How to Learn the Gangnam Style Dance — The Evergreen Tutorial
Published on April 2026
Gangnam Style by PSY remains one of the most searched dance tutorials on the internet, more than a decade after its release. Its enduring popularity is well-founded: the choreography is genuinely fun, immediately recognisable, learnable by complete beginners, and still one of the most reliable crowd-pleasers at any social event.
This guide breaks down the core movements, explains why they look wrong for most beginners, and gives you a clear path to getting them right.
The Core Movements
The horse-riding move. The defining element of the choreography — the bouncing squat position with alternating arm swings — looks deceptively simple but has one consistent error in beginner versions: the bounce is too upright. In the original, PSY maintains a genuinely low squat position with his weight consistently in his heels, which gives the movement its characteristic power and bounce. Most beginners straighten their legs too much on the upward phase, losing the connection to the ground that creates the rhythm.
Keep your weight low. Let the upward phase of the bounce be shorter than it feels like it should be. Record yourself from the side and compare — your low position is almost certainly higher than PSY's.
The lasso. The circular arm movement is typically executed with the wrist drawing the circle rather than the full arm. In the original, the lasso comes from the shoulder and elbow, with the wrist adding a snap at the end of each rotation. This is subtle but visible — the wrist-only version looks small and pinched; the shoulder-led version looks big and confident.
The walk cycle. The side-to-side walking sections between the main horse-riding moments are where most beginner versions lose momentum. The walk should stay low, with the same squat quality as the main movement — it is not an upright walk with arm swings attached, it is a low, grounded lateral movement.
The Timing — Why It Often Looks Wrong
The most common reason beginner Gangnam Style attempts look off is that the arm swings are landing on the beat rather than slightly before it. In the original, the arm swing anticipates the beat — it arrives just ahead of the downbeat, creating a sense of energy and drive. Landing exactly on the beat produces a flat, mechanical quality. Record your version alongside the original and watch specifically for where your arm arrives relative to the beat.
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