25 of the best things to do in Paris

Times

09-05-2025

Paris is one of the most beautiful cities in the world. That's not bragging — I live there — but simply a fact. Stroll along the Seine or scuttle through the cobblestone streets of the Marais and you'll find it nigh-on impossible not to swoon. But it's more than just a pretty backdrop. Along with its rich heritage, the French capital is also a bustling, diverse living city, over-brimming with distinct micro-neighbourhoods in every arrondissement. Whether you're interested in architectural splendour, irreverent entertainment, croissants, street food, art or shopping, this city really does have a version of itself to offer everyone. Here's an expert-picked selection of things to do in Paris — from the tried and true to the unexpected.
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The Île de la Cité is Paris's raison d'être: the island that bridges Left Bank and Right Bank. It's here that you'll find the biggest concentration of medieval heritage; take a private or small-group tour for insights into the gothic-era city, as well as 'skip the line' access to popular sights. Notre-Dame has now reopened to the public, so you can view the restoration work that was done after it was fire damaged in 2019, and you can also see inside La Sainte-Chapelle, an ethereal pinnacle of the Middle Ages, as well as the Conciergerie, whose ghosts of the French Revolution featured in the Paris 2024 opening ceremony.
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Head up to the Bassin de la Villette in the north of the city — a formerly industrial canal latterly transformed into an urban pleasure ground — and rent a boat from the popular Marin d'Eau Douce company. You're at the helm here, with a choice of self-drive electric boats accommodating groups of up to 11 for a very leisurely pootle (top speeds of 7km per hour) northwards, taking you up to the suburb of Pantin, home to a plethora of cool bars and arts venues. You can pack your own picnic or aperitif, and the time slot — from one hour to one day — is yours to manage as you see fit. Just be sure to leave enough time to get back to base.
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Forget the stories about Marie Antoinette and her imported Austrian habits: French breakfasts were a strictly no-croissant affair before the Viennese baker August Zang opened his shop on Rue de Richelieu in the late 1830s. Today pâtissiers compete for the title of best croissant-maker in Greater Paris. Experience what goes into this deceptively simple challenge during a croissant class near the Place des Vosges in the 11th arrondissement, which also includes the secret behind a good pain au chocolat. This is one discipline where flakiness is not a sin.
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It's hard to appreciate this in the post-skyscraper age, but when the Eiffel Tower opened in 1889it was almost twice as tall as anything ever built by human hands. Opting to walk up the first two levels can not only dramatically cut the queueing time, but also help to reinstil that sense of awe — over the course of 674 steps. Guides on small-group tours can fill in the historic context, and also take you to the often-missed first-level glass floor. The lift to the top from level two costs extra.
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Once threatened with being concreted over, the Canal Saint-Martin has in the past two decades been reappraised by Parisians, who now flock to its tree-lined banks, particularly come evening, to drink in some of the city's most creative bars. Two of the standard-bearers are Le Comptoir Général,a vast hidden maze of slick stylings and well-mixed cocktails, filled with plants and retro furniture; and Point Éphémère, a more industrial-feeling space hosting concerts, also by the water.
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When Baron Haussmann masterminded the clearance of many old districts of Paris in the mid-19th century, giving much of the capital its distinctive look, there was one quarter that largely escaped his attentions. Le Marais is almost a city within the city, and within its proudly unrationalised street plan you'll find great diversity: stately 17th-century mansions on Place des Vosges, popular falafel joints in the old Jewish quarter of Rue des Rosiers, traditional shops such as Mariage Frères tea merchants, inventive fashion boutiques, gay bars and jazz cafés.
La Villette has the sprawling lawns, river promenades and sausage stands of a top city park. Yet here in the crook of the Périphérique, you can also explore the giant mirrored ball-shaped building containing the city's science museum and planetarium. Come at any time of day to ride the carousel, catch a free concert at the Philharmonic or watch old-school cabaret. The dress code spans tuxedos to swimming trunks, for dipping in the canal basin. Squint and the scene resembles a painting by Georges Seurat.
The MAD, Paris's answer to the V&A, is surely one of the city's most underrated museums. Housed in a wing of the Louvre accessible from the Rue de Rivoli, the elegant building showcases a dazzling permanent collection of exhibits tracing the history of fashion, interiors, jewellery and more, with entire displays dedicated to one object — chairs or vases, for example — through the ages. The temporary exhibitions are always interesting, and lately have included displays dedicated to a single designer — Dior or Schiaparelli, say — and a retrospective on the birth of the department store.
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The eastern neighbourhood of Belleville is both the working-class Paris of Édith Piaf and home to communities that have come from all corners of the world. It's famous as the city's traditional Chinatown, and you can discover all the flavours it has to offer, including Tunisian wraps and pastries, on a 'street food and street art' tour led by a local resident. With bold wall designs and far-reaching hilltop views across Paris, Belleville's streets are away from the big tourist circuits, and some tours end at one of the city's finest green spaces: Parc des Buttes Chaumont.Attractions at the Louvre fall into two categories: the Mona Lisa, and everything else. If you're happy to focus on the latter, you'll have an enriching and often quiet experience at the world's most popular museum. Other icons include the Venus de Milo and the Egyptian Seated Scribe, but for even smaller crowds head for the second floor or the entire Richelieu wing, with its galleries of French sculpture, decorative arts and painting up to the Louis XV period.
Nobody's quite sure, but it's likely that the term 'flea market' (if not the concept) originated in Paris. The Marché aux Puces de Saint-Ouen, north of the city, is the world's largest such market, containing 2,500 shops in 15 sub-markets. It can be daunting, although less so when you're in a small group looking around on a weekend with a guide who knows how the place works. Tour guides will highlight the character and specialities of the different sections, and offer insider tips on how to get a bargain.
The Arc de Triomphe isn't just a splendid arch and war memorial: it's the linchpin of the 'axe historique,' the urban axis that extends more than five miles from the Tuileries Gardens, along the Champs-Élysées and past the modern arch of La Défense. It stands in the centre of Place Charles de Gaulle (aka L'Étoile), and once you've braved the underpass and queued to get up top, it provides clear lines of sight along the 12 radiating avenues — and the mesmerising spectacle of 12 influxes of traffic trying to navigate one circle.
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It's a pity the invention of the bicycle came too late to serve the royal court at Versailles: one suspects that Louis XVI, with his love of mechanical contraptions, would have been fascinated. But bikes are also particularly useful when getting around the 800-hectare gardens, first laid out for his great-great-great-grandfather, Louis XIV. A Versailles bike tour begins — after the train from Paris — in the town of Versailles with a farmers' market visit, and includes a tour inside the château (on foot) and a stop at Marie Antoinette's mock hamlet.
France may never have gone through American-style prohibition, but it did ban absinthe in 1915 — so it's not too much of a stretch to imagine a speakeasy when gathering in a historic vaulted cellar in Montmartre for an Airbnb workshop on the art of cocktails à la Française. Aspiring mixologists work with spirits selected for curiosity and rarity value, to follow three recipes and come up with one cocktail of their own. The 'green fairy' also makes an appearance, having been legalised again in 1988.
A visit to the Musée d'Orsay with kids in tow can be a mixed bag: Seurat's The Circus is full of life and motion, but the subdued colour palette of Whistler's Mother is likely to go over young heads, while Manet's Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe may prompt embarrassing questions. Help is at hand, though, with this family-friendly exploration of the majestic station-turned-museum, France's largest collection of art from the period 1848–1914. Even foot-draggers are likely to be inspired by the combination of tour and treasure hunt.
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The Bateaux Mouches and similar boats that ply the Seine are world famous; the Batobus is a little different. No commentary, no on-board restaurant, just uninterrupted views of Left Bank and Right Bank through the wraparound windows or from the small open deck at the back. This hop-on, hop-off service allows unlimited rides for 24 or 48 hours, with nine stopping points on its two-hour loop between the Eiffel Tower and Jardin des Plantes. Count off the bridges that pass overhead: Pont Neuf, Pont des Arts — 23 in all of Paris's 37.
Some say that Paris is best seen at an amble, like that of the flâneur walking nowhere in particular. The guides at Runrun Tours beg to differ. On routes of distances from a mile and a half to a half-marathon, they show Parisian treasures to groups at heightened heart rate, with everything from sunrise runs to night-time sprints under the city lights. Two of the tours involve challenges to work out the best route, and for history lovers there's a jog through the Latin Quarter that ends with an optional picnic in the Luxembourg Gardens.
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Auguste Rodin (1840–1917) was the genius sculptor of his age, bridging the gap between classicism and modern art. Although his works could be controversial in their time, they have been honoured since 1919 at the Musée Rodin, with the more central of its two sites housed in a mansion with grand gardens, on the same street as the French prime minister's residence. Alongside sketches and photographs, you'll find Rodin's greatest works in bronze and marble, including the harrowing The Burghers of Calais, and the self-explanatory The Thinker and The Kiss.
La Petite Ceinture ('The Small Belt') was a train line that encircled most of Paris's 20 arrondissements, until it closed to passengers in 1934, and was abandoned entirely in the 1990s. Today its future is up for debate: try to revive services, give it a visitor-friendly spruce-up like New York's High Line, leave it quietly to nature, or some combination of all three? For now, check the preservation association's website to find hidden walks along overgrown tracks in discrete sections, and bars, restaurants and cultural spaces in some of the old stations.
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Making a fashion pilgrimage in Paris doesn't necessarily mean the boutiques of the Golden Triangle or department stores such as Galeries Lafayette. Some of the most exciting finds are small independent brands in districts such as Le Marais — as you'll find when taking a fashion tour with Kasia Dietz. A handbag designer herself, she can arrange bespoke itineraries taking in anything from the city's best vintage shops to the big-name luxury labels. Along the way you can meet other local designers and gain insights into what makes up the elusive Parisian look.
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For cultural interest on a strict budget, the city's municipally run museums and art galleries are good news. With some exceptions (notably the Catacombs), permanent collections have free admission. The Musée Carnavalet covers Parisian history, and you'll also find 20th and 21st-century works at the Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris housed in the art deco-era Palais de Tokyo, mainly east Asian art at the Musée Cernuschi, and 18th-century interiors at the Musée Cognacq-Jay.
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There are few shows as famous as the one you'll see at the Moulin Rouge and fewer still that have remained on stage since the 1800s. Over 60 dancers and artists come together in this big-name Montmartre nightclub for Paris's headline act: a 90-minute show that's a flurry of feathers, sequins and risqué moves inside a grand ballroom. Be warned that lots of the acts are in French, but there are plenty of moments that won't need translating. You'll gasp with the rest of the audience as acrobats balance on top of wobbling towers of chairs, dancers dive into water tanks and the high kicks of the can-can begin. There are plenty of different packages available, some including dinner and drinks, and you may well share a table with good company — guests have included everyone from Elton John to Frank Sinatra.
France took an early lead in aviation, with the Montgolfier brothers launching manned hot-air balloon flights in 1783, and Sophie Blanchard later becoming 'official aeronaut' under Napoleon and the restored monarchy. It's fitting, then, that one of the world's largest capacity hot-air balloons should be in Paris. Permanently tethered at Parc André-Citroën in the southwest of the city, where it doubles as an air-pollution monitor, the Ballon de Paris Generali takes up to 30 passengers at a time (weather permitting) for ten-minute rides that supply views over the city from 492ft (150m) above.
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Montmartre is Paris's most famous 'village within the city', but on the opposite side of the capital's clockface, in the 13th arrondissement, is another hilltop quarter of cobbled streets, barely known by outsiders: La Butte aux Cailles. It has no big sights like the Sacré-Coeur, but is ideal for unhurried wanderings among art nouveau houses with pocket gardens, neighbourhood bistros and plentiful street art. You'll also find one of the city's best public pools, the Piscine de la Butte aux Cailles, with two outdoor pools and a splendid 1920s indoor one.
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La Seine à Vélo's cycle route is waymarked from Notre-Dame ('kilometre zero') to Le Havre, but you don't have to pedal far to reach gorgeous impressionist landscapes. Hire a Vélib cycle-share and join the Seine path in Chatou. Glide past posh villas, mansard-roof manors, fruit orchards and weekend fishermen — as calm and captivating a scene as Pissarro and Daubigny captured 150 years ago. If it's summer, break for lunch outside Poissy at Guinguette des Villennes with a view to the willow-draped river.
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Additional reporting by Lucy Perrin, Rory Goulding and Ellen Himelfarb
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