Round Earth Building is one of the popular types of Hakka earth buildings.

This type of building is round in shape and divided into three classes, small, medium and big. The small ones are usually 2 to 3 stories tall with a single ring. The medium dwelling is usually 3 to 4 stories tall with a large inner open space (single ring) or double rings. The large round building is usually 4 to 5 stories tall consisting of as many as three rings.

The very small round building has about 12 to 18 rooms, the small ones have 21 to 28 rooms, the medium ones have about 30 to 40 rooms, the large ones have about 42 to 58 rooms, and the super large round buildings have about 60 to 72 rooms.

Two thirds of the round building are 3 stories high and hold roughly 20 families or 100 people.

The round earth building is a "group-oriented" residence, usually with one main entrance. Its wall is usually around 1 meter thick. The main entrance door is padded with iron sheet and is locked by 2 horizontal wood bars. The wooden bars retract into the walls in order to open the door. In the event the wood bars are sawed through, the locking mechanism is still intact.

Inside the entrance is a huge central courtyard where all the doors of the rooms and inner windows are open to.

At the ground level except the hall and the staircases, the rooms are used as kitchens and dining rooms. The rooms on the second floor are used for storage. The rooms on the 3rd level are used as bedrooms. The rooms in each level are identical. In front of each room, there is an open round hallway and usually there are 4 staircases to move from one level to another.

Thus each family occupies one vertical unit with lower level as kitchen, 2nd level for storage and miscellaneous use and 3rd level and above used as bedroom. Sometime there is no open round hallway. Instead, every family has its own private staircase.

A typical room is about 10-13 square meters in size. The larger round earth building has room around 15 square meters. The windows facing outside tend to be small, with the window size at the outer wall smaller and the window size at the inner wall larger enabling wider surveillance from the inside. It is extremely hard for outsiders to come in through the windows. There is usually no window at the ground level.

While the round building is fairly large, it has an inner ring, which is like a round building within a round building. For round building that built earlier than 15th century, they have other defensive features that would counter siege. It is said that during Ming Dynasty as Japanese pirates intruded the coastal areas, they always leave the Hakka's Earth Buildings area alone.

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