65 Best Sights in Amsterdam, Netherlands

This Neoclassical ceremonial gateway was built in 1840 as an excise post to replace one of the former city gates, which had to be demolished. It has been variously used as a police station, fire station, and public works office; in 1986 it was restored and converted into apartments. It's a useful landmark to find your way to the Westerpark.

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Founded by Gerard Heineken in 1864, the Heineken label has become one of the most famous in the world. The beer is no longer brewed here, but the former brewery has been transformed into the "Heineken Experience," an interactive visitor center that offers tours of the facilities. Everything from vast copper vats to multimedia exhibits are on view, and if you've ever wanted to know what it feels like to be brewed and bottled, the 4D virtual-reality ride "Brew Your Ride" will clue you in. At the end of the tour you get to taste the goods. (No beer is served to visitors under the age of 18.)

Buy your ticket in advance; you'll save €3, and they often sell out.

From the outside, it's a bit hard to believe that these ponderous premises were declaimed by poet and diplomat Constantijn Huygens as the "Eighth Wonder of the World." The palace was built between 1648 and 1665 and was the largest secular building in the world when it was completed. From the inside, the magnificent interior inspires another level of disbelief—that it was actually built as a mere city hall. Golden Age giants like Ferdinand Bol, Govert Flinck, and Jan Lievens were called in to decorate (Rembrandt's sketches were rejected). In the building's Burgerzaal, or public entrance hall, there are two maps inlaid in the marble floor: one with Amsterdam as the center of the world, the other as the center of the universe.

Dutch schoolchildren once had to learn the number of piles (13,659) on which the Royal Palace was built, by using a nifty trick: the days of the year (365) with a 1 before and a 9 after. This number has since changed, because two piles were removed during recent renovations.

The building has remained the Royal Palace ever since King Louis Napoléon (Napoléon's brother) resided here from 1808 to 1810, and it's one of three palaces at which today's Dutch monarch hosts official receptions and state visits. The Palace also hosts exhibitions and displays on the history of the building itself. Official occasions mean opening times can vary.

This beautiful and seemingly tranquil tree-lined square hides a lively and radical past---in the 1960s, the Provo counterculture movement held weekly gatherings around the statue in the center of the square. Journalists and bookworms have long favored its many cafés, and the Atheneum News Center (No. 14–16) and its adjoining bookstore are the city's best places to peruse an international array of literature, magazines, and newspapers. More cultural browsing can be enjoyed at the Spui's book market on Friday and at its art market on Sunday.

This wonderful botanical garden was originally laid out as a medicinal herb garden in 1638 by the Amsterdam City Council before the collection expanded to include exotic plants from the East India Company's forays into foreign lands. A total of 4,000 species are represented in the ornamental gardens and the three-climate greenhouse. There's also a butterfly house. One of the treasures is a 300-year-old Eastern Cape giant cycad, perhaps the oldest potted plant in the world. The orangery houses a charming café terrace—one of the most peaceful places in the city to enjoy a cup of coffee. In fact, the Hortus harbors the leafy descendants of the first coffee plants ever introduced into Europe. Hoping to end the Arabian Peninsula's expensive monopoly on coffee, a Dutch merchant stole a coffee plant from Mocha, Yemen, and presented it to the Hortus in 1706, where it flourished in the greenhouse. Its offspring played an important role in spreading coffee production around the world.

Jewish financier, economist, and scholar Isaac de Pinto was a significant investor in the Dutch East Indies Company and bought this house in 1651. It was grandly renovated in the style of Dutch Classicism by his son, together with architect Elias Bouwman, in the 1680s. In the 1960s it was almost demolished so that the street could be widened, but activists saved the building. The restored interior features recent additions, such as beautiful painted ceilings and by the entrance, a little cherub reading a book, a reference to the building's current manifestation as a literary and cultural center. The reading room is a peaceful place to while away a few hours on a rainy day (or swap a book in the book exchange library) and ''coffee concerts,'' book presentations, and other cultural events are regularly held here.

Four Ashkenazi synagogues (or shuls, in Yiddish), dating to the 17th and 18th centuries, were combined with glass-and-steel constructions in 1987 to create this warm and impressive museum commemorating four centuries in the history of the Jewish people in Amsterdam and the Netherlands. Back in the 17th century, Ashkenazi Jews fled the pogroms in Central and Eastern Europe. Sephardic Jews had already settled here---and each community built its own synagogues. There are four of them in this complex: the Neie Sjoel (New Synagogue, 1752) shows the history of Jews in the Netherlands from 1900 until today; the Grote Sjoel (Great Synagogue, 1671) presents the tenets of Judaism as well as the history of Jews in the Netherlands before 1900; the Obbene Sjoel (Upstairs Synagogue, 1685) is home to the children's museum; and the Dritt Sjoel (Third Synagogue, 1700/1778) houses the museum's offices. The museum is also home to one of the city's few kosher cafés. Whether you tour the collections or regular exhibitions, check out the excellent tours of the Jewish Quarter conducted by this museum.

Rembrandt loved to sketch this slightly leaning redbrick tower, which was built in 1516 as part of the city's defenses. In 1606, the Dutch sculptor and architect Hendrick de Keyser oversaw the addition of an octagonal brick superstructure and spire complete with clockworks that was known as Malle Jaap (Crazy Jaap) by locals because the bells pealed at odd times. The year 1610 saw the tower embark on a lean too far, and with lots of manpower and ropes it was reset on a stronger foundation. From 1878 to 2006, it housed the City Water Office. Today it's the office of a company that rents out classic saloon boats (captain included).

Landmarking the eastern corner of the Waterlooplein, this structure once had a warehouse facade to disguise its function as a clandestine Catholic church. If this church could speak, it would name-drop the great philosopher Spinoza (it was built on the location of his birth house) and Franz Liszt (it hosted a recital of his Graner Messe, attended by the Hungarian composer himself). Originally built in the 1640s, it was rebuilt in 1841 by architect T. F. Suys, then refurbished in 1969. The church's popular name (Moses and Aaron) refers to the figures adorning two gable stones of the original edifice, now seen in the rear wall. In a rare move in a rapidly secularizing country where churches are sometimes turned into carpet stores or bowling alleys, the Mozes en Aäronkerk was reconsecrated in 2014, after a hiatus of 34 years. It's used today by the Catholic Community of Sant'Egidio.

Founded in 1757 by Doede Jansen Kromhout, a carpenter, this is one of Amsterdam's oldest functioning shipyards. Almost 300 ships were built here during its heyday in the late 19th century. In the early 20th century, 't Kromhout was producing the diesel engines used by Dutch canal boats. Boats and engines are still restored here, and the museum has a collection of historical ships' engines on display.

This is the house that Rembrandt, flush with success, bought for 13,000 guilders (a princely sum) in 1639, and where he lived and worked until 1656, when he declared bankruptcy. The house interior has been restored with elegant contemporaneous furnishings and artwork in the reception rooms—a collection of rarities that match as closely as possible the descriptions in the inventories made when Rembrandt was forced to sell everything—but it doesn't convey much of the humanity of Rembrandt himself. When he left here, he was not only out of money but also out of favor with the city after relationships with servant girls following the death of his wife, Saskia. The little etching studio is perhaps the most atmospheric. Littered with tools of the trade, a printing press, and a line hung with drying prints (there are demonstrations), it's easy to imagine Rembrandt finding respite here, experimenting with form and technique, away from uncomfortable schmoozing for commissions (and loans) in the grander salon. The museum owns a huge collection of etchings (260 of the 290 he made), and a changing selection is on permanent display. His magisterial prints Hundred Guilder and Three Crosses show that Rembrandt was almost more revolutionary in his prints than in his paintings, so this collection deserves respectful homage, if not downright devotion, by printmakers today.

Just 200 meters from Centraal Station and built on a peninsula on the IJ, this spectacular building's design (compliments of Danish architects 3XN) was based on the shape of a ship. Since opening in 2005, it has become a main concert hall for both classical and jazz fans: the black box jutting out is the legendary jazz venue, Bimhuis. The glass building is architecturally stunning with its ship's ramp entrance and the Zen-like simplicity of its three natural colors (concrete, black, and light maple wood). The floor-to-roof glass walls provide spectacular views into the building and out onto the IJ, and the interior atmosphere changes naturally with variations in weather—clouds, rain, sunshine, and light. There are regular exhibitions, and workshops for kids (ages seven-plus) in the educational Klankspeeltuin (Sound Garden). Pay a lunchtime visit to chill out in café-restaurant 4'33 and enjoy the waterfront terrace.

The National Monument, a towering white travertine obelisk, was erected in 1956 as a memorial to those who died in World War II. Designed by architect J.J.P. Oud, who thought that De Stijl minimalism was in keeping with the monument's message, it's the focal point for Remembrance Day (May 4), when Dutch losses in wars and peacekeeping missions around the world are commemorated. The monument contains 12 urns: 11 are filled with earth from all the Dutch provinces, and the 12th contains earth from the former colonies (Indonesia, Suriname, and the Antilles). Oud designed the steps to be used as seating, and today it's still a favored rest spot and a great place to watch the world go by.

While it's one of the oldest streets in Amsterdam, the Nes may not one of the prettiest, but it's filled with plenty of theaters and restaurants. For two centuries, it was packed with monasteries and convents, until the Alteration (or Protestant changeover) in 1578, which kick-started Amsterdam's march toward the Golden Age. Adjacent to the southern end of the Nes is Gebed Zonder End, the "Prayer Without End" alleyway, which got its name because it was said you could always hear prayers from behind the walls of the convents that used to line the alley. The Frascati Theater (No. 63) began life as a coffeehouse in 1810, but it wasn't until the 1850s that the street really blossomed with cafés filled with dance, song, operetta performances, and vaudeville, the stars of which often represented the less uptight segment of the Jewish community.

With its elegant gray-and-white facade and spout gable—the block atop the building that looks like a funnel, which used to signify a warehouse or trade house rather than a residential property—this building appears to be another lovely 17th-century canal house, and on the lower floors it is. But tucked away in the attic is a clandestine place of Catholic worship, a schuilkerk (hidden church), one of the very few to survive. Catholic masses were officially forbidden from 1578, but the Protestant authorities in Amsterdam turned a blind eye, provided the churches were not recognizable as such from the outside. Restored to its 19th-century appearance, the chapel itself is a triumph of Dutch taste, with a magnificent old rose color scheme and marbled wood columns to match, a gorgeous green altar, and the Baptism of Christ in the Jordan (1716) painting by Jacob de Wit presiding over all.

The grandeur continues throughout the house, which was renovated by merchant Jan Hartman between 1661 and 1663. The kitchen and chaplain bedroom remain furnished in the style of the age, and the day room looks as if it were plucked from a Vermeer painting. With its copper chandelier and marble Solomonic columns, it's one of the most impressive 17th-century rooms left in Amsterdam. The new part of the museum, on the other side of the alley, hosts temporary exhibitions.

Amsterdam's oldest building has evolved over many centuries to look as it does today. What began as a wooden chapel in the 13th century was built up to a hall church and then a cross basilica between 1366 and 1566 (and fully restored between 1955 and 2013). Prior to the Reformation, the Oude Kerk was known as "the living room," because peddlers displayed their goods in the church and beggars slept there. It was violently looted during the Reformation and stripped of its altars and images of saints—although the looters did leave the 14th-century paintings still visible on its wooden roof, as well as the Virgin Mary stained-glass windows that had been set in place in 1550. The famed Vater-Müller organ was installed in 1726. Don't miss the carved choir stalls that illustrate proverbs relating to cardinal sins, among other things. Within this open, atmospheric space, there's a gravestone for Rembrandt's first wife, Saskia van Uylenburgh, and also for Kiliaen van Rensselaer, one of the Dutch founders of what is now New York. Outside, embedded in the sidewalk by the door, is a bronze plaque of hand cupping a naked breast; it's one of a series of pieces of art anonymously placed throughout Amsterdam by an artist in the 1990s. Today, the Oude Kerk is as much an exhibition space as a place of worship, hosting top-notch modern art shows. Its carillon is played every Tuesday at 2 and every Saturday at 4—the best place to listen is the bridge in front of the church.

Landmarked by its now-famous pair of chiseled spectacles set over the Oudezijds Achterburgwal pediment—a sweet reference to old age—this passage led to an Oudemannenhuis, or pensioners' house, founded in 1602. Today bikes (not canes) are in evidence here, as this former almshouse is now part of the University of Amsterdam. One charming relic from its 18th-century days is the covered walkway, which was once lined with traders selling luxury items, whose rents helped subsidize the elderly. Adorned with red shutters, the stalls now house an array of antiquarian booksellers. Atop the Kloveniersburgwal end stands a group of allegorical figures, sculpted by Anthonie Ziesenis in 1786, representing Mercy with the attributes of Abundance (a horn), Enlightenment (a lamp), and Wisdom (a book) flanked by Old Age and Poverty.

Inspired by Jerusalem's Temple of Solomon, Elias Bouman designed this noted synagogue between 1671 and 1675 for the Sephardic community, the first Jews to settle in the Netherlands. They were descendants of Spanish and Portuguese Jews—Sepharad is Hebrew for the Iberian peninsula—escaping the Inquisition or forced conversion to Catholicism in the 15th and 16th centuries. When it was completed, it was the largest synagogue in Europe, and its spare, elegantly proportioned wood interior has remained virtually unchanged through the centuries. It is still magically illuminated by hundreds of candles in immense candelabra during services. The buildings around the synagogue house the world-famous Ets Haim (Tree of Life) library, the oldest still-functioning Jewish library in the world.

This stunning park was built by and named after noted city benefactor Samuel Sarphati (1813–66), whose statue graces the central fountain. It has undulating paths among the trees, duck ponds, and expanses of grass, and though not very large, it's the perfect place to picnic with everything you picked up at the Albert Cuypmarkt. If you have little ones, there's a wonderful sandpit/playground on the northwest side, while a nature playground was added for bigger kids in the summer of 2020 on the southeast side.

With its extravagantly phantasmagoric lead-roof detail spilling over various sculpted sea horses, boat anchors, sea gods (Neptune and his four wives), dolphins, and even shoals of fish, this is one of Amsterdam's most delightful early 20th-century structures. Built in the 1910s with a suitably prow-shape front, it was used as the headquarters for the major shipping firms operating in Java and the Spice Islands during the final Dutch colonial years. Today it's the five-star Grand Hotel Amrâth Amsterdam. Twentieth-century master architects Piet Kramer, Johan van der Mey, and Michel de Klerk all contributed to the design of the building; their structure was one of the opening salvos by the fantastic Amsterdam School. After you admire all the ornamentation on the facade, amble around the sides to take in the busts of noted explorers, such as Barentsz and Mercator, along with patterned brickwork and strutting iron tracery. Wander inside to check out the design of the Seven Seas restaurant and have a drink at the classically restored bar. You can book a private tour of the building and its lavish interiors (Sunday only, in combination with a rather expensive high tea or lunch, via Museum Het Schip www.hetschip.com).

Amsterdam's only surviving defense tower began life around 1487 as the end point of the city wall. The term schreier suggests the Dutch word for wailing and as lore would have it, the "Weeping Tower" was where women came to cry when their sailor husbands left for sea and to cry again when they did not return (there's a commemorative stone from 1569 of a woman and a boat on the Gelderskade side). However, the word schreier actually comes from an Old Dutch term for "sharp," and because the old city wall made a sharp corner here, this is a more accurate derivation for the tower's name. It's also famous as the point from which Henry Hudson set sail to America. A plaque on the building tells you that he sailed on behalf of the Dutch East India Company to find a shorter route to the East Indies. In his failure, he came across Canada's Hudson Bay and later—continuing his unlucky streak—the New York harbor and the Hudson River. He eventually landed at what is now Manhattan and named it New Amsterdam. The attached VOC café has a lovely view and serves jenever, veal croquettes, and other local delights. On the next floor up, there's a nautical shop for modern-day sailors.

The architect A. C. Bleys designed this Catholic church with its large dome, twin steeples, and colorful stained-glass windows as a replacement for all the clandestine churches that operated during the Reformation. After the Oude Kerk and the Ons' Lieve Heer op Solder (Our Lord in the Attic) chapel, this church, completed in 1887, became the third (and probably final) Sint-Nicolaas church in Amsterdam. Saint Nicholas, the all-purpose patron saint of children, thieves, prostitutes, sailors, and the City of Amsterdam, transforms into Sinterklaas in mid-November, when he is popularly said to arrive from Spain on a steamboat with his helper Zwarte Piet (Black Pete). The eve of his birthday on December 6 is celebrated as a family feast when everyone exchanges presents and poems. In recent years, the Black Pete phenomenon has received a lot of flak, with some claiming that Sinterklaas's sidekick is a slave. There are church tours for groups with a minimum of seven participants; call for reservations on Thursday 10–noon. The church hosts a Gregorian chant vesper service on Sunday at 5, September–June.

Taking its nickname from the combination of "Stadhuis" (City Hall) and "Opera," this brick-and-marble complex, which opened in 1986, houses both, as well as the Dutch National Ballet and large-scale productions, both domestic and international. Popularly derided by locals for looking like a set of dentures, the colossal white marble tiled building is currently undergoing phased renovations. Before the first brick was in place, locals protested over the razing of historic houses in the old Jewish Quarter and around Nieuwmarkt to make way for it. (In particular, look for the moving memorial that marks the spot of a Jewish orphanage, which honors the saga of how, in 1943, three teachers voluntarily accompanied 100 children to the extermination camp of Sobibor: "None of them returned. May their memory be blessed."). Twice-weekly tours offer a ''behind the scenes look'' at the daily life of set dressers, costume designers, and performers at the National Opera and Theater (Tues. and Sat. from September-June).

As family home to the two Trip brothers, who made their fortune in the arms trade during the 17th-century Golden Age, this noted house's buckshot-gray exterior and various armament motifs—including mortar-shaped chimneys—designed by Justus Vingboons, are easily explained. But the Corinthian-columned facade actually covers two symmetrical buildings (the dividing wall is positioned behind the middle windows), one for each brother, making it the widest residence (at 72 feet) in Amsterdam. From 1817 to 1885 it housed the national museum or Rijksmuseum and is now the home of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. Be sure to look across the canal to No. 26, the white building topped with golden sphinxes and dated 1696, which is known as the "Little Trip House." The story goes that Mr. Trip's coachman remarked that he would be happy with a house as wide as the Trippenhuis door. By way of response, Mr. Trip is alleged to have built just that with the leftover bricks. In reality, the domicile was constructed six decades after the Trip mansion, after both of the brothers had already died, possibly as a way to squeeze a house into an existing alleyway. There are a few other very narrow houses in Amsterdam, too: the narrowest rear gable is at Singel 7 at only 3 feet wide, and the building on Oude Hoogstraat 22 is only 7 feet wide and 19 feet deep.

The country's largest ethnographic museum was first built to educate the Dutch about their colonial history in the East and West Indies, but today it excels in hands-on exhibits covering all non-Western cultures. A gorgeous tiered atrium is rich with wood, marble, and gilt, and displays many, many pieces of antiquity, art, and musical instruments made accessible through workshops and in playful, simulated villages and bazaars, which convey the full sensory experience of life in the former Dutch Indies, the Middle East, India, Africa, and Latin America. There's also a park-facing patio where you can enjoy globally inspired food from the café.

At the Tropenmuseum Junior, children can experience other cultures through programs involving art, dance, song, and sometimes cooking. There are weekend activities such as drawing, building, and crafts for toddlers and preschoolers and their parents in the Kartini Wing. For preschoolers and over, there are special children's routes through the museum and events on Wednesday afternoon and holidays. Most children's activities are in Dutch.

From May 14, 1940, to May 5, 1945, the Netherlands was occupied by Nazi Germany, and this museum looks at the population's response—who resisted and how. All forms of resistance are covered: strikes, forging documents, hiding and escape (such as the Paris route), armed resistance, and espionage. Personal documents, interviews, and sound fragments offer a rich context that not only conveys what occupied life really felt like but also challenges visitors to consider their own behavior and choices today. The Resistance Museum Junior focuses on the stories of four eyewitnesses: Eva, Henk, Jan, and Nelly, who were between 9 and 14 years old during the war (the same age group as the target audience). The children's museum gives the concept of "resistance" a positive twist, using examples from World War II to make kids aware of the importance of mutual respect, freedom, the fragility of democracy, and their own responsibility in dealing with discrimination and persecution. Displays also show how some of today's main Dutch newspapers and magazines, like Het Parool (The Password) and Vrij Nederland (Free Netherlands), began as illegal underground newsletters.

On sunny days, Amsterdam's "green lung" is the most densely populated section of the city. Vondelpark is the place where sun is worshipped, joints are smoked, beer is quaffed, picnics are luxuriated over, bands are grooved to, dogs are walked, balls are kicked, and lanes are biked, jogged, and rollerbladed on. By evening, the park has invariably evolved into one large outdoor café. The great thing about this park is that, as long as you stay relaxed and go with the flow, you can dress however, hang however, and do whatever. (For years, a mysterious man danced around the park on 1970s silver roller skates, wearing silver body paint and a silver G-string—even in winter—with shaved legs and chest, headphones, and a silver cap with propeller, and nobody batted an eyelid; his spirit lives on today.)

The Vondelpark was laid out in 1865 as a 25-acre "walking and riding park" for residents of the affluent neighborhood rising up around it. It soon expanded to 120 acres and was renamed after Joost van den Vondel, the "Dutch Shakespeare." Landscaped in the informal English style, the park is an irregular patchwork of copses, ponds, children's playgrounds, and fields linked by winding pathways. The park's focal point is the open-air theater, where there is free summer entertainment Friday to Sunday.

Over the years a range of sculptural and architectural pieces have been installed in the park. Picasso even donated a sculpture, The Fish, on the park's centenary in 1965, which stands in the middle of a field to deter football players from using it as a goalpost. On the west side of the park, you can stop in at the Neoclassical-era Hollandsche Manege (the oldest riding school in the Netherlands; Vondelstraat 140), inspired by the famous Spanish Riding School in Vienna. Visit the on-site museum (€8) and enjoy a cup of tea in the foyer bar, which overlooks the riding arena where classes are regularly held.