Granada tourist attractions

The Nasrid palace city on the Sabika hill is the reason most people come to Granada. The Nasrid Palaces run from the Comares tower to the Court of the Lions, where slender columns and carved plaster frame a marble fountain. The Alcazaba keeps the oldest walls and the widest view, the Palacio de Carlos V adds a round Renaissance courtyard, and a path leads to the Generalife, the summer palace whose terraces of water channels look back at the whole complex. Slots for the palaces fill weeks ahead in high season.

Style: Nasrid, with a Renaissance palace by Pedro Machuca · Heritage: UNESCO World Heritage Site, listed 1984

Location: Calle Real de la Alhambra, Sabika hill

Access: Timed entry; the open precinct is free · Tickets and tours

Granada's oldest square opens at the foot of the Alhambra hill, on ground where the Darro river still runs unseen beneath the paving. Tapas terraces spread across it below the Renaissance front of the Real Chancillería, the old royal court of appeal, with the church of Santa Ana closing the eastern end. The square works as the hinge of the old city: Carrera del Darro leads off towards Sacromonte, Cuesta de Gomérez climbs into the Alhambra woods, and the flat centre begins a few steps west. Nights are loud with terrace chatter, while early morning leaves it quiet enough for an unhurried look up at the hillside.

Location: Between Calle Reyes Católicos and Carrera del Darro, historic centre

Access: Free public square, open at any hour

Narrow lanes behind the cathedral mark where the Nasrid silk exchange once traded, a walled bazaar that kept its own gates and guards. Fire destroyed the medieval quarter in the 19th century, and what stands today is a romantic rebuild: horseshoe arches, carved plasterwork and passages barely two people wide, now hung with lamps, marquetry boxes, ceramics and leather. Plaza de Bib-Rambla opens at the southern end, Corral del Carbón waits a couple of minutes east, and the cathedral wall rises behind the stalls. Shops shutter through the afternoon lull, so weekday mornings are the calmest time to browse.

Location: Calle Alcaicería, behind Granada Cathedral

Access: Free to walk; individual shops keep their own hours

The terrace beside the church of San Nicolás holds Granada's defining view: the red towers of the Alhambra along the ridge opposite, the Generalife gardens above them and, on clear days, the Sierra Nevada snowline behind. Guitarists, students and tea shops crowd the low wall at sunset, when the walls turn copper and the square fills to its edges. Mid-morning brings the same panorama with room to stand, and the climb through the whitewashed lanes of the Albaicín is half the pleasure. Nothing here is gated or timed, and the viewpoint stays open long after dark.

Location: Plaza de San Nicolás, upper Albaicín

Access: Free public viewpoint, open at all hours

Five naves rise inside the cathedral the Catholic Monarchs raised over the city's main mosque, a Renaissance interior of white stone and enormous piers. Light falls through tall stained glass into the Capilla Mayor, a circular sanctuary ringed by columns and hung with paintings of the Virgin, while the sacristy museum keeps Golden Age canvases, silver and vestments. Outside, the main front faces Plaza de las Pasiegas in three deep arches, a design that broke with every cathedral facade before it. Cultural visits run through the year and pause for services.

Architect: Alonso Cano (main facade) · Style: Renaissance

Location: Plaza de las Pasiegas, historic centre

Access: Ticketed cultural visit, paused during worship · Tickets and tours

Granada's only surviving Nasrid caravanserai stands a few steps from the cathedral quarter, behind a horseshoe gateway carved with Arabic inscription. Merchants once stored goods on the ground floor and slept in the galleries stacked around the brick courtyard, and after 1492 the building served as a coal yard, a playhouse and a tenement before restoration returned it close to its original shape. The courtyard is small, quiet and free of stalls, an unhurried pause between the Alcaicería and Plaza Isabel la Católica, with an exhibition room opening off one side.

Style: Nasrid · Heritage: Bien de Interés Cultural

Location: Calle Mariana Pineda, off Calle Reyes Católicos

Access: Ticketed as one of the Andalusi Monuments, free on Sundays

Ferdinand and Isabella chose burial in the city whose conquest in 1492 ended Muslim rule in Iberia, and their marble tombs lie behind a monumental iron screen beside the cathedral. Their daughter Joanna and her husband Philip the Handsome rest alongside, while the crypt below holds the plain lead coffins that actually contain them. The sacristy museum keeps Isabella's Flemish paintings, her crown and Ferdinand's sword, and a gilded Renaissance retable towers over the altar. Cameras stay in bags here: photography and video are not allowed inside.

Style: Isabelline Gothic

Location: Calle Oficios, beside Granada Cathedral

Access: Ticketed; closed Good Friday, 25 December and 1 January · Tickets and tours

Granada's old Moorish quarter climbs the hill facing the Alhambra in a maze of whitewashed lanes, blind walls and carmen gardens hidden behind their gates. The street plan barely changed after 1492, which is why UNESCO added the district to the Alhambra's World Heritage listing in 1994. Cobbled cuestas link small squares, cisterns and the garden terrace of the Mezquita Mayor, while Carrera del Darro runs below past the brick vaults of El Bañuelo. There is no route to follow and no ticket to buy: the pleasure lies in losing the thread and finding another viewpoint.

Heritage: UNESCO World Heritage Site, listed 1994

Location: Hillside north of Carrera del Darro

Access: Free to wander at any hour

Look closely at the older walls inside the Alhambra and paler slabs show among the brick and rubble, several carved with Arabic script and Nasrid ornament. They are gravestones. After the surrender of 1492 and the revolt that followed it, the crown took over the Muslim cemeteries of Granada, and their carved markers were reused as ordinary building material in later repairs to the fortress. A number sit in walls near the Puerta del Vino, the gate opening onto the Plaza de los Aljibes, and the Alhambra Museum in the Palacio de Carlos V gathers Nasrid stonework of the same kind.

Location: Puerta del Vino, Calle Real de la Alhambra

Access: Free in the open precinct of the Alhambra; the Nasrid Palaces, Alcazaba and Generalife need a timed ticket

The Catholic Monarchs founded this monastery in 1492, and its Renaissance church became the burial place of Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba, the Great Captain who won Naples for Spain. Frescoes cover the vaults above his tomb, and a carved retable fills the apse from floor to ceiling with painted saints, warriors and trophies. Two cloisters open off the church, the main one lined with orange trees and the smaller Empress's Cloister behind it, and both rank among the finest in the city. Tourist visits stop while services are held in the church.

Style: Renaissance

Location: Calle Gran Capitán, university quarter

Access: Ticketed; cloisters, common rooms and church