Derinkuyu Underground City, Cappadocia

Derinkuyu Underground City tickets and opening hours

Foreign visitors pay about €13 at the gate. Turkey now prices its main museums for foreigners in euros, but the Ministry of Culture page does not list Derinkuyu’s fare, so we mark the figure as “verifying”. Cards are accepted, and lira usually are too, at the day’s rate.

The site is open every day from 8:00 to 18:00, and the ticket office closes at 17:15. There is an official e-ticket, but the queue at the gate is rarely more than a few minutes, so buying ahead is optional.

Planning the Göreme Open-Air Museum, Ihlara Valley and Kaymaklı too? Do the maths on the Museum Pass Cappadocia — it covers Derinkuyu and pays off after three or four paid sites. For Derinkuyu alone it is not worth it.

Is Derinkuyu Underground City worth visiting?

Yes, if it is your first time in Cappadocia. Nothing else explains so well how people survived here for centuries, and you feel the depth in your legs on the way back up. It is also one of the few sights in the region that works just as well in rain, summer heat or snow.

Skip it if tight spaces make you anxious, or if you have already done Kaymaklı — a second underground city feels like a repeat. And don’t expect to roam a whole city: only around a tenth is open, the route follows arrows, and at midday it can be crowded.

Who built Derinkuyu, and why?

The city is cut into volcanic tuff beneath the modern town of Derinkuyu in Nevşehir province. Tuff is soft when you carve it and hardens in the air, so people could dig deep with almost no supports. The first rooms may date from the Phrygians in the 8th–7th centuries BC; it grew into a real city under the Byzantines.

During Arab raids, roughly from 780 to 1180, locals retreated underground with their animals and food, sealing the passages from inside with rolling stone doors. It was still used until 1923, when Cappadocia’s Greek Orthodox Christians left in the population exchange. Then it was forgotten, until a resident knocked through a basement wall in 1963. Visitors have been allowed in since 1965.

What to see inside

• Stables near the entrance — animals lived on the upper levels, keeping their smell and warmth away from the families below.
• Kitchens, a winery and a room for boiling pekmez (grape molasses); the kitchens seem to have been shared between families.
• Rolling stone doors — round, man-sized slabs rolled out of a niche to block a passage from inside.
• The ventilation shaft, 55 metres deep, which brought air to every level and doubled as a well.
• The barrel-vaulted hall on the second level, thought by some to have been a religious school.
• The church on the lowest level — the deepest point of the route, at the end of a long, steep staircase.
• The start of the tunnel towards Kaymaklı — only the first stretch is visible; the rest is sealed.

Derinkuyu vs Kaymaklı: which underground city?

They are built the same way, and the second one in a row rarely surprises. Pick one: depth at Derinkuyu, comfort at Kaymaklı.

Cappadocia’s historic sites compared

Every historic site in Cappadocia rated by YesGo. Tap a column heading to sort.

How to do it right

• One underground city per trip is enough — choose Derinkuyu or Kaymaklı; the second feels like a rerun.
• Pair it with a walk in Ihlara Valley, about an hour further along the same road south.
• The signs inside are brief. Join a tour or read “What to see inside” before you go, or much of it will be just tunnels.
• Follow the arrows: side passages are closed, and walking against the flow on the stairs is the main way to get stuck.
• Don’t eat down there — there are no bins and the air is already heavier than at the surface.
• Use your phone’s night mode rather than flash: in a narrow tunnel the flash dazzles you and everyone behind.

Questions