Thank you,
Andy
Hello Andy.
Thank you. Yes. I had a fantastic and unforgettable trip. Mongolia, Korea, Japan (the goal was tho hike on Yakushima island) were incredible. Türkey as well. And Greece 😉 I wish i could cary on forever.
M. Youn is very nice and quick to act. But I wish I had more time to organise the shipping so I could maybe find a lower price by sharing the container.
Here is the last feedback about the shipping from Busan in South Korea to Le Havre in France.
It ended up being very expensive and not the good choice regarding the actual value of my bike. But I learned a lot.
I rode the bike to the new harbor of Busan. Be careful, it is a very big port area. A bit far from city center of Busan. Taxis didn’t want to come here and it could have been expensive if they had. Luckily, my contact at the warfare gave me a lift back by car to Busan. Offered me food and coffee. He even paid the subway for me. Korean are so friendly and nice.
M. Youn charged me 3900$ for the whole process to put the bike in a 20′ container, harbor handling and shipping to France.
But I didn’t know that didn’t include the French harbor fees that were very high (and there is a docker strike that make mandatory to pay extra fees because the container was stuck in the harbor for 8 days – cost me an extra 700€).
I left my bike the 7th of November 2024 to the warehouse in Busan. The ship arrived the 26th of January 2025 in Le Havre. I got it back the 7th of February.
So it was a full 3 months traveling for the bike. 2 weeks waiting in Busan before shipping – 2 months on the ship – 2 weeks waiting in Le Havre.
The container was opened by a french company who charges me 2153€ for checking the customs for me and move the container to an other warehouse.
It appears that my bike has fallen on the left side during the travel, oil and fuel were leaking.
Side stand was broken. As there is no central stand, it is quite a big problem. A nice young man welded it. Very nice.
The engine started after quite a few tries and I could be on my way.
The total cost for the shipping was 5942€ (all included).
Feel free to ask questions if you have.
Thank you for sharing all your experiences.
Hi Zemathy, I added your comment from the Japan Shipping Companies page to this article as well as it is related to South Korea shipping and may help someone in future. But I have replied on your original post.
Thanks,
Andy
Hello Andy,
Sorry for the delay in following up our shipping news. It was a rather disagreeable process, and I hoped that time would provide perspective to better reflect, which eventually I forgot to follow up altogether. I hope this helps give a fuller picture of shipping news from Busan with Mr Youn.
To remind you, we shipped 2 x WR250R from Busan to Le Havre early June 2023. We had done our research making (or trying to) contact with up to 8 shipping companies. Eventually we started working with Wendy Choi. While airfreight is her specialty, it was impossibly expensive (3 years of COVID effectively shut down the transport systems) and she tried to help us with sea freighting. Eventually this hit a dead end and we made contact with Mr Youn, now feeling a bit of pressure.
A bunch of things happened that I can’t remember, eventually we loaded the 20foot container with 2 bikes. Cost €2286. We didn’t get the star service, we returned to Busan in the city bus. The shipping was based on ‘next available ship, and for some reason we had to extend our TIP (minimum extension 15 days) to make sure the bikes were on the boat leaving harbour before the TIP expired.
40+ days (end August) later we picked up the bikes. We had been in contact with a freight forwarder from Paris (a Korean woman living in Paris referred by Mr Youn, who was NOT a specialist, pretty sure she took the job under duress) who charged us €1614.
Total €1950 per moto.
I was pretty involved with packing the motos despite the irritation of the packing company, the bikes arrive in good condition.
IIRC Mr Youn was complicated and our communications were strained. I think he eventually he stopped emailing us and was generally not reactive to our questions. We actually never met Mr Youn in person.