Athens tours are the easiest way to see Greece’s capital, its ancient monuments and the islands that lie beyond its port. For more trips across the country, see our tours in Greece page.
This page covers what Athens tours include, how to get around the city, the ancient sites and museums they visit, the neighbourhoods and evenings, the day trips by road and by sea, where to stay, and the city’s past.
What do Athens tours include?
Athens tours cover the main sights of the Greek capital on foot, by bus or by private car. A tour runs for a morning or for a full day, and a tour guide leads each visit.
One operator offers bus tours and private tours to the major sites and monuments, plus shared group tours. Others run walking tours, photography tours, food tours and night-time city tours. For a wider choice, browse our tours and cruises.
The city visitor bureau lists tours of a different kind. Athens tours there include a cooking class with Acropolis views and a bike tour of the Athens Riviera. Another one goes kayaking to the Temple of Poseidon at Sounion.
Athens tours differ in length. One operator lists a guided city tour of 3.5 hours. Another sells an Athens highlights tour of 6 hours and a private full-day tour of 8 hours.
Prefer to ride and watch? Try the hop-on hop-off bus tour and let the sightseeing bus pass the landmarks of the city. You step off at a stop, look around, and step on again.
Cruise passengers have their own shore excursions. One operator describes a private vehicle that carries them to the Acropolis, Plaka and Syntagma Square. It brings them back to the ship on time. Athens tours of this kind suit a short stop in port.
How do you get around Athens on tours?
Take the metro to reach the centre before your Athens tours start. Line 3 links the airport with Monastiraki and Syntagma, and Line 2 crosses it at Syntagma.
Athens has three metro lines, named by colour: Green, Red and Blue. The Green Line starts at Piraeus and ends at Kifissia, and it changes to the Blue Line at Monastiraki. Stations also show art and finds from digs made while the lines were built. Read more about Athens transport before you travel.
Athens International Airport stands near the town of Spata, 35 km east of the centre. Travellers heading for Athens tours can ride the Proastiakos suburban railway. It joins the airport to Larissa station and the port of Piraeus.
A tram leaves Syntagma Square and reaches Palaio Faliro. There two branches part. One follows the coast to Voula, and the other goes to Piraeus. Our Athens tools and tips help with planning your own route.
The centre suits walkers, and Athens tours on foot use its car-free streets. Dionysiou Areopagitou Street begins by the Temple of Olympian Zeus and runs under the Acropolis near Plaka. The walk finishes beyond the Temple of Hephaestus, in the Thiseio area. Walkers can look up at the Parthenon and across to the Agora.
Drivers meet the Attiki Odos toll motorway. Its main section, the A6, links Elefsina with the airport. If you want your own wheels, see our car rental page.
Which ancient sites do Athens tours visit?
Athens tours centre on the Acropolis, a walled hilltop that rises 150 metres over sea level above the city. They add the Ancient Agora and also the huge Temple of Olympian Zeus. The Parthenon is the main building up there.
Pericles coordinated the building work on the Acropolis in the fifth century B.C. Work on the Parthenon started in 447 B.C. and ended in 438 B.C. The temple honours the goddess Athena. Athens tours reach the whole complex.
The Propylaea is the monumental gateway, designed by the architect Mnesicles. Beside it, on a bastion, sits the little Temple of Athena Nike. On the north side, the Erechtheion rests its porch on six sculpted female figures. For spoken background, pick an Acropolis visit with an audio guide.
The Theatre of Dionysus spreads over the south slope. Its terrace first hosted the City Dionysia, the drama festival. Works by Euripides, Sophocles and Aristophanes were performed on that spot. Visitors who want the rock and its finds together can book a guided Acropolis tour with the Acropolis Museum.
North-west of the Acropolis you reach the Ancient Agora, a place for trade and assembly. A rebuilt stoa lined with shops, the Stoa of Attalos, now serves as its museum. Athens tours also stop at the Temple of Olympian Zeus. Work on this colossal temple began in the sixth century B.C. and ended under Emperor Hadrian.
Athens tours near the Acropolis can also take in these sites:
- The Kerameikos, an area with an important cemetery on either side of the Dipylon Gate.
- The Roman Agora, a marketplace from the Roman era, east of the Ancient Agora.
- The Areopagus, a rocky outcrop called the Hill of Ares, where the Apostle Paul gave his sermon.
- The Philopappos Monument, a Roman tomb on Mouseion Hill.
Which museums do Athens tours visit?
Athens tours include the Acropolis Museum, which welcomed its first visitors on 20 June of the year two thousand nine. Its halls display over 4,250 objects, found on the Acropolis and its slopes, in 14,000 square metres of space.
Glass panels in the floor open a view of the excavations below. The finds date from the Bronze Age through Roman and Byzantine eras.
The National Archaeological Museum stands in the Exarcheia area, with its entrance on Patission Street. Athens tours that go there see artefacts from prehistory to late antiquity. Its neoclassical building holds the world’s richest collection of Greek antiquity. The south wing is the Epigraphical Museum, which has the world’s largest set of inscriptions.
The Byzantine and Christian Museum stands on Vassilissis Sofias Avenue. Its founding goes back to the early twentieth century, and its halls show over 25,000 exhibits. They include pictures, manuscripts, pottery and frescoes from the third century A.D. to the Late Middle Ages.
Antonis Benakis set up the Benaki Museum in the nineteen-thirties, in memory of his father Emmanuel. It fills the Benakis family mansion. Its main collection spans Greek art from the prehistoric era to the present day.
The Cycladic museum was founded in the nineteen-eighties. It houses the Cycladic and ancient Greek art of Nikolaos and Dolly Goulandris. Its permanent collection has over 3,000 items. Athens tours can pair it with the other museums.
Which neighbourhoods do Athens tours walk through?
Athens tours walk through Plaka, the old quarter that wraps around the Acropolis hill on its north and east sides. They link it with Anafiotika, Monastiraki, Thiseio, Psyri and Syntagma Square.
Plaka is a maze of narrow lanes lined with neoclassical houses. Its monuments span all of the city’s eras. Homes have stood on this ground since the Neolithic period. Adrianou Street runs through the middle and splits the quarter into an upper and a lower level. The Athens photo gallery shows these lanes before you go.
Above Plaka sits Anafiotika, built under King Otto by builders from the island of Anafi. On Athens tours it gives walkers a taste of the Cyclades inside the capital. The cubic white houses are tiny, and only 45 remain.
Monastiraki is the flea market district. Its square borrows the name of the Pantanassa church, a “little monastery”. The two main lanes there are Pandrossou Street and Adrianou Street. Two metro lines, Line 1 and Line 3, meet at its station.
Athens tours also cross Thiseio, an old district northwest of the Acropolis. The Temple of Hephaestus gave it a name. Walkers find car-free streets, cafes with Acropolis views, and a station of their own.
Psyri has turned into a trendy district of restaurants, bars and tavernas with live music. Syntagma Square is the heart of modern Athens, facing the old royal palace that now holds the Greek Parliament.
A ceremonial guard changes every hour beside the Unknown Soldier’s tomb. Below the square, metro lines 2 and 3 connect.
What do Athens tours add in the evening and on the hills?
Athens tours add Lycabettus Hill and the marble Panathenaic Stadium. The hill stands 277 metres above sea level, higher than any other point in central Athens. Meals and evening outings round out the day.
Lycabettus is made of Cretaceous limestone, with pines around its foot. A funicular railway runs up from Aristippou Street in Kolonaki. Two peaks hold a chapel of St. George from the nineteenth century, a theatre and a restaurant.
No other stadium on Earth is built wholly from marble, and the Panathenaic Stadium is that one. It was the setting for the first modern Olympics, which opened and closed here. A restoration returned it to its second-century look. Athens tours find it in Pangrati, between the two pine-clad hills Ardettos and Agra.
The Central Market is a busy stop for food, with a wide assortment of produce and local colour. One operator offers an Athens food tour, and another lists a market day food tour in Keramikos. Athens tours of this kind turn lunch into the sightseeing.
Evening has its own choices. One operator runs an Athens by Night tour, and another lists a night-time city tour of the iconic monuments. Alternative Athens lists nightlife tours, and one operator serves a heritage dinner in Plaka.
Which day trips by road start with Athens tours?
Athens tours reach Delphi and Meteora by road. Delphi is a holy site of the ancient world in central Greece. Meteora is a rock formation in Thessaly, where monasteries crown tall stone pillars.
At Delphi, the Pythia gave answers to people who came with big decisions. Mount Parnassus rises behind the ruins, and the sacred ground climbs its southwestern side.
The ancient Greeks saw Delphi as the centre of the world, and a carved stone called the omphalos showed where. Athens tours here start with a legend about the place name. The Suda links it to Delphyne, a she-serpent slain by Apollo. The Delphi mythology tour is one way to hear such legends.
Today the ruins form a large archaeological park. UNESCO protects Delphi because the Greek city-states each raised monuments on this ground. Choose the classical Delphi tour if the ruins themselves are your goal.
Meteora belongs to the regional unit of Trikala. Kalabaka is the town below it, and Kastraki is a nearby village. Athens tours that join both places take two days, for example the two-day Delphi and Meteora tour.
Builders put twenty-four monasteries on the pillars, starting in the later fourteenth century. Today monks or nuns still live in four of them, and visitors are welcome. The pillars themselves rise more than 20 metres. The word Meteora means “lofty”. For a single day, see the Meteora day trip.
What other trips leave Athens?
Athens tours also head south and east of the city. Mycenae and Epidaurus lie in Argolis in the Peloponnese. Cape Sounion is the southern tip of Attica. Cruises call at islands in the Saronic Gulf.
Mycenae crowns a hill in Argolis. From Athens, the site is 120 kilometres away to the south-west. Visitors walk through the Lion Gate and see the Treasury of Atreus. The Mycenae, Epidaurus and Nafplio day trip links these places in one day.
The old city of Epidaurus stood close to the Saronic Gulf. UNESCO lists its theatre and its Asclepius sanctuary, which served healing. Together they show how such sanctuaries grew up in Greek and Roman times. Athens tours in Argolis pair it with Mycenae.
Olympia lies further west in the Peloponnese. Greeks gathered there for the ancient Olympic Games, held once every four years. Athens tours that go this far west are described on the page for Ancient Olympia.
Sounion ends the Attica peninsula, 69.5 kilometres from Athens. Poseidon’s temple crowns the cape, and the sea reaches it on three sides. Athens tours to the cape include the Cape Sounion sunset tour.
Aegina belongs to the Saronic Islands, and Poros sits in the same gulf. Athens tours by sea include a Saronic Islands cruise among such islands.
The Hydra, Poros and Aegina day cruise names three islands in its title. Longer trips leave from the port of Piraeus, and Greek islands cruises go further out.
Which Greek islands can you reach from Athens?
Athens tours reach the Greek islands through Piraeus, the chief port of Greece. Central Athens is 8 km away from the harbour, which faces the Saronic Gulf. Island trips head from there to the Saronic islands nearby and to the Cyclades in the Aegean Sea.
Our list of Greek destinations covers every island named here. Athens tours and island trips share one gateway, because Piraeus is the largest harbour in Greece. Plans to make it the port of Athens date from the start of the fifth century B.C.
A day away from Athens tours of the city begins at a busy dock. Piraeus ranks fifth among the passenger ports of Europe. The Saronic islands lie closest to the capital.
- Aegina is 27 km from Athens. In classical times its city-state challenged Athens as a rival. Today the island is known for its pistachio production and the Aphaia temple.
- Hydra carried the ancient name Hydrea, which refers to its natural springs. A strait splits it from the Peloponnese coast.
- Poros is a pair of islands about 58 km south of Piraeus. The sea channel between it and the Peloponnese is 200 metres across. Athenians treat it as a weekend destination.
Athens tours that carry on to the Cyclades go much further out into the Aegean. Each island below is a separate stop.
- Mykonos is a Cycladic neighbour of Tinos, Syros, Paros and Naxos. Its main town, Chora, stands on the west coast.
- Santorini forms the southern end of the Cyclades. Its ring of islands surrounds a caldera, and the main island is the largest of the ring.
- Naxos has the greatest area of any Cycladic island. Its role as a centre of early Cycladic culture goes back to the Bronze Age.
- Paros lies west of Naxos, only 8 km away, and is about 150 km from Piraeus.
- Ios is the midpoint between Naxos and Santorini and runs about 18 km from end to end.
Where do you stay in Athens?
Plaka climbs the Acropolis hill on its northeast side, with Syntagma at one edge and Monastiraki at the other. These central areas sit close together, so they form a compact base for Athens tours and old town walks.
Our Athens hotels list sorts the hotels by star class. Start with the class you want, then compare the areas below. Staying in the centre keeps Athens tours and the sights close to your door.
Monastiraki is a flea market district and one of the main shopping areas in Athens. Two metro lines, the green one and the blue one, stop at its station. Plaka and the Trigono area hold the restaurants, tavernas and bars of the historic centre.
The page for central Athens hotels covers this part of the city. Compare the areas first, then book Athens tours that suit your base.
Athens tours cover the old town by day, while Kolonaki leans towards cafes and restaurants. The lower station of the Lycabettus funicular stands there, on Aristippou Street. The district also holds Bauhaus and Art Deco buildings from the nineteen-twenties onward.
Psyrri is especially busy with nightclubs and bars, so pick a quieter area if you want early nights. Choose the area by the evening you want after Athens tours finish for the day.
Going on to the islands after the capital? The page for hotels in Greece helps with stays outside Athens.
What is Athens like, and what is its past?
Greece has its capital in Athens, a city whose written record reaches back over 3,400 years. Athens tours cross a modern city that still carries the marks of that long past.
The southernmost capital of mainland Europe is Athens. About 3.6 million people live in its urban area. The area fills a wide lowland of Attica, the Athens Basin. Four mountains ring it: Aigaleo in the west, Parnitha up north, Pentelicus in the northeast and Hymettus in the east. The sea, the Saronic Gulf, borders it in the southwest.
Hills rise all over the city itself, and Athens tours climb between low streets and higher viewpoints. The climate is Mediterranean with a hot summer. At the weather station near the centre, the yearly average sits at 19.2 degrees Celsius.
Heat is part of daily life here, since the city has been named the hottest in mainland Europe. Before you book Athens tours, read our Greece travel information for the season of your trip.
In Ancient Greek the city’s name was Athenai, a plural word. Greek myth says the goddess Athena, who stood for wisdom, won the city by offering the first olive tree. Poseidon offered a salt spring, and King Cecrops judged the contest. Scholars today agree that the goddess took her name from the city. Athens tours retell this myth.
By the sixth century B.C., unrest in the city led to the reforms of Solon. Cleisthenes then brought in democracy in 508 B.C. A council of 500 citizens was chosen by lot every year. Free adult men took part, while women, slaves and foreign residents did not. Athens tours explain how this system grew in one small city.
A golden age of democracy followed the Persian Wars. Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides wrote plays here, while Socrates and Plato taught philosophy. Pericles led the city into an ambitious building program, which gave Athens its great monuments.
Later, Athens passed through Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman rule. In the eighteen-thirties it replaced Nafplio as the capital of the modern Greek state. Athens tours cover all of these layers of the city’s story, from the ancient age to the present day. They show how each period left its mark.
What else do travellers ask about Athens tours?
What is Hadrian’s Library, and when was it built?
Hadrian’s Library is the ruin of a monumental building. The Roman emperor Hadrian created it in AD 132, north of the Acropolis. Travellers who book Athens tours can picture the original from the written record.
Cupboards and shelves on the eastern side held rolls of papyrus. Adjoining halls served as reading rooms, and the corners worked as lecture halls.
The main entrance was part of the Stoa of Hadrian, with columns of Karystian marble and Pentelic capitals. Three churches were built at the site, and their remains are preserved. Check the stop list of your Athens tours for this ruin.
Where can you rest in a green space between the sights?
The National Garden is a green refuge of 15.5 hectares in the centre of the Greek capital. It lies between the Parliament and the Zappeion buildings.
The Zappeion keeps its own garden of seven hectares. Plan a pause in these gardens on a day of Athens tours that stays in the centre.
What is the Zappeion, and who designed it?
The Zappeion is a large, palatial building beside the National Gardens, in the heart of Athens. The Danish-born architect Theophil Hansen designed it.
It was the first building put up specifically to revive the Olympic Games. Today people use it for meetings and ceremonies, both official and private. Look at it from outside before or after your Athens tours.
Can you swim near Athens after a day of sightseeing?
Yes, because the coastal waters of Athens are accessible to swimmers again. The waste management plant on Psytalia, a small island, greatly improved the water quality in the Saronic Gulf.
Glyfada, Vouliagmeni and Varkiza lie in the southern suburbs, known as the Athens Riviera, and they have sandy beaches. The Athens city coastline runs for 25 km and ends at Varkiza, the southernmost suburb. Pack swimwear if your Athens tours end early and you want to reach the coast.
Why are there no tall buildings around the old centre?
Athens has very strict height restriction laws, which keep the Acropolis Hill visible throughout the city. A visitor on Athens tours quickly notices the absence of tall buildings.
The city has no single uniform style. Greco-Roman, Neoclassical and Modern architecture stand in the same areas. Neoclassicism dominated Athens for the greatest part of the nineteenth century. That mix turns a short walk into a lesson in how the city grew.