Izmir: what to see, where to stay and how to get around
Izmir is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the Mediterranean — settlement at Bayraklı goes back five thousand years — and almost nothing in the centre looks it. The reason is September 1922: a fire that started as the Greek army withdrew burned the Greek and Armenian quarters for four days and destroyed a large part of the city. What survived is the Turkish and Jewish quarter around the bazaar, which is where this walk goes. Two and a half hours, flat, and the bazaar closes on Sunday.
A short history of Izmir
The city was called Smyrna, and the Greeks claimed that Homer was born here. In the 4th century BC the city was moved from its old site to Mount Pagus, according to tradition at the inspiration of Alexander the Great. Under Rome it was one of the great cities of Asia Minor, and the remains of its agora lie in the city centre. In the Ottoman period it was a major trading port where Greeks, Armenians, Turks, Jews and European merchants lived. In 1626 Sabbatai Zevi, who declared himself the Messiah, was born here. In September 1922, at the end of the Greco-Turkish War, a great fire burned the Greek and Armenian quarters, and the city was rebuilt under the name Izmir.
The ten best sights in Izmir
1Konak SquareThe centre of the city, and everything in the old town is within 15 minutes of it
2Clock TowerBuilt in 1901 for the sultan’s jubilee, and the clock itself was a gift from the Kaiser
3Kızlarağası HanA 1744 caravanserai in the middle of the bazaar, free, and the courtyard is the coffee stop
4Hisar MosqueFree, the largest in the old city, from 1592, and the ceiling painting is the reason
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5Şadırvanaltı Mosque
Free, in the bazaar, and the fountain under it gives it its name
6Agora of Smyrna200 lira, rebuilt by Marcus Aurelius after the 178 earthquake, and the basement vaults are intact
7KadifekaleFree, Alexander’s citadel hill, and the view is the whole bay — go before dusk
8Historical LiftFree, built in 1907 to replace 155 steps, and the terrace café is at the top
9Dario Moreno StreetFree, the lane up to the lift, and it is named after the singer who grew up on it
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10Havra Street
Free, nine synagogues in a few hundred metres, and most are behind unmarked doors
Scan with your phone camera to open the map there
What is an audio walk?
Tours in Izmir →A guide in your headphones: open the walk on our site, walk from stop to stop, and at each one your phone tells its story. No guide, no group, and free. This is the first walk in Izmir:
Free walking tours in Izmir
Smyrna, and what the fire left
Izmir is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the Mediterranean — settlement at Bayraklı goes back five thousand years — and almost nothing in the centre looks it. The reason is September 1922: a fire that started as the Greek army withdrew burned the Greek and Armenian quarters for four days and destroyed a large part of the city. What survived is the Turkish and Jewish quarter around the bazaar, which is where this walk goes. Two and a half hours, flat, and the bazaar closes on Sunday.
- Clock Tower · Built in 1901 for the twenty-fifth anniversary of Abdülhamid the Second’s accession, designed by Raymond Charles Père — a Levantine architect born in the city — and the clock mechanism inside it was a present from Kaiser Wilhelm the Second. It survived both the 1922 fire and the earthquakes, and it is the one monument every side of the city claims.
- Kemeraltı Bazaar · The bazaar is built on water, or rather on where water used to be: this was the inner harbour of Smyrna, a bay that cut into the city, and it silted up and was deliberately filled during the seventeenth century. The curve of the main lane is the curve of the old shoreline, which is why a bazaar laid out on flat ground bends for no visible reason.
- Kızlarağası Han · A caravanserai of 1744, built by the chief of the imperial harem eunuchs — the kızlar ağası, which is where the name comes from — as an endowment whose rents funded a mosque. It fell into use as a warehouse and was restored in the 1990s; the ground floor is now coppersmiths, who were there originally too.
- Havra Street · Nine synagogues stand within a few hundred metres here, which is the densest surviving cluster in the eastern Mediterranean. The community was Sephardic, arriving after the 1492 expulsion from Spain, and by the seventeenth century Izmir was second only to Salonica in the empire. Sabbatai Zevi, who declared himself the messiah and shook Jewish communities from Yemen to Amsterdam, was born on this street in 1626.
- Agora of Smyrna · The Roman market square, and what you see is the rebuild: an earthquake flattened the city in 178 and Marcus Aurelius paid to reconstruct it, at the request of the orator Aelius Aristides, who had a dream about it and wrote the appeal. The vaulted basement is the most complete part and still carries water through the original channels.
- Kadifekale · Alexander the Great refounded Smyrna on this hill in 334 BC, and the reason given in the ancient sources is a dream: he fell asleep under a plane tree after hunting and two Nemeses told him to move the city here. Whatever the truth, the move worked — the old site at Bayraklı had no defensible height and no deep water, and this one has both.
The Levantine city and the seafront
For three hundred years Izmir was the Ottoman Empire’s western port, and the people who ran its trade were Levantines — Italian, French, Dutch and British families who settled, intermarried and stayed for generations without ever being quite European or quite Ottoman. They built the quay, the lift, the consulates and the clubs, and the names on the shopfronts in Alsancak are theirs. Two hours along the water, and the evening is the time to do it.
- Historical Lift · Built in 1907 by Nesim Levi Bayraklıoğlu, a Jewish merchant, as a gift to the neighbourhood: the cliff between the shore road and the district above it was a hundred and fifty-five steps, and he paid for a lift so that the people living up there — including his own employees — did not have to climb them. It still runs, it is still free, and it still does the same job.
- Dario Moreno Street · The lane up to the lift is named after David Arugete, a Sephardic Jew born in this quarter in 1921 who became Dario Moreno and sold millions of records in France in the fifties and sixties. He died in Istanbul airport on his way home. The street was renamed for him in 1990, which is unusual — Turkish streets are almost never named after entertainers.
- Saint Polycarp Church · The oldest standing church in Izmir, built in 1625, and it is dedicated to the bishop of Smyrna who was burned in the city stadium in about 155 — the account of his death is the earliest surviving description of a Christian martyrdom. Smyrna is one of the seven churches addressed in Revelation, and it is the only one of the seven that gets no criticism.
- Pasaport · The name is literal: this was the quay where arriving passengers had their papers checked, and the customs house behind it was the border. The quay itself was built in the 1870s by the Dussaud brothers of Marseille under a concession, which is why the Kordon looks like a French port rather than an Ottoman one.
- Kordon · Two and a half kilometres of waterfront with no road between the grass and the sea for most of it, because the city closed the inner carriageway to traffic in the 2000s. The horse carriages that used to work here were withdrawn in 2020 after a campaign about the animals, and electric carts replaced them.
- Kültürpark · Forty-two hectares of park in the middle of the city, and it exists because of the fire: the land it stands on was the burned Armenian quarter, left as rubble for fourteen years, and in 1936 the mayor laid it out as a park and permanent fairground rather than let it be rebuilt. The İzmir Fair has been held in it every September since.
Ephesus and the coast
Three of the biggest classical sites in the world are inside an hour and a half of Izmir, and each one died of a different cause: Ephesus because its harbour silted up, Pergamon because Rome inherited it and moved its library, Sardis because Persia took it. None of them is a half-day — Ephesus alone needs three hours and in July it is thirty-eight degrees with almost no shade. Go at opening or after four.
- Ephesus · A city of perhaps two hundred thousand people that died because the Cayster river filled its harbour with silt faster than it could be dredged. The sea is now five kilometres away. The Library of Celsus was finished in 117 as a tomb — the man it commemorates is buried in a sarcophagus under the floor — and its facade is built with a deliberate optical trick: the columns at the ends are shorter and the base curves up, which makes it look wider than it is.
- Temple of Artemis · One of the Seven Wonders, four times the size of the Parthenon, and what is left is one reassembled column in a field with a stork nesting on it. It was burned down in 356 BC by a man named Herostratus whose stated motive was to make his name immortal; Ephesus made it a capital offence to repeat the name, which is why we know it.
- House of the Virgin Mary · The building was located in 1891 by French priests using the written visions of Anne Catherine Emmerich, a German nun who never left Westphalia and described a house on a hill near Ephesus in detail. They found a ruin matching the description. Three popes have visited. The Church has never declared the site authentic and has never denied it either.
- Pergamon Acropolis · The theatre here is the steepest in the ancient world — eighty rows at a gradient that feels close to a wall — because the hill left no room to spread. The city’s library held about two hundred thousand scrolls and was a rival to Alexandria, and when Egypt cut off the papyrus supply to stop it, Pergamon developed treated animal skin instead. The word parchment is the city’s name.
- Asklepion · A medical centre rather than a temple, and the treatment was psychological as much as physical: patients walked a sacred way, bathed, slept in a dormitory and reported their dreams to priests who prescribed from them. Galen, whose anatomy textbooks were used in Europe for fifteen hundred years, trained and practised here.
- Sardis · The capital of Lydia, and the place where coinage was invented: the Lydians struck the first standardised metal coins around 600 BC from electrum panned out of the Pactolus stream that runs through the site. Croesus was their king, which is why the phrase exists. The synagogue excavated here is the largest ancient one found anywhere.
Getting to Izmir and getting around
- Adnan Menderes Airport · 15 kilometres out, and the suburban train to the centre takes 25 minutes
- Basmane Station · The old terminus; trains to Selçuk for Ephesus leave from here
- Alsancak Station · The suburban İZBAN line; one card works on trains, metro, buses and ferries
- İzmir bus terminal · 8 kilometres east, and buses to Bergama and Çeşme go from here
- Konak pier · The ferry across the bay costs the same as a bus and is the best ride in the city
- Karşıyaka pier · The other side of the bay, 20 minutes by ferry, and the promenade there is quieter
Cheap eats in Izmir
Izmir eats standing up more than any other Turkish city, and four of the things it eats exist nowhere else. Boyoz is a Sephardic pastry brought by Jews expelled from Spain in 1492 — a coil of oiled dough, eaten with a boiled egg, for breakfast and only in Izmir. Kumru is a sandwich of sausage, cheese and tomato in a sesame roll from Çeşme. Söğüş is cold sliced lamb head in flatbread with parsley, which is exactly what it sounds like. And the bread ring is called gevrek here, not simit, and locals will correct you. Forty to a hundred and fifty lira each.
- Dostlar Fırını · About 40 lira with the egg, mornings only, and gone by eleven
- Kemeraltı söğüş stalls · About 90 lira, cash, and ask for it without brain if you prefer
- Kumrucu Şevki · About 150 lira, in Çeşme, and it has been making the same sandwich since 1961
- Midyeci Ahmet · About 10 lira each, you count your own shells, and evenings are the time
- Tavacı Recep Usta · About 500 lira, lamb tava and kebab, and it is a sit-down institution
- Kemeraltı Bazaar · Gevrek, lokma and şambalı from carts, nothing over 50 lira, and shut on Sunday
- Bostanlı market · Wednesday on the north shore, produce and cheese, and the tulum is the buy
- Bornova market · A student quarter, cheap plates, and this is where the city eats on a weekday
Museums in Izmir
Izmir’s museums are small, because the city’s own past mostly burned in 1922 and its ancient past is out of town at Ephesus, Pergamon and Sardis. What the city museums do hold is the thing those sites cannot: the finds from Old Smyrna at Bayraklı, which take the settlement back five thousand years, and the objects of a Levantine merchant city that no longer exists.
- Archaeology Museum · 200 lira, an hour and a half, and closed Monday
- Ethnography Museum · Free, in an 1831 hospital building, and the camel-wrestling room is the oddity
- Atatürk Museum · Free, on the Kordon, and 40 minutes is enough
- Agora of Smyrna · 200 lira, and the vaulted basement still carries running water
- Ephesus Museum · 400 lira, in Selçuk, and do it before the site, not after
- Red Basilica · 300 lira, built as a temple to Serapis, and the river runs in tunnels under it
- Metropolis · Free, 37 kilometres out, excavation ongoing, and usually nobody is there
- Klazomenai · Free, near Urla, and the reconstructed press is the thing
Holy places in Izmir
Three communities built this city and two of them are almost gone. Smyrna was one of the seven churches of Revelation and had a Greek Orthodox majority into the twentieth century; the Sephardic Jewish community, arriving after 1492, was the second largest in the Ottoman Empire; and the Muslim city grew around the bazaar. The 1922 fire and the 1924 population exchange ended the first, and emigration after 1948 thinned the second. The buildings are still standing and most are still in use.
- Havra Street · Free to walk, most are locked, and the heritage ticket opens three
- Signora Synagogue · Open with the heritage ticket, named after Doña Gracia Nasi, and restored in 2020
- Saint Polycarp Church · Free, ring the bell at the gate, and mornings are best
- Saint John Cathedral · Free, the Catholic cathedral, and mass runs in Turkish, Italian and English
- Hisar Mosque · Free, from 1592 and the largest in the old city, and the painted ceiling is the reason
- Şadırvanaltı Mosque · Free, in the bazaar, and the ablution fountain under it gives the name
- House of the Virgin Mary · 600 lira, Muslims visit it too as a place of Meryem Ana, and silence is asked for
- İsa Bey Mosque · Free, in Selçuk, and the courtyard is the part to sit in
Nature and day trips near Izmir
Izmir sits at the head of a deep bay with two peninsulas running west, and the geography decides everything: the meltem, a steady north-west summer wind, makes Alaçatı one of the best windsurfing bays in the Mediterranean and keeps the city bearable in August. The Gediz river delta on the north side is a wetland of international importance, and the flamingos on it are not seasonal — they are there all year and they breed.
- Gediz Delta · Free, 26 kilometres out, and a car and binoculars are needed
- Bird Paradise · Free, the visitor centre of the delta, and the hides are open from dawn
- Alaçatı · 67 kilometres out, windy from May to September, and book ahead in August
- Ilıca Beach · Free, hot springs rise through the sand, and the water is shallow a long way out
- Karaburun · 59 kilometres out, a car is essential, and the narcissus are in January
- Pamucak Beach · Free, wide and almost empty, and this was the sea Ephesus used as its harbour
- Wildlife Park · 150 lira, a conservation park with open enclosures, and half a day with children
- Mordoğan · 45 kilometres out, pebble beaches with no hotel strip, and the water is cold and clear
Things to do in Izmir with kids
- Ferry across the bay · Costs the same as a bus, 20 minutes, and the gulls follow the boat for simit
- Historical Lift · Free, a 51-metre ride up a cliff, and the terrace at the top has a café
- Wildlife Park · 150 lira, lions and giraffes in open ground, and a shuttle runs inside it
- Kültürpark · Free, a pond with pedal boats and a lot of shade, and it is open till late
- Bostanlı sunset deck · Free, wooden steps right down to the water, and ice cream carts along it
- Ephesus · 1,500 lira, the theatre seats 25,000 and children can sit in it, and hats are needed
- Bird Paradise · Free, flamingos visible from the hides, and go early for the birds
- Pamucak Beach · Free, wide and shallow, and it pairs with Ephesus in one day
Nightlife in Izmir
Izmir is the most relaxed large city in Turkey about drinking, and that is a political fact as much as a social one: it votes secular by large margins and calls itself so openly. The evening has two halves — the Kordon, where people sit on the grass with beer from a kiosk and nobody minds, and Alsancak behind it, where the meyhane tables of raki and meze run until two. Alcohol is not sold in shops after ten by national law.
- Kordon · A beer from a kiosk is about 80 lira, and shops stop selling at ten
- Kıbrıs Şehitleri Street · The main Alsancak strip, bars and meyhane, and it gets going at ten
- Deniz Restaurant · About 900 lira a head with raki, and book for the window
- Tavacı Recep Usta · About 500 lira, open late, and the lamb tava is the dish
- Alsancak · Side streets of Levantine houses turned into bars, and most close at two
- Bostanlı · The north shore version, quieter and cheaper, and the last ferry back is at midnight
- Alaçatı · The summer nightlife of the region, 67 kilometres out, and prices double in August
- Sığacık · A walled marina with fish tables, 39 kilometres out, and it stops at midnight
Frequently asked questions about Izmir
What is there to see in Izmir?
The top sights in Izmir are Konak Square, Clock Tower and Kızlarağası Han. The full list on this page has 10 sights, each with a photo and a short note.
How many days do you need in Izmir?
Three to four days are enough to see the best of Izmir without rushing, including at least one walking tour.
Is there a free walking tour in Izmir?
Yes. sleepntrip has 3 free audio walks in Izmir, with no guide and no group: your phone tells the story at every stop. The first one: Smyrna, and what the fire left.
How do you get to Izmir and get around?
The main ways are Adnan Menderes Airport, Basmane Station and Alsancak Station. Full details are in the transport section on this page.
Where to stay in Izmir, and for how much?
sleepntrip shows only rooms in Izmir that meet nine conditions: a good location, high guest scores, cleanliness, and a price of up to $80 a night for two. Pick your dates and see what is free.
Looking for a hotel in Izmir for your dates?
Only rooms that meet nine conditions, up to $80 a night.