Amsterdam has 165 canals. Start with the right boat.
Which cruise actually turns into the Jordaan. What Zaanse Schans costs with the bus and without it. How far ahead the Anne Frank House goes. Every Amsterdam tour, reviewed and ranked.
A boat on the Grachtengordel is the trip everyone books first.
Seventeenth-century merchants dug the ring in three concentric arcs and the city never grew out of it. Ninety minutes afloat passes more of Amsterdam than a whole day on foot. What separates one cruise from the next is the boat, whether the roof opens, and whether anybody is talking.
- 1Amsterdam Luxury Canal Cruise + Unlimited Drinks & Bites optionfrom $18.73
- 2Heated Canal Cruise with Unlimited Drinks & Bitefrom $18
- 375 Minute City Canal Cruise with Audio Guidefrom $18
Windmills, Van Gogh, tulips, a boat: the Amsterdam shortlist.
Six bookings define a first trip here. Here is what each one really involves, and how far ahead it has to be arranged.
A brewery, a saloon boat and the Rijksmuseum: what Amsterdam books.
Every review →Ranked by the number of travellers who have actually been and rated it, not by what anyone wants you to buy.
1
Heineken Experience Ticket including 2 Drinks
Amsterdam’s Heineken Experience, 90 minutes with an audio guide and 2 included beers. Brew U ride, English moments, and a final bar stop.
From · $29
Read our review →
2
Amsterdam Classic Saloon Boat Cruise with Drinks and Cheese
from $21.06
3
Amsterdam Luxury Canal Cruise + Unlimited Drinks & Bites option
from $18.73
4
Rijksmuseum Entry Ticket
from $31
5
Classic Saloon Boat Cruise with Cheese & Wine
from $18
6
Evening Cruise with Optional Wine and Snacks
from $23
7
Heated Canal Cruise with Unlimited Drinks & Bite
from $18
8
75 Minute City Canal Cruise with Audio Guide
from $18
9
Zaanse Schans, Volendam & Marken Day Trip
from $34
The Netherlands is small. Use that.
Windmills in forty minutes, a fishing harbour in an hour, Bruges before lunch. From Amsterdam almost half the Low Countries sits inside a day return, and the coach usually collects you off Damrak.
How far out of Amsterdam each day trip really goes.
Three of the world’s great collections share one Amsterdam square.
The Rijksmuseum, the Van Gogh Museum and the Stedelijk stand within a few hundred metres of each other on Museumplein. All three sell timed slots online, all three run out on wet weekends, and the combination tickets that pair one with a canal cruise are usually the cheaper way in.
The Anne Frank House and the old Jewish Quarter.
The house on the Prinsengracht sells timed tickets online only, released six weeks in advance, and there is no ticket desk at the door. When the slots are gone, guided walks of the Jordaan and the Jewish Quarter cover the same streets and the same history, and several of them end at the National Holocaust Names Memorial.
An Amsterdam day out starts at the price of two beers.
Every tour on the site sorted by what it actually charges, with the most-reviewed pick in each bracket.
Museum entry, a bike for the day, a walking tour of the ring, a cheese tasting.
The canal cruises with drinks, the windmill coach, the food tours through the Jordaan.
Private boats, small-group day trips over the border, and the guided museum mornings.
Things that only make sense in Amsterdam.
Museums and food tours exist in every European capital. Flat-bottomed saloon boats, a cheese economy and a city built around bicycles do not.
The Saloon Boat
Amsterdam’s canals are shallow, narrow and crossed by well over a thousand bridges, so the boats evolved to fit them: long, flat-bottomed salonboots with glass roofs low enough to slide under a seventeenth-century arch. That is why a cruise here feels nothing like a river trip. The older wooden boats take twenty people; the modern ones take eighty and feel it.
- 1Amsterdam Luxury Canal Cruise + Unlimited Drinks & Bites option★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 30,518 reviews
- 2Heated Canal Cruise with Unlimited Drinks & Bite★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 21,431 reviews
- 375 Minute City Canal Cruise with Audio Guide★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 19,938 reviews
The Cheese Counter
The Dutch eat more cheese per head than almost anyone in Europe and still weigh it in market halls built for the purpose. A tasting here is not a novelty act: you work from a young Gouda through the crystalline thirty-six-month wheels, usually with mustard and jenever alongside. Most tastings sit inside a shop on the Jordaan side of the ring and run under an hour.
- 1Amsterdam Classic Saloon Boat Cruise with Drinks and Cheese★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 31,825 reviews
- 2Classic Saloon Boat Cruise with Cheese & Wine★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 27,035 reviews
- 3Guided Zaanse Schans, Windmills & Cheese Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 4,826 reviews
The Cycle Lane
There are roughly as many bicycles in Amsterdam as residents, and the fietspad is a road with its own rules, its own lights and no patience. Riding it with a guide for the first two hours is the difference between seeing the city and surviving it. Tours run the ring, the Vondelpark and the harbour behind Centraal, and rental is normally included.
- 1Big Bike tour Amsterdam – See all in 3 unforgettable hours★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 4,929 reviews
- 2Small Group Guided Bike Tour of Amsterdam’s Hidden Gems★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 3,936 reviews
- 3Off the Beaten Path Bike Tour in French★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 1,632 reviews
The Amsterdam bookings that cannot be left to the day before.
Most of this city can be arranged from your hotel the night before. These four cannot: they run on ticket releases, a growing season and a festival calendar that pay no attention to when your flight lands.
- 01Amsterdam Anne Frank: Small-Group Walking Tour & Local GuideTickets are sold online only and released six weeks ahead. Nothing is held back for the door.
- 02Van Gogh Museum Ticket and City Canal CruiseTimed-entry slots, bought online. The museum does not sell tickets at the entrance.
- 03Keukenhof Entry & Shuttlebus with Flexible ReturnThe gardens open for about eight weeks, late March to mid-May, and then shut for the year.
- 04Light Festival Boat with Unlimited Drinks & SnackLate November to mid-January only, and the boats fill through Christmas week.
One Amsterdam day in three arrives wet. Book indoors.
Rain here is fine drizzle carried sideways off the North Sea, and an umbrella is useless against it. The city is unusually well equipped for the problem: the great collections, a brewery, a cheese counter and an evening on a heated boat with the roof closed all work better in bad weather than good.
Where the day trips actually go
Zaanse Schans180 tours
Keukenhof95 tours
Volendam & Marken75 tours
Giethoorn78 tours
Rotterdam40 tours
Delft35 tours
Bruges25 tours
Brussels18 tours- Every day trip →
The newest Amsterdam reviews.
All recent →
Happy B-day Amsterdam! Guided Tour with a History Buff
Read our review →
Private Photo Shoot in Amsterdam with a Professional Photographer
Read our review →
Private day trip to Giethoorn and the Enclosing Dike
Read our review →
Private Sightseeing Tour to Giethoorn from Amsterdam incl. canal cruise
Read our review →
Private Tour The Hague and Delft incl. Mauritshuis from Amsterdam
Read our review →
Private red light district & coffeeshop tour with a local
Read our review →
Tulips and Windmills Skip the Line Private Tour from Amsterdam
Read our review →
Full Day Private Dutch Golden Age Cities Tour
Read our review →
Private Tour to Zaanse Schans + Giethoorn with renting boat
Read our review →
Flying Dress Photoshoot Experience in Amsterdam and Sea Coast
Read our review →