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If you plan on traveling around Turkey for a couple weeks, you might want to invest in the Museum Pass Türkiye.
Is the Museum Pass Türkiye Worth It?
For 4000₺ (as of November 2023), you can visit every site in the country run by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism for 15 days. The pass is available for purchase at most tourist sites. To get your money’s worth, you need to make sure some of the biggest sites in Turkey are on your itinerary. At the very least, you’ll be able to save time by skipping some potentially long lines at ticket booths. Visit the official website for more info.
I’ve purchased the Museum Pass Türkiye on two separate trips and had mixed results. My first time buying the pass, it paid for itself probably three times over. I visited Istanbul, Cappadocia, Edirne, Bursa, Ephesus, Hierapolis-Pamukkale, Izmir, Bodrum, and Marmaris.
The second time, the price increase was so high, triple what I paid the previous year, that I pretty much broke even. I visited Ephesus, Datça, and some of the lesser known sites near Fethiye before spending a week in Istanbul.
The best way to figure out if the Museum Pass Türkiye is worth it for you it’s to do a little research before your trip. Head to the Ministry of Culture and Tourism website and add up the admissions for the places you want to visit. If the number comes close to the price of the card, it’s worth getting.
Where to Go
Obviously, there are lots of combinations of places to visit in Turkey. Here’s a suggestion:
If you plan on starting in Istanbul, visit Topkapi Palace and run through a few museums. That should cover about half the value of the pass and will take about three or four days without rushing yourself.
From there, you can head down to Ephesus and see all the sites in the area. That should get you close to the value of the pass. Once you hit other major attractions such as Pamukkale and Cappadocia, the Museum Pass Türkiye will have paid for itself.
