Jerusalem Old City: Guide, Tours and Map

A walled city within a city

The Old City is a 0.9 square kilometre walled area, small enough to cross on foot in well under an hour. Its present walls and gates were built by the Ottoman Empire between 1535 and 1542 under Suleiman the Magnificent. Seven gates stand open today, and Jaffa Gate on the west side is where almost every tour and most visitors begin.

In a tradition that may have started with a British map of the 1840s, the city is divided into four uneven quarters: the Muslim Quarter, the Christian Quarter, the Armenian Quarter and the Jewish Quarter. A fifth area is the Temple Mount, known in Arabic as Haram al-Sharif, the plateau of the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

The name is slightly misleading. Archaeologists believe the original settlement core of ancient Jerusalem lay on the rocky spur south of the plateau, where the City of David excavations now sit. The walled Old City as Suleiman built it sits a little north of the ancient city, which had spread much wider at its peak.

• UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1981, listed together with the walls
• Four quarters plus the Temple Mount plateau
• Main visitor entrances: Jaffa Gate, Damascus Gate, Dung Gate, Lions' Gate
• About 0.9 square kilometres, walkable end to end

Three faiths, one square kilometre

The Old City holds sites of central importance to Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The Western Wall is a retained section of the ancient retaining wall of the Temple Mount plateau and a place of Jewish prayer. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre is for Christians the site of the crucifixion, burial and resurrection of Jesus. Muslims revere the plateau above as the place of the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

People live in all four quarters. The Jewish Quarter held around 19,000 Jewish residents in the early 20th century, was razed in the 1948 war and rebuilt after 1967, and housed around 3,000 residents and 1,500 students as of 2013. The Armenian Quarter is the oldest living diaspora community outside Armenia, dating to Armenian monks who settled here in the 4th century. The Christian Quarter contains about 40 Christian holy places. This is a working city of homes, schools and shops, not an open-air museum, which is why dress and quiet conduct matter here more than at most attractions.

From Jaffa Gate to the Western Wall

Jaffa Gate is an Ottoman gate from 1538 with an L-shaped entryway, a defensive design meant to slow attackers. Travellers and pilgrims arriving from the port of Jaffa ended their journey here, which gave the gate its name. Beside it a wide breach in the wall was cut in 1898 so the German emperor Wilhelm II could enter by carriage, and cars still use that gap today.

Inside the gate the Tower of David, also called the Citadel, stands immediately to your right. The citadel you see dates to the Mamluk and Ottoman periods, built on the site of much older Hasmonean, Herodian and Byzantine fortifications. It now houses the Tower of David Jerusalem Museum, and its courtyard hosts the Night Spectacular sound-and-light show.

From Jaffa Gate the main route runs east through the Armenian Quarter and the Jewish Quarter, past the Cardo, the north-south main street of the Roman and Byzantine city. The quarter was systematically destroyed after its surrender in the 1948 war and rebuilt from the 1970s, with excavations that uncovered the Broad Wall, the Burnt House and the Byzantine Cardo. The route ends at the Western Wall plaza at the foot of the Temple Mount. Entry to the plaza is free and open to all, with modest dress required.

Up to the plateau and across to the Holy Sepulchre

From the Western Wall plaza, non-Muslim visitors can reach the Temple Mount plateau through the Mughrabi Gate, the bridge by the plaza, during limited morning and early-afternoon hours from Sunday to Thursday. It is closed to visitors on Fridays, Saturdays and various Muslim and Jewish holidays, and can close at short notice, so check on the day. Visitors stay in the open courtyards and do not enter the buildings.

The route then turns north through the Muslim Quarter along the Via Dolorosa, the street route tradition associates with the path of Jesus to crucifixion, marked by fourteen stations. It ends at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in the Christian Quarter, which Christians venerate as the site of the crucifixion and the tomb. Entry is free. Six denominations share the church under fixed arrangements, which explains the crowded and busy interior.

Most guided walks then loop back through the souk markets to Jaffa Gate. On your own, the Austrian Pilgrim Hospice on the Via Dolorosa has a rooftop terrace for 5 NIS ($1.62), open daily 10:00 to 22:00, which is the best cheap viewpoint inside the walls.

Opening hours that matter

The streets and gates of the Old City are open at all hours. The sites inside them are not, and the differences shape your day.

The Church of the Holy Sepulchre opens 05:00 to 20:45 in summer, closes 20:00 in October, runs 04:00 to 19:00 in winter and closes 19:30 in March. A Franciscan procession takes place daily at 17:00 in summer and 16:00 in winter. Special hours apply on Catholic and Orthodox Good Friday and Orthodox Holy Saturday. Saint Anne and the Pools of Bethesda at the start of the Via Dolorosa cost 12 NIS ($3.88), students 10 NIS, open Monday to Saturday 08:00 to 12:00 and 14:00 to 16:00, closed Sunday. The Temple Mount plateau takes non-Muslim visitors only Sunday to Thursday in limited hours, and closes to them on Fridays, Saturdays and various holidays, sometimes at short notice.

Shabbat runs from Friday sunset to Saturday nightfall. Public transport largely stops for it, though the churches of the Old City stay open, and the light rail ends early on Friday and does not run on Saturday. Plan arrival and departure around this.

• Holy Sepulchre: 05:00 to 20:45 in summer, quietest right at opening
• Temple Mount plateau: Sunday to Thursday only for visitors, no exact printed hours, check on the day
• Saint Anne and Pools of Bethesda: closed Sunday
• Friday evening into Saturday: city streets busy with religious life, transport reduced

Dress and conduct

Modest dress is required at the Western Wall and on the Temple Mount plateau: covered shoulders and knees, and head covering for men at the Wall. The same standard is sensible anywhere in the Old City and is required on ultra-Orthodox neighbourhood tours elsewhere in Jerusalem.

All four quarters are residential. The Christian Quarter counts about 40 Christian holy places and still has a resident Christian community, though numbers have dwindled. Keep voices down in narrow residential lanes, ask before photographing worshippers, and follow any sign restricting photography inside the churches. Guides on the walking tours handle these boundaries for you, which is one quiet argument for booking one on a first visit. The quietest time in the lanes, our estimate, is early morning before 09:00 or after 18:00, when tour groups thin out and the shop shutters start to come down.

Reaching Jaffa Gate

Jaffa Gate sits at the western edge of the walls, where Jaffa Road meets the Old City. From the west you approach through Mamilla Mall, a pedestrian shopping street that runs from the city centre straight to the gate, roughly a ten minute walk from the light rail stop near City Hall, our estimate.

The Jerusalem light rail Line L1 runs from Mount Herzl past the Central Bus Station, Mahane Yehuda and Jaffa Road to near Damascus Gate. Pay with a Rav-Kav card or an approved app, the validators take no bank cards and there are no paper tickets. Damascus Gate is the northern entrance, useful if you are starting at the Via Dolorosa or the Garden Tomb outside the walls. For the Western Wall and the City of David, Dung Gate in the south is the closest entrance.

Travellers arriving from the coast can take the Israel Railways train to Jerusalem Yitzhak Navon station next to the Central Bus Station, about 35 to 45 minutes from Tel Aviv, every 30 minutes Sunday to Thursday and hourly on Friday until early afternoon, with no trains from Friday afternoon until after dark on Saturday. From the station, the light rail or a walk through Mamilla brings you to Jaffa Gate. More detail is in our guide to getting around Jerusalem.

Tours that collect you

If you would rather not navigate, several tours include hotel pickup in Jerusalem. Full-day city tours such as the full-day Jerusalem tour with entry fees collect you at your hotel and drop you back. Private Old City tours can meet you at your hotel lobby and start walking from there.

For a first morning in the city, meeting a guide at Jaffa Gate remains the simplest option, because the gate is signposted from everywhere and impossible to miss. See our page on where to stay in Jerusalem if you want to be within walking distance of the walls.

Choosing your routing

The walls contain perhaps a dozen major stops, and no one sees all of them well in one visit. A shared four-hour walk covers the spine of the city at a comfortable pace. A five-hour private walk adds the Armenian Quarter, the Upper Room on Mount Zion and a slower look at the quarters. Doing it alone costs nothing but takes planning, since the Holy Sepulchre alone rewards an unhurried hour.

Our pick for a first visit is the guided walking tour from Jaffa Gate: four hours, 4.8 stars from 423 reviews, and a guide who manages the dress rules, the security lines and the Temple Mount closure on Fridays and Saturdays. Return later in your trip for the City of David south of Dung Gate or a walk down the Mount of Olives. If you only have one day in Jerusalem overall, our one-day Jerusalem itinerary fits the Old City into a wider plan.

A short list worth reading before you walk

The Old City rewards a little background. These five points come straight from the historical record and from the site rules, and each one has a practical consequence for your visit.

• The current layout is not the ancient city. Most archaeologists believe the original settlement core lay on the spur south of the Temple Mount, where the City of David excavations now stand, so the walled Old City sits slightly north of where ancient Jerusalem peaked. Wikipedia, Old City of Jerusalem
• The wide gap next to Jaffa Gate was cut in 1898 so German emperor Wilhelm II could enter the city by carriage, and it is why cars can reach the Old City from the west today. Wikipedia, Jaffa Gate
• The four-quarter division is a tradition that may have begun with a British map of the city in the 1840s, not an ancient arrangement. Wikipedia, Old City of Jerusalem
• The Jewish Quarter holds two historic mosques, the Sidna Omar and the Al Dissi, both closed since 1967. Wikipedia, Jewish Quarter
• The Tower of David took its name from a Herodian tower in the 5th century CE, and only since 1967 has it officially referred to the entire citadel, including the 17th-century minaret visitors photograph as the tower. Wikipedia, Tower of David