Myanmar
Yangon
Southeast Asia's most complete colonial streetscape, laid out at the foot of its greatest pagoda.
Myanmar's biggest city and its capital until 2005, Yangon spreads north from the river around Shwedagon Pagoda, the gilded hilltop stupa that is the country's holiest shrine and the reason most people come. Below it lies a downtown grid of British-era banks, courts and shophouses, mildewed and magnificent in roughly equal measure, threaded with teashops, pavement markets and monsoon-stained balconies. It is hot, loud and worn at the edges, and there is more to look at here than anywhere else in the country.
Suggested stay
2–4 days
Language
Burmese
Currency
MMK
Timezone
UTC+6:30
Why you'll love Yangon
Shwedagon A gold-plated stupa the height of a tower block, at its best after dark when the marble has cooled and the platform fills with candles, families and monks.
The downtown grid Block after block of peeling banks, courts and shophouses on numbered streets running down to the river, still lived in rather than restored.
Street food Mohinga at dawn, teashops all day and barbecue on plastic stools after dark; the best and most varied eating in the country.
A layered city Pagodas, mosques, a synagogue, Hindu temples, Baptist churches and a working Chinatown within a few blocks of one another.
Best time to visit
Nov-Feb
Cool & dry · 33-35° days
16.797° N, 96.161° E
UTC+6:30 · Asia/Yangon
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Weather & when to go to Yangon
Month by month: typical highs and lows, rainfall and rain days.
✓ Best Nov-Feb
Conditions Jan Cool & dry · Feb Dry season · Mar Hot season · Apr Extreme heat · May Monsoon starts · Jun Monsoon · Jul Monsoon peak · Aug Heavy rain · Sep Monsoon · Oct Rains easing · Nov Dry returns · Dec Cool & dry
Watch for Feb-Apr haze risk · Feb-Apr extreme heat risk · Apr-Jun, Oct-Dec cyclones & hurricanes risk · May-Sep monsoon flooding risk
Cards tinted by verified verdict · big number = typical daily high, small = low · hover for conditions
When to avoid Yangon
April and May bring the hardest heat of the year, and the southwest monsoon soaks the city from about June to September, when Yangon is among the wettest big cities in Asia. Separately, Myanmar has been unstable since 2021 and several governments advise against travel, so check current advice before booking anything.
Top things to do in Yangon
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Shwedagon Pagoda - the golden heart of the country
culture arts history 👍 PopularA gilded stupa the height of a tower block on Singuttara Hill, plated in gold and tipped with a diamond-studded finial, said to enshrine relics of four Buddhas. Four covered stairways climb to a marble platform ringed by shrines, planetary posts and bell pavilions. Go barefoot in the late afternoon and stay while it lights up.
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Downtown colonial grid - walk Pansodan and Strand Road
history culture arts ⭐ Highly recommendedThe old British commercial core survives block by block: the vast red-brick Secretariat where Aung San was assassinated, the domed High Court, the Strand, and banks with columned porticos now streaked with mould and hung with laundry. Numbered streets run straight down to the jetties. Best done slowly on foot, early or late.
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Yangon Circular Railway - three hours around the city
culture arts off beaten path ⭐ Highly recommendedThe colonial-era loop line clatters out of Central Station through market platforms, vegetable plots and stilt suburbs and back again, taking around three hours for the full circuit. Wooden benches, open windows, vendors working the aisles and commuters who will make room for you. The most honest tour of the city there is.
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Bogyoke Aung San Market - jade, longyis and tailors
shopping culture arts 👍 PopularA 1926 covered bazaar of cobbled lanes under iron roofs, stacked with jade and gemstones, lacquerware, longyis, antiques and tailors who will run something up while you wait. The stones are a gamble and everything is haggled, but it is the most enjoyable browsing in the city. Shut on Mondays and public holidays.
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Chaukhtatgyi Buddha - the reclining giant under a shed
culture arts 👍 PopularA colossal reclining Buddha in Bahan, housed in what amounts to a corrugated hangar, with glass eyes, painted lips and soles inscribed with 108 auspicious marks. The monastery around it is full of novices at their lessons. It takes ten minutes and no ceremony, and sits close to Kandawgyi.
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Sule Pagoda - the stupa in the roundabout
history culture artsA gilded octagonal stupa said to be more than two thousand years old, marooned on a traffic island the British simply laid their street grid around. City Hall, the old Baptist church and the High Court stand at its corners, and the junction has been the rallying point of every uprising since.
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Botataung Pagoda - walk inside the stupa
culture arts historyRebuilt after an Allied bomb flattened it in 1943, and unusual in that you can walk into the hollow stupa itself, through a mirrored gold maze past the relic chamber. It stands by the river jetties east of downtown, with a terrapin pond in the grounds that pilgrims come to feed.
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Kandawgyi Lake - Shwedagon over the treeline
scenicA creaking wooden boardwalk runs around the lake in Bahan with the pagoda floating above the trees, which is the view every postcard uses and best an hour before sunset. The Karaweik, a concrete replica of a royal barge moored at the eastern shore, is more photogenic from across the water than up close.
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Chinatown and 19th Street - barbecue on plastic stools
food nightlife musicLatha runs a street market by day and a barbecue strip after dark, where you point at skewers of pork, okra, quail egg and mushroom and they come back charred. Around it are the Sri Kali Hindu temple, Chinese clan halls and, a few blocks east, teashops serving mohinga from first light.
Best areas to stay in Yangon
$ Budget $$ Mid-range $$$ Premium
Downtown (Kyauktada)
First-time visitors $$Colonial grid with the river at the end
Explore hotels in Downtown (Kyauktada) →
Chinatown (Latha)
Budget and food $Night barbecue, temples, cheapest central beds
Explore hotels in Chinatown (Latha) →
Bahan
Comfort and calm $$$Leafy embassy streets below Shwedagon
Explore hotels in Bahan →
Sanchaung
Local life $Dense residential lanes, teashops, few visitors
Explore hotels in Sanchaung →
Live nightly prices from Booking.com, Agoda and others, centred on Yangon
Getting to & around Yangon
Getting there
Fly into Yangon International, then 30 min to over an hour by taxi south into downtown depending on traffic.
Flight
Yangon International Airport (RGN)
At Mingaladon, about 16 km north of downtown. Taxis from the arrivals counter are the only realistic transfer and take anything from half an hour to well over an hour in traffic; agree the rate at the desk before you set off.
Coach
Aung Mingalar bus terminal
Express coaches from Mandalay, Bagan, Inle and Kyaikto land well north of the centre, often before dawn, leaving you a taxi ride in.
Train
Yangon Central Station
Slow lines north to Mandalay and a branch towards Bagan. Atmospheric, considerably slower than the road, and often late.
Drive
Yangon
The Yangon-Mandalay Expressway is the fast road north and the one every coach uses; it has a poor reputation for accidents.
Getting around
Taxi
Everywhere, unmetered and inexpensive. Agree the rate through the window before you get in.
TBC
Ride-hailing
Grab covers the city and settles everything in the app, which takes the haggling out of it.
TBC
Circular train
The colonial loop line doubles as commuter transport and the city's best sightseeing ride, from Central Station.
TBC
City bus
The YBS network is extensive but numbered and signed in Burmese; hard to use cold, and the local default.
TBC
River ferry
Passenger boats cross to Dala from the Pansodan jetty every few minutes through the day.
TBC
Walking
The downtown grid is walkable end to end, though broken pavements, heat and traffic make it slower than it looks.
Free
Day trips from Yangon
Bago
Full dayOld Mon capital
The Mon and later Burmese capital, roughly two hours northeast and the easiest big day out from the city. Shwemawdaw Pagoda stands taller than Shwedagon, the Shwethalyaung reclining Buddha is older and finer than Yangon's own, and the four Kyaikpun Buddhas sit back to back around a single pillar.
Getting there
car | train | tour
About 2 hr each way by car, or by train from Central Station
Thanlyin and Kyauktan
Half dayRiver pagodas and ruins
Across the Bago River lies Syriam, the old Portuguese and Mon port. Kyaikkhauk Pagoda sits on a hill above the town, the brick shell of a seventeenth-century church stands in a field nearby, and at Kyauktan a small gold pagoda occupies its own midstream island, reached by a crowded boat.
Getting there
car
About 1 hr each way by car over the Thanlyin bridge
Dala
Half dayFerry across the river
The crossing is the trip: a battered passenger ferry, vendors working the deck and the downtown skyline dropping away behind you. Dala on the far bank is a poor delta township of dirt lanes and stilt houses, usually seen by trishaw with a driver who finds you at the ramp.
Getting there
ferry | walk
About 10 min each way by ferry from Pansodan jetty
Kyaiktiyo (Golden Rock)
1-2 daysBoulder shrine on a ridge
A gilded boulder balanced on the lip of a cliff, held there by a hair of the Buddha according to the legend, with a small stupa on top. Pilgrims press gold leaf onto it through the night. Possible as a very long day, and much better with a night on the ridge.
Getting there
car | bus | tour
About 4-5 hr each way by car or coach, then an open truck up the mountain
A little history of Yangon
Yangon began as Dagon, a Mon village grown up around the Shwedagon. In 1755 the Burmese king Alaungpaya took it and renamed it Yangon, roughly end of strife. The British seized it twice, and after annexing Lower Burma in 1852 made Rangoon their capital, clearing the burnt town and laying out the grid that still runs down to the river. Rice, teak and oil made it one of the busiest ports in the empire, and migration from India and China made it, for a time, a city where Burmese speakers were outnumbered.
Japanese occupation and Allied bombing emptied and wrecked it. Aung San negotiated independence and was assassinated in the Secretariat in 1947, months before it arrived. Ne Win's coup in 1962 nationalised the economy, drove out much of the Indian and Chinese population and sealed the country off, and the stagnation that followed is the accidental reason so much colonial fabric survives at all. Yangon was the centre of the 1988 uprising and the 2007 monks' protests, lost the capital to Naypyidaw, opened to the world after 2011, and has been under military rule again since 2021.
Alaungpaya takes Dagon and renames it Yangon.
Britain annexes Lower Burma; Rangoon becomes the colonial capital.
Japanese occupation; the city is bombed and largely emptied.
Aung San and six colleagues are assassinated in the Secretariat.
Independence, with Rangoon the capital of the new union.
Ne Win's coup begins decades of military rule and isolation.
The nationwide uprising centres on Yangon and is crushed.
The junta renames the country Myanmar and the city Yangon.
The government moves the capital to Naypyidaw.
Know before you go
Payment
Cash only
English
Limited
Wifi
Limited
Power
Type A / B / C / D / E / F / G / I
230 V, 50 Hz
Dialing
+95
Bring cash. Foreign cards and ATMs are unreliable to unusable here, so plan on carrying what the trip needs and changing money on arrival.
Haze risk in this window; check current conditions before you go.
Extreme heat risk in this window; check current conditions before you go.
Cyclones & hurricanes risk in this window; check current conditions before you go.
Monsoon flooding risk in this window; check current conditions before you go.
The months our climate read flags to avoid: the wettest, lowest-rated weather of the year.
FAQs about Yangon
▸ When is the best time to visit Yangon?
November to February is the cool dry season and by far the easiest time to be walking the city. March and October sit either side of it, hotter and stickier but workable. April and May are the hottest months of the year, and the southwest monsoon runs from about June to September.
▸ How long do you need in Yangon?
Two days covers Shwedagon, the downtown walk, Bogyoke market and the circle line without rushing. A third buys Bago or Thanlyin, or simply more teashops. Most people treat Yangon as a bookend on a longer trip rather than a destination in itself.
▸ Is Yangon safe to visit?
Street crime is low and the city feels calm day to day, but Myanmar has been under military rule since the 2021 coup, conditions change quickly, checkpoints and curfews come and go, and several governments advise against all travel. Check current government advice and whether your insurance would cover you.
▸ What are the rules for visiting a pagoda?
Shoes and socks come off at the gate rather than at the shrine, so you cross the platform barefoot on stone that can be scorching by mid-afternoon. Shoulders and knees stay covered, men included; a longyi is easily bought at the market if you need one. Walk clockwise around the stupa.
▸ Is Yangon expensive?
Food, taxis and everyday costs are among the lowest in Southeast Asia. Hotels are the exception: the supply of decent rooms is thin and they eat more of a budget than the rest of the trip would suggest, so the gap between a basic bed and a comfortable one is wide.
▸ Do cards and ATMs work in Yangon?
Assume not. The city runs on cash. Cards are taken at bigger hotels and a handful of restaurants, ATMs have been unreliable and at times cut off from international networks, and exchange counters want clean, unfolded, unmarked notes. Carry more cash than feels sensible and keep it dry in the wet season.