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The Blue Mosque with its six minarets and cascading domes in warm evening light 8 more photos
Photo: Moonik / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0, resized

Culture · Istanbul · Fatih

Blue Mosque (Sultan Ahmed Mosque)

Sultanahmet Camii

The six-minaret mosque facing Hagia Sophia, named for the blue İznik tiles that line its upper walls.

  • Hours not verified Check on site before you go
  • Visit ~30–45 min
  • Museum Pass

Directions See it on the Istanbul map

Build a day-by-day plan with closing-day warnings and ticket totals.

What to see

Completed in the early seventeenth century for Sultan Ahmed I, the mosque closes the view at the southern end of Sultanahmet Square. Inside, thousands of hand-painted tiles, stained-glass windows and four enormous columns carry the domes.

A visit takes 30 to 45 minutes. Visitors enter through a separate door, remove their shoes and follow the mosque dress code; the building closes to tourists around prayer times, especially at Friday midday prayers.

Come in the first hours of the morning for the quietest visit, and go back to the square after dark when the minarets are lit.

Getting there

The mosque is on Sultanahmet Square, next to the Sultanahmet stop of the T1 tram line.

Transport lines are general directions, not checked against the operator's timetable.

Nearest rail & tram stops

  • T1 Sultanahmet in Turkish Tram stop ~300 m~6 min walk (estimate)
  • Marmaray Sirkeci in Turkish Suburban rail station ~950 m~16 min walk (estimate)

Straight-line distance; the walking time adds a rough allowance for detours. Stops on operating lines only (OpenStreetMap, via ilçemde, our sister directory); station pages open on ilçemde and show what is around each station (in Turkish — names, phone numbers and map work in any language).

Open in OpenStreetMap See it on the Istanbul map

Watch

  • Istanbul Blue Mosque - Amazing Sultanahmet Walking Tour 4K

    A&D Travelogue · Watch on YouTube (new tab) ↗

Videos by independent creators on YouTube; we don't endorse tours or offers in them. The player loads from youtube-nocookie.com only when you press play.

Nearby

Open now near me →

Eat & drink nearby

Restaurants

Cafés

  • Turkish Street Cafe Café · ~250 m (straight line) 5.0 on Yandex (31 reviews)
  • North Art Coffee Coffee shop · ~200 m (straight line) 4.8 on Yandex (63 reviews)
  • Cafe Restourant Café · ~200 m (straight line) 4.8 on Yandex (34 reviews)
  • Meşale Cafe Café · ~150 m (straight line) 4.2 on Yandex (190 reviews)
  • Coffee No. 4 Coffee shop · ~450 m (straight line) 5.0 on Yandex (120 reviews)

Bakeries

Listings from ilçemde, our sister directory; ratings from the map service shown. We don't rank by payment. Nearer places come first (within 300 m, then 700 m), then ratings weighted by how many reviews they have. Opening hours can change; “Open now” uses Istanbul time.

Also in this area

Straight-line distances.

Where to stay nearby

Fatih has 493 places to stay licensed by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism (Ministry list, counted on ilçemde on 30 Sep 2026).

Hotels and guesthouses in Fatih ↗

Places to stay in Sultanahmet ↗

How we rank: Nearby Ministry-licensed places first (matched to the Ministry of Culture and Tourism list), then other places by distance band (within 5 km, 15 km, 40 km; straight line) and public map ratings and review counts. A licensed place never jumps ahead of a closer band. Places more than 25 km away in another town are shown only when there are few options nearby. No business pays to be listed. A high score from a handful of reviews counts for less than a slightly lower score from hundreds. Ratings and counts come from ilçemde's data (source shown on each card, checked 1 Oct 2026); read the reviews themselves on the map services.

Accommodation lists open on ilçemde, our sister directory of Turkish businesses (new tab). We do not take bookings or commissions.

Pharmacies on duty tonight in Fatih ↗ The list changes every day; on-duty pharmacies stay open when the others are closed.

About this page

Location: Wikidata Q80541 (P625). Ticket, hours and closing days: only from the operator's own pages; anything we could not confirm there is marked “Not verified”. Last checked 30 Sep 2026.