Ten underrated Asian cities, from Khiva's walled inner town to Matsumoto's black castle, ranked by how much more they give than their visitor numbers suggest.
Most Asia trips run Bangkok, Bali, Tokyo, Seoul and Hanoi. These ten sit a train or a short flight off that circuit. We ranked them by the gap between how good the place is and how few visitors it gets, the same basis as our global hidden gems list.
Uzbekistan's first UNESCO site, listed in 1990: a walled inner town of mosques, madrasas and minarets you can cross on foot in ten minutes. Sleep inside the walls to have Itchan Kala before the tour buses arrive and after they leave.
The island's seat of government until 1887, with Taiwan's oldest forts, its first Confucian academy and a temple on almost every block. Come hungry: the city eats early, from beef soup at dawn to a night market after dark.
Silla's capital for close to a thousand years, never built over, so royal tomb mounds rise between the city blocks. Cycle the tombs and Wolji pond after dark, then give a day to Bulguksa and the Seokguram grotto.
UNESCO listed the whole historic centre in 1993, and its mosques and madrasas still sit on the lanes, pools and covered bazaars that joined them. The Kalyan Minaret, finished in 1127, is the tower Genghis Khan left standing.
A state capital that still behaves like a river town, with wooden boats crossing to Fort Margherita and the rainforest half an hour out. See the orangutans at Semenggoh and the sea stacks of Bako, with Sarawak laksa for breakfast.
The Spanish colonial town UNESCO listed in 1999, where horse-drawn kalesa outnumber cars on the cobbles of Calle Crisologo. Stop at the burnay jar yards, then eat empanada off Plaza Burgos after dark.
Tamil and Hindu where the rest of the island is Sinhalese and Buddhist, closed by thirty years of war and back on the railway since 2014. Go in August for Nallur's 25-day festival, or take the ferry to Delft's loose horses.
Seven hundred hanok in the middle of a working city, and in 2012 the first Korean city UNESCO named a Creative City of Gastronomy. Eat bibimbap near the Gyeonggijeon shrine, then drink in the makgeolli alleys.
The city the tin rush built, which kept its shophouses when the mines closed and filled its limestone hills with cave temples. Walk the Old Town for white coffee and bean sprout chicken, then climb the painted cave at Perak Tong.
One of five castles in Japan designated a National Treasure, its black keep built in the 1590s and never replaced. The town runs on Alpine spring water from street wells, and Kamikochi lies inside the same city limits.
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