Two mosques seven minutes apart, each with its own rules. We plan the order, the tickets and the quiet hour.
A ticketed visitor entrance to the upper gallery, since January 2024
Free, and closed around the noon and afternoon prayers
The Blue Mosque opens to visitors at 2:30 pm
Hagia Sophia at opening time, every day of the week
There is no fixed itinerary. Tell us what you care about, and the route is built around it. The two mosques can fill a morning on their own or open a longer day.
Who is coming, and whether the mosaics, the tiles or the whole square matter most to you.
Around the Blue Mosque’s prayer closings and Hagia Sophia’s quiet hour. A written plan comes back within a day.
Tickets can be arranged with your day, and a car can collect you from your hotel and take you back.
At your hotel if you stay in Sultanahmet, with the morning already timed.
Start with Hagia Sophia at opening, see the Blue Mosque before it closes for the noon prayer, and walk the Hippodrome while the mosque is shut. On a Friday the order turns around, because the Blue Mosque lets visitors in only from 2:30 pm.
Visitors from abroad buy their tickets at the booth facing the Fountain of Ahmed III, then walk in through a tunnel and up a ramp under the south minaret. Before you go in, your guide tells you the building’s story, because inside, only the official audio may tell it.
A separate, ticketed visitor entrance since 15 January 2024, apart from the worshippers’ door.
Upstairs, the route passes through the marble Gate of Heaven and Hell to the Deesis in the middle of the south gallery and the Empress Zoe panel on its end wall, with the prayer hall below you. Bring earphones: the visitor area stays silent, and the official audio plays on your phone.
The official audio comes in 23 languages, and the booth sells headphones to anyone without a pair.
The main dome is in the most extensive restoration in the Turkish Republic’s history, with a temporary steel roof above it and a platform beneath for the mosaic work. Expect scaffolding in your photographs, and a controlled flow of visitors at the doors.
The mosque stays open to worship and visitors throughout the restoration.
Seven minutes across Sultanahmet Square, the Blue Mosque asks you to dress for prayer in the courtyard as well as inside. If you are not, a booth at the door lends you what you need, and you hand it back there.
Open 8:30 am to 5 pm from 1 October to 31 March and to 7 pm in summer, last entry 30 minutes before closing.
Shoes come off at the door, voices stay low, and visitors keep to their own area, apart from the space for prayer. Look up: more than 21,000 tiles from İznik and Kütahya, lit through six rows of windows.
Shut to visitors around the noon and afternoon prayers, from half an hour before each call; no strollers inside.
While the mosque closes for the noon prayer, the Hippodrome beside it stays open to the sky. The obelisk from Egypt and the Serpent Column from Apollo’s temple at Delphi still mark the centre line of the old chariot track.
Begun under the Roman emperor Septimius Severus; the German Fountain was added in 1901.
Hagia Sophia sells visitors a ticket to its gallery and asks for silence inside. The Blue Mosque is free but shuts its doors around prayer, and on Friday mornings.
Opening time is Hagia Sophia’s quietest hour on every day of the week, by Google’s visit data. Weekday afternoons stay under two thirds of the week’s peak, and weekend afternoons come close to it.
| Day | 9am | 10 | 11 | 12pm | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6pm |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mon | 26 | 39 | 49 | 56 | 61 | 63 | 64 | 60 | 51 | 40 |
| Tue | 24 | 36 | 47 | 55 | 60 | 61 | 61 | 58 | 49 | 38 |
| Wed | 24 | 36 | 48 | 56 | 62 | 64 | 64 | 59 | 49 | 38 |
| Thu | 24 | 37 | 48 | 56 | 61 | 62 | 63 | 60 | 52 | 41 |
| Fri | 31 | 47 | 66 | 89 | 100 | 95 | 87 | 77 | 63 | 49 |
| Sat | 34 | 54 | 71 | 84 | 93 | 96 | 96 | 91 | 80 | 64 |
| Sun | 26 | 41 | 56 | 70 | 81 | 87 | 90 | 87 | 76 | 59 |
So we start at opening whenever your day allows, and keep weekend afternoons for the Hippodrome, the bazaars or the water.
Ask for any of them by name when you write, or see all our guides.
Mosaics and icons
An art historian of Christian iconography, she reads a mosaic, a dome and a saint cycle with you.
She studied English Literature at Boğaziçi University.
Byzantine layers
Licensed since 2011, with an MA in Art History, she reads the Byzantine city beneath the Ottoman one.
She guides in English and Spanish.
Sultanahmet
An engineer by training, he works Sultanahmet as one of his main areas, Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque included.
He guides in English.
Licensed guides, TÜRSAB member #7651Guiding Istanbul since 2011145 Google reviews rated 5.0560 TripAdvisor reviews rated 4.8No. Since 15 January 2024, Istanbul’s Directorate of Foundations has allowed no guide narration of any kind inside Hagia Sophia’s visitor area, which must stay silent. Visitors hear the official audio on their own phones and earphones, and a licensed guide tells the building’s story outside, before and after.
Yes. Entry to the Blue Mosque in Istanbul is free, by its own visitor guide, and the mosque sells no tickets. Websites offering “Blue Mosque tickets” are selling guided tours. Hagia Sophia, across the square, is ticketed for visitors from abroad.
See both if you can: they stand about seven minutes apart on foot across Istanbul’s Sultanahmet Square. Hagia Sophia, dedicated in 537, keeps Byzantine mosaics in its upper gallery. The Blue Mosque, finished in 1617, is a working Ottoman mosque lined with more than 21,000 tiles. With time for one, choose Hagia Sophia for the mosaics and the Blue Mosque for the tiles.
Yes. Hagia Sophia in Istanbul has been a mosque again since 24 July 2020, and visitors from abroad enter through their own ticketed entrance to the upper gallery, while the ground floor is kept for prayer. Istanbul’s deputy mufti puts the number of visitors since 2020 at more than 30 million.
Yes. Hagia Sophia in Istanbul divides its doors by purpose, not by faith: Turkish citizens coming to pray use the worship entrance, and visitors use the ticketed visitor entrance to the gallery, where the Christian mosaics are.
Yes, long jeans are fine. The Blue Mosque in Istanbul asks visitors to dress for prayer in the courtyard as well as inside: shoulders and knees covered, and a headscarf for women. Under its own rules, a booth at the entrance lends clothing to anyone who needs it.
The Blue Mosque in Istanbul closes to visitors from 30 minutes before the noon and afternoon calls to prayer until 15 minutes after each prayer ends. On Fridays, visits start at 2:30 pm. From 1 October to 31 March it closes to visitors at 5 pm.
At opening time, on every day of the week, by Google’s visit data for Hagia Sophia in Istanbul. Weekday afternoons are busier, and Saturday and Sunday afternoons are among the busiest hours of the week.
Yes. Hagia Sophia’s main dome in Istanbul is in the most extensive restoration in the Turkish Republic’s history, under a temporary steel roof with a platform inside for the mosaic work, and the eastern semi-dome comes next. The mosque stays open to worship and visitors throughout, with a controlled flow at the doors.
Tell us your date, your hotel or ship, who is coming and what you want to see. There is nothing to buy in advance. We reply within a day with a plan and the name of the guide who would lead it.
