Warsaw: what to see, where to stay and how to get around
In January 1945 Warsaw was a heap of rubble: eighty-five per cent of the city destroyed, most of it not in battle but demolished systematically after the uprising. The Old Town you walk through was rebuilt in the 1950s from the eighteenth-century cityscapes of Bernardo Bellotto — painters reconstructed it street by street from pictures. It is the only UNESCO site listed for being a reconstruction.
A short history of Warsaw
Warsaw grew up in the Middle Ages as a town on the Vistula, and in 1596 King Sigismund III moved the court here from Kraków. Before the Second World War about 350,000 Jews lived here, about a third of the city's population and the largest Jewish community in Europe. In 1940 the Germans confined them in a ghetto, from which most were sent to Treblinka. In April 1943 the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising broke out. After the Polish uprising of 1944 the Germans systematically blew up the city, and about 85 per cent of it was destroyed. The old town was rebuilt according to old paintings, and in 1980 it was declared a World Heritage Site.
The ten best sights in Warsaw
1Old Town SquareRebuilt from paintings after being flattened in 1944
2Royal CastleBlown up by the Germans, rebuilt by donations
3BarbicanThe old city gate, and the wall around it
4Krakowskie PrzedmieścieThe royal route, and the best street in the city
5Palace of CultureStalin’s gift, and the view is best from inside it
6Nowy ŚwiatCafés, bookshops, and no cars at weekends
7PragaThe side the war missed — real tenements, real bullet holes
8Vistula boulevardsA wild sandy bank on one side, a promenade on the other
9POLIN MuseumA thousand years of Jewish Poland, not only the end
10Warsaw Rising MuseumSixty-three days in 1944, told hour by hour
Scan with your phone camera to open the map there
What is an audio walk?
Tours in Warsaw →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 Warsaw:
Free walking tours in Warsaw
The Old Town that was rebuilt
In January 1945 Warsaw was a heap of rubble: eighty-five per cent of the city destroyed, most of it not in battle but demolished systematically after the uprising. The Old Town you walk through was rebuilt in the 1950s from the eighteenth-century cityscapes of Bernardo Bellotto — painters reconstructed it street by street from pictures. It is the only UNESCO site listed for being a reconstruction.
- Old Town Square · Every facade here was painted back into existence. Where Bellotto had got a detail wrong, the rebuilders copied his mistake anyway — the painting was the only document that survived.
- Royal Castle · The Germans drilled holes for explosives in 1939 and blew it up in 1944. Poles had smuggled out fragments — a cornice, a column, a piece of parquet — and hidden them for twenty-five years. The rebuilt castle has them set back into the walls.
- Barbican · A sixteenth-century gate that was already built over and forgotten by 1800. The war demolished the houses around it and revealed it — so it was rebuilt from its own exposed foundations.
- Krakowskie Przedmieście · The road the kings took from the castle to Wilanów. Chopin played his first concert on this street at eight years old, and the church halfway along holds his heart in a pillar.
- Tomb of the Unknown Soldier · Three arches are all that is left of the Saxon Palace, which the Germans blew up in December 1944. The arches survived because the tomb was under them, and nobody rebuilt the palace — the gap is the monument.
- Saski Garden · Opened to the public in 1727 — one of the first public parks anywhere in the world, two generations before the idea reached London or Paris.
The ghetto and what is left
Before the war three hundred and seventy thousand Jews lived in Warsaw — a third of the city, the largest Jewish community in Europe. What was the ghetto is now ordinary housing with almost no trace, because the Germans burned it to the ground in 1943 and the communists built blocks on top. This walk is about what cannot be seen, and about what remains anyway.
- POLIN Museum · A thousand years of Jewish life in Poland, and only the last room is the Holocaust. The building stands on ghetto rubble and its entrance is a crack that splits the facade like the parting of a sea.
- Ghetto Heroes Monument · The bronze was cast from stone that Hitler’s architect had brought to Berlin for a victory monument. In 1970 the German chancellor knelt here unannounced, and the photograph changed Europe.
- Umschlagplatz · From this siding three hundred thousand people were put on trains to Treblinka in two months in 1942. The wall carries four hundred first names — one for each letter, standing for everyone whose surname was lost.
- Okopowa Jewish Cemetery · Two hundred thousand graves under a grown forest, open since 1806 and never destroyed. Zamenhof who invented Esperanto is here, and so is the rabbi of Ger.
- Nożyk Synagogue · The only one of more than four hundred synagogues in Warsaw still standing, because the Germans used it as a stable and it was not worth demolishing. It holds services again.
- Warsaw Rising Museum · Sixty-three days of fighting in 1944, told hour by hour, in a power station. The Red Army sat on the far bank of the river and watched. Two hundred thousand civilians died and the city was then levelled in revenge.
Parks and Praga
Warsaw is one of the greenest cities in Europe — a quarter of it is parkland. But the interesting thing is across the river: Praga, the side the Red Army took early and the war therefore spared. The real nineteenth-century tenements stand there, with bullet holes and shrines in the courtyards — the only part of the city that is as it was.
- Łazienki Park · The last king of Poland built a palace on an island in the lake, with a theatre on a second island so the audience sat on the bank. Every Sunday in summer someone plays Chopin under his statue, free.
- Ujazdów Castle · Burned in 1944, left as a ruin, demolished by the communists and then rebuilt in the 1970s as a centre for contemporary art — which is what it still is.
- Vistula boulevards · One bank is a built promenade; the other is left wild — a sandy, forested riverbank inside a capital city, protected because beavers and kingfishers live on it.
- Praga · The Red Army reached this bank in September 1944 and stopped, so the fighting never came here. The tenements, the cobbles and the courtyard shrines that people built during the occupation are all original.
- Bazar Różyckiego · A market on the same ground since 1874, and the black market of the communist years. Much of it is gone, but the old women selling pyzy from a pot are still there.
- Neon Museum · In the 1960s the communist state commissioned artists to design neon shop signs, as proof that socialism could glow too. After 1989 they were torn down; two collectors saved a hundred and light them here.
Getting to Warsaw and getting around
- Chopin Airport · Twenty minutes by train to the centre
- Warszawa Centralna · Trains to Berlin, Prague and Kraków
- Metro Świętokrzyska · Where the two metro lines cross
Museums in Warsaw
- POLIN Museum · Give it three hours, and start at the top
- Warsaw Rising Museum · Sixty-three days in 1944, hour by hour
- National Museum · Polish painting, and Nubian frescoes from Faras
- Chopin Museum · His last piano, and his handwriting
- Copernicus Science Centre · Four hundred things to press, and a planetarium
- Neon Museum · Communist-era shop signs, lit again
Parks and gardens in Warsaw
- Łazienki Park · Peacocks, a palace on water, and free Chopin on Sundays
- Wilanów Palace · Baroque, and the war never reached it
- Vistula wild bank · A protected sandy forest inside the capital
- Kampinos National Park · A forest of moving dunes, forty minutes out
- Powązki Cemetery · Two hundred and fifty years of Warsaw, under trees
Things to do in Warsaw with kids
- Copernicus Science Centre · Book ahead — it sells out at weekends
- Warsaw Zoo · Where three hundred people were hidden in the cages
- Multimedia Fountain Park · A free light and water show on summer evenings
Cheap eats in Warsaw
Eight counters, and the best of them are communist. A bar mleczny is a milk bar — a state-subsidised canteen invented in 1896 and kept going by the government ever since, where a plate of pierogi still costs less than a coffee. You queue, you point, you sit where there is room.
- Bar Prasowy · Pierogi for 12 złoty, queue and point
- Zapiecek · Pierogi made in the window, in the Old Town
- Hala Mirowska · A real market — herring, cheese, and flowers outside
- Hala Gwardii · The hall next door, turned into food counters
- Hala Koszyki · A 1909 iron market hall, now twenty kitchens
- Elektrownia Powiśle · The power station that lit pre-war Warsaw
- Zapiekanka stalls · Half a baguette with mushrooms and cheese, 15 złoty
- Pyzy at Bazar Różyckiego · Potato dumplings sold out of a pot, in Praga
Live music in Warsaw
- Chopin at Łazienki · Free concerts under the statue, Sundays in summer
- Soho Factory · A factory yard in Praga, with clubs in the sheds
- Plac Zbawiciela · The square where the city drinks and argues
Frequently asked questions about Warsaw
What is there to see in Warsaw?
The top sights in Warsaw are Old Town Square, Royal Castle and Barbican. The full list on this page has 10 sights, each with a photo and a short note.
How many days do you need in Warsaw?
Three to four days are enough to see the best of Warsaw without rushing, including at least one walking tour.
Is there a free walking tour in Warsaw?
Yes. sleepntrip has 3 free audio walks in Warsaw, with no guide and no group: your phone tells the story at every stop. The first one: The Old Town that was rebuilt.
How do you get to Warsaw and get around?
The main ways are Chopin Airport, Warszawa Centralna and Metro Świętokrzyska. Full details are in the transport section on this page.
Where to stay in Warsaw, and for how much?
sleepntrip shows only rooms in Warsaw 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 Warsaw for your dates?
Only rooms that meet nine conditions, up to $80 a night.