The grounds and buildings of the Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II-Birkenau camps are open to visitors. The duration of a visit is determined solely by the individual interests and needs of the visitors. As a minimum, however, at least three-and-a-half hours should be reserved.
To go on a tour of the site, you'll need to book online at visit.auschwitz.org. Make sure you plan ahead as tours can book up months in advance, especially on weekends. To see Auschwitz-Birkenau, you can choose between four different tours, the general tour, a one or two day study tour, or the individual tour.
Access by public transport
- By suburban train — board at the Krakow Główny station and get off at the Wieliczka Rynek Kopalnia station. You can walk from the station to the Mine in a few minutes.
- By bus line 304 — board the at the Dworzec Główny Zachód stop near Galeria Krakowska.
The easiest way to get to Auschwitz is from Krakow, which is about a 1.5-hour journey by car or bus. Most tours take at least 6 hours and include hotel pickup and round-trip transport. Meanwhile, Warsaw is just under 4 hours away by road, with tours last over 10 hours given the transport times. Wear comfortable shoes.
Can I enter the Museum upon arriving without a pre-booked entry pass? Entrance to the Museum is only possible with a personalized pre-paid entry pass. Reservations can be made at visit.auschwitz.org. The number of entry passes available is limited.
The maximum size of bags and backpacks allowed to carry on the Museum grounds is 30 x 20 x 10 cm.
It takes an average of 7h 39m to travel from Prague to Krakow Central by train, over a distance of around 244 miles (392 km). There are normally 12 trains per day travelling from Prague to Krakow Central and tickets for this journey start from €5.40 when you book in advance.
From 1 July, the site of the former German Nazi Auschwitz concentration and extermination camp will again be open to visitors. Reservations for guided tours, as well as individual entry for the period 1 July - 30 September, can now be made online at visit.auschwitz.org.
listen)) is a German phrase meaning "Work sets you free" or "Work makes one free". The slogan is known for appearing on the entrance of Auschwitz and other Nazi concentration camps.
Like many museums in Europe, the Memorial and Museum Auschwitz-Birkenau in southern Poland's Oświęcim has been severely affected by the coronavirus pandemic. On March 12, 2020, the international memorial on the site of the former German Nazi concentration and extermination camp closed to visitors.
It is a symbolic place marked by 17,000 stones where you can feel the massive tragedy of the Jewish community during World War II. You will also have the option to visit Treblinka I, a penal labor camp which is located 1.5 miles from the death camp, where the Nazis murdered a further 10,000 Polish people.
After the rebuilding of the camp, each building had lavatories, usually on the ground floor, containing 22 toilets, urinals, and washbasins with trough-type drains and 42 spigots installed above them.
About 7,000 starving prisoners were found alive in the camp. Millions of items of clothing that once belonged to men, women and children were discovered along with 6,350kg of human hair. The Auschwitz museum holds more than 100,000 pairs of shoes, 12,000 kitchen utensils, 3,800 suitcases and 350 striped camp garments.
Auschwitz today is many things at once: an emblem of evil, a site of historical remembrance and a vast cemetery. It is a place where Jews make pilgrimages to pay tribute to ancestors whose ashes and bones remain part of the earth.
