Give Antalya four days. Spend the first in Kaleiçi, the walled old town, which holds Hadrian's Gate, the Seljuk minaret, the harbour and most of the places worth eating in. Spend the second at the Antalya Museum and on Konyaaltı beach. Keep the third for the Roman cities inland: Perge and Aspendos together, or Termessos on its mountain. Use the fourth for water, or the drive south to Olympos.
Antalya is two trips that happen to share an airport. One is the coast: a walled old town on a cliff above its own harbour, a long pebble beach under the Beydağları, and late evenings in the lanes of Kaleiçi. The other is inland and Roman, and it is the reason to give the city more than a weekend.
The 10 best things to do in Antalya
1
Kaleiçi and Hadrian's Gate
Old town· Kaleiçi, Muratpaşa, Antalya
The gate went up in AD 130 for the emperor's visit, three marble arches deep enough to walk through in shade, with a Roman tower beside it rebuilt for a Seljuk sultan in the 13th century. Behind it the old town runs downhill inside its walls: Ottoman houses, courtyards turned into hotels, and lanes that end at the harbour.
Time3 hrs
CostFree
Best atEarly evening
TipThe lanes run downhill to the harbour and the climb back is steeper than it looks
Museum· Bahçelievler, Konyaaltı Caddesi No 88, Muratpaşa, Antalya
One of the largest archaeological museums in the country, and the place the sites around Antalya were emptied into. More than 5,000 objects run from the Palaeolithic to the Ottoman period, but the reason to come is the Hall of Gods, a line of Olympian statues excavated at Perge. Go before the sites rather than after.
Time2 hrs
CostTicket
Best atMorning
TipThe nostalgic tram terminates outside the door at the Müze stop
The best preserved Roman theatre stage in the Mediterranean, built in the 2nd century AD to a design by the local architect Zenon. What survives is the part that usually does not: the stage building stands to its full height, so the acoustics still work as they were meant to. It is also still in use every summer.
Time2 hrs
CostTicket
Best atMorning
TipFestival performances start at 21:00 in September
The Düden river comes off the Taurus and drops twice on its way to the sea, and the two falls are nothing like each other. The upper falls sit in a wooded valley where a path runs behind the water into the cave. The lower falls go over the cliff at Lara and land in the Mediterranean, best watched from a boat.
Time2 hrs
CostTicket at the upper falls
Best atLate afternoon
TipBoat trips out of the Kaleiçi harbour pass the lower falls
A Pamphylian city that surrendered to Alexander in 334 BC and did its best building under Rome. The plan is unusually legible: a colonnaded main street with a water channel down the middle, a Hellenistic gate, a stadium and baths, all of it flat and walkable. Its statues now fill the Antalya Museum.
Time2 hrs
CostTicket
Best atMorning
TipThere is almost no shade on the colonnaded street or in the stadium
Ancient city· Güllük Dağı Termessos National Park, Korkuteli road, Antalya
The Pisidian city Alexander the Great decided not to take. He besieged it in 333 BC, judged the mountain approach too costly and moved on, and the site still reads as a natural fortress: a thousand metres up, reached by a steep climb through pine. Little of it is signed and none of it is crowded.
The city's western bay, a long grey pebble beach running from the cliffs below the museum toward the mountains, with the Beydağları rising off the far end of it. It holds Blue Flag status, the water drops away quickly and stays clear, and the promenade behind it carries a park, cafes and the tram.
Harbour· Kaleiçi Yat Limanı, Selçuk, Muratpaşa, Antalya
Antalya's original harbour, tucked into a gap in the cliff below the old town and in working use from antiquity until the modern port took over. Restored in the 1980s, it is now a marina ringed by terraces. Take the stone ramp down, because the whole harbour appears at once from the top of it.
Time2 hrs
CostBoat fare
Best atSunset
TipBoats sell by the hour along the quay and prices move with the season
Viewpoint· Kılınçarslan, Hıdırlık Sokak, Muratpaşa, Antalya
A Roman tower of the 2nd century AD stands at the seaward corner of the old town, square below and round above, and nobody has settled whether it was a tomb, a lighthouse or both. What is not in doubt is the position, and the park running east from it is the city's evening walk.
Time1 hr
CostFree
Best atSunset
TipThe cafes on Hıdırlık Sokak look straight down the coast
An hour and a half down the coast, a Lycian city lies in a valley behind a shingle beach, its tombs half taken back by oleander and fig. The reason to stay until dark is above: at Yanartaş, methane seeping through the rock burns in small permanent flames, as it has since antiquity.
Four. One for Kaleiçi and the harbour, one for the museum and a beach, one for the Roman cities inland, and one for the Düden falls or the drive south to Olympos. Two days covers the old town and one site, and leaves the reason most people come inland unvisited.
When is the best time to visit Antalya?+
April to early June and September to October. The sea is warm enough either side of summer, the archaeological sites are walkable without losing the middle of the day to the heat, and prices sit below the July and August peak.
Do you need a car for the ancient sites?+
Not for all of them. Perge and Aspendos are reachable on a half-day tour or by dolmuş from the coach station, and Side is on the regular bus route east. Termessos, Sillyon and Arykanda are far easier with a car, and Termessos also needs an hour of climbing once you park.
Is Antalya walkable?+
Kaleiçi is, and nothing else really is. The city runs for kilometres along its bay, so the tram, the buses and the occasional taxi do the connecting. The AntalyaKart works on all of it and is sold from machines at the tram stops.
Konyaaltı or Lara for the beach?+
Konyaaltı is pebble, closer to the old town, backed by a promenade and framed by the mountains. Lara is sand, warmer underfoot, easier with small children and lined with the large resorts. If you are staying in Kaleiçi, Konyaaltı is the one you can reach on the tram.
Beyond the top 10
Best ancient sites in Antalya
Six more Greek, Roman and Lycian sites within a drive of the city.
Manavgat, 75 km east
Side
Ancient port
A Pamphylian port built out on a peninsula, with the Temple of Apollo at the tip above the water and a large theatre behind the modern town.
Three small harbours joined by a paved street, set in pine forest at the foot of Tahtalı Dağı. The middle harbour is a swimming beach, so bring a towel.
A flat-topped hill east of the city carrying a barely excavated Pamphylian town: a ramp gate, a Seljuk mosque, cisterns and the plain laid out below. No facilities.
A limestone cave northwest of Antalya occupied on and off for hundreds of thousands of years, and one of the most important Palaeolithic sites in Turkey.
A Lycian city terraced up a mountainside above the Bey valley, with a theatre, stadium and baths stacked one above another. The equal of Termessos for setting.
A small Lycian city in the hills above Kumluca, known for the monument to Opramoas, recorded in one of the longest inscriptions to survive from antiquity.
A small terraced beach inside the old town, under the cliff beside the harbour and reached through a restaurant that charges for access. The only walkable swim.
A long shingle beach an hour and a half south, with Olympos at one end and the flames of Yanartaş behind. A protected turtle nesting site, so building is low.
A pebble cove in the pines on the road to Kemer, looking straight across at Tahtalı Dağı. Clear deep water off the shingle, and quieter than anything inside the city.
A wide bay at the far end of the Bey mountains, held between two headlands and lined with small guesthouses. The Lycian Way passes above it and boats run from the beach.
A modern room a few minutes from Hadrian's Gate, opened in 2007 and run by a British chef, cooking a short seasonal menu. The most consistent fine dining in the old town.
Set in a restored Ottoman mansion on one of the narrowest lanes in Kaleiçi, with a courtyard garden and a room of stone and velvet. The dressed-up option.
A small lunch counter in Elmalı that makes its piyaz to order, the tahini whisked with vinegar until it goes silky. The version everything else gets measured against.
Three small collections in and around the old town, beyond the archaeological museum.
Kaleiçi
Suna and İnan Kıraç Kaleiçi Museum
House museum
Two buildings on a Kaleiçi lane: a restored 19th-century house staged with scenes of local life, and the former Church of St George holding Çanakkale ceramics.
Roughly 3,000 toys from the 1860s to the 1990s, in a house near the marina. Free to enter, and a straightforward hour with children in the middle of the old town.
The house kept as a museum since 1986 to mark Atatürk's visits to Antalya in 1930 and 1935, furnished to the period. Quiet, and mostly visited by Turkish families.
A roof bar in the middle of the old town with the Kaleiçi roofline one way, the sea another and the Taurus behind. Cocktails made properly, which is less common here.
Four districts, and what each one gives you in exchange for the commute.
Muratpaşa
Kaleiçi
Old town
The walled old town, and the only properly walkable part of Antalya. Ottoman houses turned into small hotels, the harbour below, the best tables ten minutes apart.
The western bay: the long pebble beach, the park behind it, the aquarium and the museum at the eastern end. Residential, modern, on the tram, and good for a morning swim.
East of the centre, past the point where the Düden drops into the sea. Sand instead of pebbles, the large all-inclusive resorts, and beach clubs rather than street life.
The working centre just north of the walls, where late Ottoman townhouses line Işıklar Caddesi and Elmalı keeps the everyday food. Nothing is staged for visitors.
Five drives, from a canyon an hour away to the Lycian coast at Kaş.
Manavgat, 80 km northeast
Köprülü Canyon
Rafting, ruins
A national park around the longest canyon in Turkey, and the country's busiest rafting river. Above it, a Roman bridge and the ruined city of Selge among standing stones.
Myra's rock-cut tombs and Roman theatre, the church where St Nicholas served as bishop, and a boat over the sunken city at Kekova where walls run under water.
A small harbour town on the Lycian coast with a Hellenistic theatre above it and diving off the point. Three hours each way makes it a long day, and a better overnight.
The reason Antalya can claim a ski morning and a beach afternoon: a small resort at around 2,000 metres, an hour from the coast, open when there is snow.
The white travertine terraces and the ruins of Hierapolis on top of them, inland beyond the mountains. A long drive each way, so go early or make it an overnight.
The city's road race, run in spring along the coast road, with the marathon and shorter distances starting together.
23 Apr
National Sovereignty and Children's Day
A national holiday marking the first Grand National Assembly in 1920, and the one Atatürk dedicated to children.
May – Nov
International Antalya Sand Sculpture Festival
Sculptors carve the year's theme out of sand near Lara in spring, and the figures stay on show until November.
30 Aug
Victory Day
The national holiday for the decisive battle of the War of Independence in 1922. Ceremonies in the morning.
12 – 26 Sep
Aspendos International Opera and Ballet Festival
Opera and ballet staged in the Roman theatre, where the acoustics do the work a sound system would elsewhere.
29 Oct
Republic Day
The anniversary of the declaration of the republic in 1923, with flags across the city and events on the seafront.
Oct
Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival
Turkey's oldest film festival, running since 1964 and held each autumn at the Antalya Cultural Centre. Open to the public.
Nov – Dec
International Antalya Piano Festival
A recital series at the Antalya Cultural Centre that has run for a quarter of a century, in the quietest weeks of the year.
Getting around
Antalya transport & airports
How to arrive and move around the city.
AYT
Antalya Airport
The country's third busiest airport, east of the city, with two international terminals and a domestic one. The AntRay tram stops here, which is the cheapest way into the centre.
The modern tram runs from Fatih in the west across the city to Expo in the east, calling at the coach station, the centre and the airport. Pay with an AntalyaKart from a machine.
A single-track heritage line runs between the museum and Zerdalilik, passing the top of Kaleiçi and Hadrian's Gate. Slow and short, and it links the two things most visitors want.
Turkey's rail network does not reach Antalya, so arriving overland means the intercity coach station on the northwestern edge, which is on the tram line. Taxis are metered.
Turkey
