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Dwelling connotes characteristics like social and cultural and technical climatic conditions, lifestyles and demands of regions, and especially, apartment, as one of dwelling types, shows various aspects of modern society. With the economic development centering on large cities, apartments have been established as universal housing forms in Seoul and Shanghai. The deepening of economic development in cities has increased small households consisting of one or two persons by affecting the population and household structure, and they've become information consumer groups. This has also influenced the size of apartment and increased the demand for small-sized housing. If the floor area is small, it is possible to use space widely according to the plan composition, so there is a need for floor planning to understand natural environment, physical environment and residents.This study compared and analyzed plan compositions of small-sized apartments which have been parceled out for the recent three years in Seoul and Shanghai. This study aims to understand housing cultures and users in the two countries depending on natural environments, living habits and spatial functions by analyzing common points and differences of public spaces like living room, dining room and kitchen, and private spaces like bedroom which have absolute effects on room arrangement and traffic line. The study results are as follows. From the perspective of natural environments, in Seoul, two-sided open cross-ventilation structure where is favorable to lighting and ventilation, occupied the biggest proportion of public space, while in Shanghai, most public spaces had lighting and ventilation structures through windows in each room. In Seoul, 3R type occupied the largest proportion of private space(87.7%), and privacy was maintained and space scale was adjusted using spaces with diverse functions such as bathroom in the couple bedroom, dress room and powder room and variable walls. But 2R type occupied the largest proportion of private space(60.2%) in Shanghai, and they emphasized private space and privacy of each room depending on major living habits. In conclusion, this study for comparing and analyzing common points and differences of small-sized apartment plan compositions in Seoul and Shanghai will provide proper guidelines for small-sized apartments to be built in Seoul and Shanghai in the future, if strong points and weak points of plan compositions in the two countries will be additionally analyzed and remedied.