Amsterdam, from the water up.
Which canal cruise actually beats the Centraal queues. Whether Zaanse Schans is worth the early start. How to see the Van Gogh without the crush. Every Amsterdam tour and day trip, weighed up and reviewed.
The Amsterdam days everyone books first.
The canals, the windmills, the Van Goghs and the cheese. The handful of days most trips are built around, and the best way to book each.
Amsterdam runs on its canals — start there.
See every canal cruise →
Ninety minutes through the Golden Age ring, a small open boat down the Jordaan, or dinner and drinks after dark — the canals are the one thing you do first. These three carry the most travellers; the full list sorts the rest by the kind of hour you want on the water.
Ninety minutes through the Golden Age ring
The open-loop cruise every first visit takes: the Herengracht mansions, the seven-bridge view down the Reguliersgracht, the skinny bridge, and a skipper who tells you which gable is which.
Light Festival and evening bar cruises
The canals do their best work at night — from November’s Light Festival installations to a covered saloon boat with a bar, the reflections and the quiet make the case on their own.
Skipper a small electric boat yourself
Rent a low electric boat, pick up drinks and captain the side canals at your own pace — no licence needed, and the Jordaan looks like a different city from the waterline.
Amsterdam’s most popular tours.
Every review →The tours more travellers take than anything else in the city — and what makes each one worth the day.
1
Van Gogh Museum Ticket
Timed entry to the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. See 200+ paintings, 500+ drawings, and 750+ letters with optional audio guide.
From · $32
Read our review →
2
Amsterdam Classic Saloon Boat Cruise with Drinks and Cheese
from $21
3
Amsterdam Luxury Canal Cruise + Unlimited Drinks & Bites option
from $18
4
Heineken Experience Ticket
from $28
5
Rijksmuseum Entry Ticket
from $31
6
Classic Boat Cruise with Optional Cheese & Wine
from $18
7
Evening Cruise with Optional Wine and Snacks
from $22
8
75 Minute City Canal Cruise with Audio Guide
from $17
Amsterdam is a walking city first.
The Jordaan’s hidden courtyards, the Nine Streets, De Wallen and the old Jewish quarter: the centre is small enough to cross on foot and dense enough to need a guide who knows which door is which.
Amsterdam keeps its Golden Age on the walls.
Van Gogh’s bedroom, Rembrandt’s Night Watch, Vermeer’s light — the great collections sit a few minutes’ walk apart on the Museumplein, and the timed tickets for all of them go early.
See all 67 museum tours →
Half of Amsterdam’s best days happen outside it.
Windmills at Zaanse Schans, tulip fields at Keukenhof, the storybook canals of Giethoorn, the cheese market at Alkmaar — all of them run as day trips from Centraal, most with the boat or coach included.
- 1Zaanse Schans, Volendam, and Marken Day Tripfrom $43
- 2Day Trip to Zaanse Schans, Edam, Volendam and Marken from Amsterdamfrom $45
- 3Zaanse Schans, Edam, & Marken Full-Day Tripfrom $35
What a day in Amsterdam costs.
Every tour on the site, grouped by what it actually runs. A great Amsterdam day can start at the price of lunch.
Canal cruises, cheese tastings, walking tours and museum tickets — the everyday best of the city.
The classic day trips: Zaanse Schans, Keukenhof and Giethoorn, plus small-group food and bike tours.
Private guides, self-drive boats and the once-a-trip splurges that earn it.
Only in the Netherlands.
Museums and food halls you can find in any European capital. The gabled canals, the working windmills and the raw-milk cheese belong to this corner of the map alone.
The Canals
Amsterdam’s Grachtengordel — the ring of canals dug in the 1600s — is a UNESCO World Heritage site and still the fastest way to read the city. Some 1,500 monumental houses lean over the water on their old timber piles, and the seven-bridge view down the Reguliersgracht is the one everyone stops for. A boat here is not a tourist trap; it is how the place was built to be seen.
- 1Amsterdam Luxury Canal Cruise + Unlimited Drinks & Bites option★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 30,518 reviews
- 275 Minute City Canal Cruise with Audio Guide★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 17,501 reviews
- 3City Centre Canal Cruise★★★★★★★★★★ 4.2 · 12,827 reviews
The Windmills
At Zaanse Schans, half an hour north, a few of the thousands of industrial windmills that once powered the Dutch Golden Age still saw wood, grind pigment and press oil the old way. You can climb inside a working mill, watch clogs cut from a single block of poplar, and taste cheese made on site. It is a museum village, but the mills are real and running.
- 1Zaanse Schans, Volendam, and Marken Day Trip★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 15,931 reviews
- 2Zaanse Schans, Edam, Volendam & Marken Bus Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 15,034 reviews
- 3Day Trip to Zaanse Schans, Edam, Volendam and Marken from Amsterdam★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 5,392 reviews
The Cheese
Gouda, Edam, Leiden, Beemster — Dutch cheese is a regional map you can taste. A good tasting pours a young mild wheel against a four-year aged one that crunches with salt crystals, usually with a jenever or a Belgian-style beer to match. Buy the raw-milk kind from a farm shop; the versions sold abroad are pasteurised and never quite the same.
- 1Classic Boat Cruise with Optional Cheese & Wine★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 22,925 reviews
- 2Guided Zaanse Schans, Windmills & Cheese Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 4,826 reviews
- 3Zaanse Schans Windmills, Clogs and Dutch Cheese Small-Group Tour from Amsterdam★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 2,369 reviews
Amsterdam is quieter and better once the day boats stop.
All evening cruises →Evening Cruise with Optional Wine and Snacks
Read our review →
The Amsterdam tickets that sell out first.
Most of Amsterdam can be booked the night before from your hotel. These cannot — they run on timed slots, spring calendars and ticket releases that do not wait for your flight.
- 01Anne Frank’s Story – Guided Walking Tour through AmsterdamTimed-entry tickets are released on a fixed schedule and go weeks ahead; there is no ticket desk at the house itself.
- 02Keukenhof Ticket and Roundtrip Shuttle TransferThe gardens open for about eight weeks in spring only, and the busiest weekends sell out well in advance.
- 03Van Gogh Museum TicketEntry is by a timed slot booked online; in high season the museum regularly sells out days ahead.
- 04Rijksmuseum Entry TicketTimed tickets again — the early morning slots, before the coach groups arrive, go first.
When the rain blows in off the Noordzee, go indoors and go deep.
Amsterdam weather turns on a coin — a bright morning becomes a grey afternoon off the North Sea. The best answers are all under a roof: the great museums, a covered canal boat, a cheese cellar, a jenever tasting. None of them care what the sky is doing.
- 1Van Gogh Museum Ticketfrom $32
- 2Rijksmuseum Entry Ticketfrom $31
- 3Moco Museum Amsterdam Entrance Tickets with Banksy & Morefrom $18
By day trip — where the train takes you
A first weekend in Amsterdam, in order.
The canals
The old centre
Van Gogh
Rijksmuseum
Zaanse SchansLatest Amsterdam tour reviews.
All recent →
Markthal Tour, Meet & Taste, and Het Witte Huis
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De Rotterdam, Cube Houses, Watertaxi and Markthal
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Rotterdam Private 2-Hour Food Tour with Tastings
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Discover Rotterdam: Classic Highlights Bike Tour by a Local
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Rotterdam Center: Cocktail Bar Walking Tour – Self Guided
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Rotterdam Architecture: Centre and South Bank with watertaxi
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