In Korea, before two families approve a marriage, they look at 궁합 (gunghap) — Saju compatibility. It compares both birth charts using the Five Elements harmony method and tells you whether your energies generate, support, or clash with each other. This page explains how it works in plain English, with a free calculator that does it in 60 seconds.
Western compatibility usually compares sun signs ("a Leo and a Scorpio? oof"). Korean gunghap is structurally deeper. It looks at four overlapping layers:
| Combination | Relationship | What it feels like |
|---|---|---|
| Wood + Fire | Wood feeds Fire (생, generation) | You inspire each other. Energetic, public-facing couple. |
| Fire + Earth | Fire feeds Earth (생) | Stable partnership. Easy domestic life. |
| Earth + Metal | Earth feeds Metal (생) | Quietly productive. Builds wealth steadily. |
| Metal + Water | Metal feeds Water (생) | Smart-couple energy. Communicates well. |
| Water + Wood | Water feeds Wood (생) | Romantic, growth-oriented. Often a creative pair. |
| Wood + Metal | Metal cuts Wood (극, control) | Tense but productive. One pushes, one resists. |
| Fire + Water | Water extinguishes Fire (극) | Volatile. Big highs, big lows. |
| Earth + Wood | Wood breaks Earth (극) | One feels controlled. Needs explicit boundaries. |
| Metal + Fire | Fire melts Metal (극) | Transformative. Either deeply rewarding or burnout. |
| Water + Earth | Earth blocks Water (극) | Communication friction. Solvable with effort. |
If your year branches form one of these pairs, you have a built-in soulmate factor:
Opposite branches clash. These pairings can still work — but expect more drama and more growth:
Combinations and clashes are the two everyone knows. Two more branch patterns show up constantly in a real gunghap report, and they explain the cases where a couple has no clash at all and still grinds.
Triads (삼합, samhap) — three branches spaced four apart lock together and amplify one element. If your two charts supply two legs of a triad, the relationship tends to pull that element into the foreground for both of you:
Harms (육해, yukhae) — a quieter friction than a clash. A clash is a loud, visible collision; a harm is the slow one, the resentment that never gets named. These are the six pairs:
Every stem and every branch carries a yin or a yang charge, so a couple has sixteen charges between them. Count them.
A lopsided ratio is not a verdict. It tells you which failure mode to watch for.
The ten Heavenly Stems pair off into five unions. When a stem in your chart meets its partner stem in theirs, classical texts read it as structural rapport — the pull that people describe as "we just clicked" before they know anything about each other:
Day-stem to day-stem unions matter most, because the Day Stem is the person themself rather than their family or their career.
Korean gunghap exists to give you language for your dynamic — not a verdict. Modern Saju practitioners typically interpret the chart this way: clashes mark where the work is, not whether the relationship should end. Marriages between "incompatible" charts often last longer than "perfect" ones because both people show up consciously.
Yes, especially in older families and in arranged-introduction (sun, 선) settings. Younger Koreans often check gunghap casually with apps before getting serious. The cultural weight has softened, but the tradition persists.
Read it as terrain, not destiny. Knowing you're a Wood-Metal pair tells you to negotiate boundaries explicitly. Knowing you're a Fire-Water pair tells you to schedule cool-down rituals. Bad gunghap forewarned is good gunghap managed.
For the deepest reading, yes — the hour pillar refines compatibility. Year + day alone gives a useful directional answer, which is enough for casual checking.