Kim was born in Seoul, South Korea. At the age of ten, Kim immigrated to the United States with her family. They lived in Staten Island, New York. She joined the middle school drama club in the 7th grade and performed in the musical My Fair Lady.

Kim attended high school at the prestigious Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, a public high school located in Manhattan. From there, she went on to study drama at the London Academy of Performing Arts and later earned her BFA degree in drama at Boston University. Kim has remarked that in her zeal to become Americanized quickly, she studied acting, academics and pronunciation with equal intensity. She is also a trained dancer and martial arts fighter.

After graduation, Kim devoted herself full-time to acting. She garnered several minor parts on MTV, in soap opera-style dramas on ABC, and on the off-Broadway stage. In 1997 she starred in Splendid Holiday, a Korean TV drama shot on location in New York. Kim decided to return to Korea. She was cast in the TV drama Wedding Dress and was also invited to act in Lee Kwangmo's feature Spring in My Hometown, although she ended up not taking this role. Her breakthrough debut came in the 1999 film Shiri, South Korea's first blockbuster film. Shiri became the highest grossing film in Korean history at the time. In November 2000 she continued her association with KangJeGyu in The Legend of Gingko.

After acting in a Japanese film and a feature set in Los Angeles, Kim appeared in the sci-fi feature Yesterday. Then in 2002, Kim took the lead role in Ardor, the feature film debut of documentarist Byun Young-ju. The film was invited to screen in a non-competitive section at the 2003 Berlin film festival.

In 2004, Kim started appearing in the U.S. television series Lost on the ABC network.

In May 2006, she becam Maxim's number 98 on its annual 100 List. In October 2006 she was featured on the cover of Stuff, as well as an inside spread.

She currently stars in the ABC drama series Mistresses.

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