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Top 10s across Ireland

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An island you can drive across in four hours, with an Atlantic coast that takes two weeks to do properly. Ireland is small on the map and slow in practice, and the slowness is the point.

Ireland at a glance

Best months

May · Jun · Sep

Ideal length

7–10 days

Budget / day

€110–190

Language

English and Irish

Getting around

Intercity rail between cities

When to visit Ireland

Best months trade daylight against crowds.

Full month guide →

Jan

Feb

Mar

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Aug

Sep

Oct

Nov

Dec

Best: May, June and September, when the evenings run long and the coast roads are open without the school-holiday traffic Peak: July and August, when Killarney, the Ring of Kerry and the Cliffs of Moher fill and rooms are booked months out Good: the shoulder months, plus March if you want St Patrick's Day and the crowds that come with it Off: short days and Atlantic weather, when the west is at its most dramatic and its least convenient

Quick answer · where to go in Ireland

Land in Dublin and give it two or three nights: Trinity College, the national museums, the Georgian squares and a day at the passage tombs of the Boyne Valley. Then pick a direction. The southwest is the classic run: Cork, Killarney, the Ring of Kerry and the Dingle Peninsula. The west has Galway, the Burren, the Cliffs of Moher and Connemara, with fewer coaches. The northwest is the quietest stretch of the Wild Atlantic Way. Go in May, June or September.

5 Ireland city guides

Each guide ranks the things worth your time, with a map and a daily budget.

Cork

Ireland · 10 picks

Dublin

Ireland · 10 picks

Kilkenny

Ireland · 10 picks

Sligo

Ireland · 10 picks

Dingle

Ireland · 10 picks

Fun fact

One number worth knowing

Irish is the first official language of the State and has been a full working language of the European Union since 1 January 2022, when a derogation limiting Irish translation ran out after sixteen years.

Stereotypes, sorted out

The clichés you have heard, what is actually true, and how to fit in.

"It rains all day, every day"

The realityRain here is frequent and light. Met Éireann puts most of the east between 750 and 1,000 millimetres a year and the west between 1,000 and 1,400, with April and May driest and December wettest. Showers blow in off the Atlantic and pass. Pack a shell, not an umbrella: the wind wins.

"Everyone speaks Irish day to day"

The realityCensus 2022 counted 1,873,997 people aged three and over who said they could speak Irish, two in five, and far fewer use it daily outside school. English runs the country. Irish is everyday speech in the western Gaeltacht, it is on every road sign, and it is very much alive.

"The whole island is one country"

The realityThe Republic of Ireland is the 26 counties covered here. Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom, with sterling, its own police service and its own entry rules. The border is open and mostly unsigned, easy to cross unnoticed until your phone bill arrives.

"Every pub has live traditional music every night"

The realitySessions are real and scheduled. They cluster in towns like Doolin, Dingle, Galway and Ennis, in particular pubs on particular nights, and the good ones are a circle of players facing each other. Ask locally on the day, and do not talk over the slow airs.

"It is small, so a long weekend covers it"

The realityThe State is 70,273 square kilometres, crossable in an afternoon on the motorways. The coast is the catch: regional and local roads at 80 and 60, single track in places, where a ninety-minute drive takes three hours with the stops you came for.

A pint of Guinness, poured in two goesSheep blocking a peninsula roadForty shades of greenA session in the corner of a pubThe Cliffs of Moher in horizontal rainAncestry talk on arrivalA ruined castle from a lay-by

Cultural notes that actually help

Buy your round. Pub rounds run on turns, with no splitting of the bill at the end, and skipping yours is the one thing that gets noticed.
Order at the bar, since table service is not coming, and check the kitchen hours: food usually stops well before the drink does.
Small talk first. A question lands better after a word about the weather or the drive, and getting straight to business reads as rude.
Let the person you are with set the tone on politics, history and the North. Curiosity is welcome, confident summaries are not.
Learn the two words on the toilet doors: fir is men and mná is women, and plenty of pubs label them only in Irish.
Tip by rounding up in a pub and by roughly ten per cent at a restaurant table when no service charge is on the bill.
Drive on the left, and give way at roundabouts to traffic coming from your right. On a single-track road, the pull-in nearest you is yours to use.

Famous Irish faces

The names behind Ireland's writing, music, film, sport and politics. Pick a field.

Seamus Heaney

Poet, awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1995

James Joyce

Novelist, whose Ulysses runs through a single Dublin day, 16 June 1904

Samuel Beckett

Playwright and novelist, Nobel laureate in 1969 and author of Waiting for Godot

Bono

Singer of U2, the band formed at a Dublin school in 1976

Sinéad O'Connor

Singer, whose 1990 recording of Nothing Compares 2 U reached number one around the world

Saoirse Ronan

Actor, nominated for four Academy Awards, from Atonement to Little Women

Katie Taylor

Boxer, Olympic lightweight champion in 2012 and undisputed professional world champion

Oscar Wilde

Playwright and critic, born in Dublin in 1854 and still the city's quickest wit

Bram Stoker

Author of Dracula, born in Clontarf on the north side of Dublin in 1847

Maeve Binchy

Novelist and Irish Times columnist, whose Circle of Friends sold worldwide

Enya

Singer from the Donegal Gaeltacht, whose Orinoco Flow topped the UK chart in 1988

Dolores O'Riordan

Singer of The Cranberries, from Limerick, whose Zombie was released in 1994

Rory Gallagher

Blues guitarist raised in Cork, and the player most Irish guitarists name first

Hozier

Singer and songwriter from County Wicklow, whose Take Me to Church was released in 2013

Cillian Murphy

Actor from Cork, awarded the Academy Award for Best Actor in 2024 for Oppenheimer

Colin Farrell

Actor from Dublin, nominated for an Academy Award for The Banshees of Inisherin

Brendan Gleeson

Actor from Dublin, a schoolteacher until his thirties and in everything since

Neil Jordan

Director and writer, Oscar winner for the original screenplay of The Crying Game

Roy Keane

Midfielder from Cork who captained Manchester United and the Republic of Ireland

Henry Shefflin

Hurler, ten All-Ireland senior titles with Kilkenny and the sport's most decorated forward

Éamon de Valera

Taoiseach three times, President from 1959 to 1973, and the State's dominant early figure

Michael D. Higgins

Poet and politician, elected President of Ireland in 2011 and re-elected in 2018

Mary Robinson

First woman President of Ireland, elected in 1990, later UN human rights commissioner

W. B. Yeats

Poet, Nobel laureate in 1923 and a founder of Dublin's Abbey Theatre

Sally Rooney

Novelist, whose Normal People was adapted for television by RTÉ and the BBC

Christy Moore

Folk singer, a founder of both Planxty and Moving Hearts

Sonia O'Sullivan

Middle-distance runner from Cobh, Olympic silver medallist over 5,000 metres in 2000

Michael Collins

Revolutionary leader and first Minister for Finance, killed in County Cork in 1922

Must-try Irish food

The potato plates first, then the coast, the butcher and the glass. Pick a category.

Irish stew

Lamb or mutton with potato and onion, simmered until the meat gives. Beef is the shortcut.

Colcannon

Mashed potato folded through kale or cabbage, with butter and spring onion through it.

Boxty

Northern midlands potato pancake of grated raw potato and mash together.

Coddle

A Dublin pot of sausages, rashers, onion and potato, cooked pale in stock.

Bacon and cabbage

Boiled loin bacon with cabbage and parsley sauce, the old Sunday plate.

Seafood chowder

The standard pub lunch on both coasts, with brown bread. A fast test of any kitchen.

Smoked salmon

Cold-smoked over oak or beech, sliced thin, eaten on brown bread with lemon.

Fish and chips

Cod or haddock in batter from a chipper. In Dublin, ask for a 'one and one'.

Guinness

Poured in two stages with a rest between, so the wait is part of the order.

Irish whiskey

Triple-distilled as a rule, and single pot still is the style that exists nowhere else.

Irish coffee

Coffee, sugar, whiskey and cream, invented at the Foynes flying-boat terminal.

Tea

Strong, with milk, offered within a minute of arriving. Refusing takes two attempts.

Champ

Mash beaten with hot milk and scallions, with a well of melting butter in the middle.

The full Irish

Rashers, sausage, egg, tomato, and black and white pudding. Built for a day outdoors.

Galway oysters

Native flat oysters, in season from September, with a Galway festival each autumn.

Dublin Bay prawns

Langoustines, best plain with butter and bread, never buried in breadcrumbs.

Irish beef

Grass-fed for most of the year, and the basis of the country's steak reputation.

Spiced beef

A Cork Christmas cure, brined with spices for days and served cold in thin slices.

Drisheen

A soft-set Cork blood pudding, traditionally eaten with tripe. The one to be brave about.

Soda bread

Raised with bicarbonate of soda and buttermilk, no yeast. Best the day it is baked.

Barmbrack

A fruited tea loaf eaten at Halloween, with a ring baked in for whoever gets that slice.

Porter cake

A dark fruit cake made with stout, kept in a tin and noticeably better after a week.

Carrageen moss pudding

A set cream thickened with Atlantic seaweed, no gelatine. A coast dish.

Know before you go

The essentials for planning an Ireland trip.

Currency

Euro (EUR)

Cards run almost everything, contactless by default, down to a coffee or a bus fare. Carry a little cash for rural pubs and small ferries. Northern Ireland uses pounds sterling.

Language

English and Irish

English is the working language everywhere. Irish is the first official language, road signs are bilingual, and in the western Gaeltacht it is what you will hear.

Calling code

+353

Prepaid SIMs and eSIMs are sold at airports and phone shops. Coverage is good in towns, patchy on peninsulas. Northern Ireland is +44, so cross-border calls may be international.

Power

230V, 50Hz, plug type G

The same three-pin rectangular plug as the United Kingdom, not the round European two-pin. Continental European and US devices both need an adapter, and US devices need to handle 230 volts.

Emergency

112 or 999

Both reach the same operator for Garda, fire, ambulance and coast guard, free from any phone. For a cliff or water incident, ask for the coast guard.

Visa

Ireland is not in Schengen

Ireland is in the EU but outside Schengen, with its own visa system: a Schengen visa is not valid here, nor an Irish one there. Check the Department of Foreign Affairs before booking.

Getting around

Rail between cities, a car for the coast

Iarnród Éireann runs into Dublin, so Cork to Galway by rail means a change. Bus Éireann fills the gaps, and a Leap Card covers city transport. The peninsulas need a hire car.

Driving

On the left, limits in km/h

Motorways 120, national roads 100, regional 80, and since February 2025 rural local roads 60. The local roads hold the scenery: single track, hedged, with livestock. Hire a small car.

Weather

Layers and a shell, year round

Most of the east gets 750 to 1,000 millimetres of rain a year, the west 1,000 to 1,400 and the mountains more. April and May are driest, December wettest. The wind defeats umbrellas.

Time zone

GMT in winter, UTC+1 in summer

Ireland keeps the same clock as the United Kingdom and changes on the same dates as the rest of Europe, which puts it an hour behind Paris and Berlin all year.

Tap water

Drink it

The public supply is treated and safe, and any boil-water notice is announced locally. On the islands and in some rural houses the supply is a private well, so ask.

Tipping

Round up in pubs, about ten per cent at table

Nobody tips at the bar for a pint. Restaurants take roughly ten per cent if service is not added, and groups often find it on the bill. Round up taxi fares.

The border

Open, but a different country

Northern Ireland is part of the UK. There is no checkpoint and often no sign, but the currency becomes sterling, the code +44, and UK entry rules apply, so check your visa covers it.

Ireland travel FAQ

How many days do you need in Ireland?+

Seven to ten covers Dublin, one coast and the drive between them without rushing. Five is Dublin plus either the southwest or the west, picking one. Three is a city break with a long day out, and it is a good trip if you plan it as one and do not try to add Kerry.

When is the best time to visit Ireland?+

May, June and September. The evenings are long, the coast roads and the island ferries are running, and the July and August crowds have either not arrived or have gone. March brings St Patrick's Day and a spike in prices around it. Winter is dark and wet, and the west is at its most dramatic in it.

Do you need a car in Ireland?+

For Dublin, Cork and Galway on their own, no. The intercity trains are comfortable and the cities are walkable. For the Wild Atlantic Way, the Ring of Kerry, Connemara or anywhere with the word peninsula in it, yes. Public transport reaches the towns and not the coast road between them.

Is Ireland expensive?+

Accommodation is the line that hurts, in Dublin especially and in Killarney and Galway in high summer. Food, drink and fuel sit in line with western Europe. The country's best days out cost nothing: the coast roads, the beaches, the hill walks and most of the national parks.

Can you visit Northern Ireland on the same trip?+

Yes, and plenty of itineraries do, running Dublin to Belfast by train or taking the Causeway Coast on the way round the north. It is a different country with a different currency and its own entry rules, so check that your visa or permission covers the United Kingdom before you plan a crossing.

Ireland by theme

Themed Top 10s across the country.

All themes →

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Road trips

Ireland on Wimup Videos

City films to watch before you book.

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