Jewish Museum Berlin

Jewish Museum Berlin

Jewish Museum Berlin
4
Speciality MuseumsHistory Museums
10:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Monday
10:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Tuesday
10:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Wednesday
10:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Thursday
10:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Friday
10:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Saturday
10:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Sunday
10:00 AM - 6:00 PM
About
Since opening its doors in 2001, the Jewish Museums Berlin has joined the ranks of Europe’s leading museums. Its exhibitions, educational activities, and diverse program of events make the museum a vibrant center of reflection on Jewish history and culture as well as about migration and diversity in Germany. An architectural masterpiece, Daniel Libeskind’s spectacular structure has firmly established itself as one of Berlin’s most recognizable landmarks. The zinc-paneled building is innovative in the connection it creates between the museum’s topics and its architecture. Closing days 2018: 10 and 11 September 2018 (Rosh ha-Shanah) 19 September 2018 (Yom Kippur) 10 November 2018 (Anniversary Dinner) 24 December 2018 (Christmas Eve)
Duration: 2-3 hours
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The area
Address
Neighbourhood: Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg (Borough)
How to get there
  • Hallesches Tor • 8 min walk
  • Kochstraße • 8 min walk
Reach out directly
See what travellers are saying
  • Michael O
    Hertford, United Kingdom111 contributions
    5.0 of 5 bubbles
    Historical walk
    If you are interested in history then for £0 (free) this museum is worth its weight in gold. It will take you at least an hour to get around and there are activities along the way. Highlights: the iron mask floor (level 1) which you walk across, the staff are very polite and enjoy assisting. All in all a 10/10 Well worth the visit
    Visited October 2023
    Travelled solo
    Written 5 October 2023
  • Wander04032092245
    3 contributions
    3.0 of 5 bubbles
    Too busy to enjoy
    Way too busy, the descriptions of the exhibitions are written in sufficiently small font that only one or two people may read at a time. You spend most of the day just queueing to read descriptions. They also confiscate your jacket so visiting outside exhibits in the winter is very unpleasant.
    Visited January 2024
    Travelled with friends
    Written 2 January 2024
  • Rovers1875
    Accrington, United Kingdom30 contributions
    3.0 of 5 bubbles
    Disappointing - school trips must be really bored
    3 at the most Very strange. I appreciate some areas were meant to feel like a foreign in a foreign land but we couldn’t get to grips with this museum. Told take iPods. Why?!! Nothing to scan listen to. I asked staff in English, she was a bit off with me. Learnt nothing today. Glad it was free
    Visited February 2024
    Travelled with family
    Written 12 February 2024
  • helenandpaul13
    Worcester, United Kingdom1,682 contributions
    4.0 of 5 bubbles
    Displays a clear insight about what life was like as a Jew in Nazi occupied Germany
    We went here for the day and managed to walk it from the hotel, which took about an hour. It is well signposted and you can get there easy with a local map. Also, after you leave you can walk into the city and see more local sites. Although the museum has lots of interesting items I found the ear piece guide very hard to follow and often I was walking round the site without much guidance. Without the electronic guide it can be hard to capture where exactly you are. However, there are some lovely exhibits. The obelisks outside on the uneven floor are lovely give visitors a feeling of being lost without a clear way out. Upstairs there is a fabulous relic showing all the anti-Semitic laws created in Germany over about 15 years up to 1945, showing how the Jews were made exempt from society. There were probably over a thousand separate laws created during this time which gave visitors a clear insight about their experiences of German life after Hitler came to power. VERY POWERFUL EXHIBIT ON ITS OWN.
    Visited March 2024
    Travelled with family
    Written 11 March 2024
  • Dianne W
    Maidstone, United Kingdom38 contributions
    5.0 of 5 bubbles
    A moving and unforgettable experience
    This is an extraordinary and powerful museum, quite unlike any I've ever visited. The architecture is designed to keep the visitor off balance and disoriented to suggest the uneasy relationship the Jews have had in German society throughout the centuries. The displays are clear and well written, reinforced by the handheld audio/written guide. The wide tunnel where visitors literally walk on suffering faces is incredibly powerful. There is so much here that it takes most of the day. Thank goodness for the beautiful light and large conservatory restaurant.
    Visited March 2024
    Travelled with friends
    Written 23 March 2024
  • June A
    Surrey, United Kingdom2,754 contributions
    4.0 of 5 bubbles
    Interesting museum with very moving films
    I visited towards the end of my stay and found it quite an unusual and different Museum with interesting exhibits presented in quite a unique way. The films are very moving and for me really were the main attraction. The history I pretty much know having visited a myriad of Jewish Museums throughout Europe. It was free when I visited but I'm not sure if that's always the case.
    Visited May 2023
    Travelled solo
    Written 28 April 2024
  • Global793256
    Scottsdale, Arizona12 contributions
    5.0 of 5 bubbles
    Excellent & educational
    What an emotional experience. Very educational and time well spent at this museum visit. The photographs & stories really capture a time in history and human suffering, but there is also this feeling of human triumphs as well. A can’t miss museum in Berlin.
    Visited November 2023
    Travelled as a couple
    Written 1 May 2024
  • Alison L
    Bath, United Kingdom83 contributions
    5.0 of 5 bubbles
    Must visit!
    Possibly the most thoughtful building I have visited. The plan was to unsettle and confuse and it does this so well. On top of that, there is such a wealth of information about Jewish life and history, the diaspora and the holocaust and, luckily for me, widely presented in English too. Also interesting gardens - one peaceful, one deliberately less so. The cafe food was tasty, not the cheapest but the visit was free otherwise. This is absolutely on my must visit list!
    Visited June 2024
    Travelled as a couple
    Written 12 June 2024
  • RIchard035
    Northwood, United Kingdom1,342 contributions
    5.0 of 5 bubbles
    Vast free museum on the history of the Jews of Germany
    The Jewish Museum in Berlin is a 10-15 minute walk from the nearest train station. It is free to enter. It is a vast museum with many exhibits and collections including Judaica and a history of the Jews in Germany. Particularly poignant was the section describing the restrictions placed on Jews during the lead up to the holocaust. You could easily spend many hours in the museum.
    Visited April 2024
    Travelled with family
    Written 17 June 2024
  • sheepygold
    5,508 contributions
    3.0 of 5 bubbles
    Interesting exhibits. The unusual building is very difficult to get around.
    This museum has some very interesting exhibits and everything is clearly explained in English. The problem for me was the building. The architecture is very unusual and certainly of interest but the issue is finding your way around especially if you can't manage the vast number of stairs. It's as if someone has said to the architect - design the most unusual building you can - and then thought let's make it a museum. We found the exhibitions very hard to navigate and find where they began and ended. There is also a huge amount of wasted space and following the floor plan is a challenge.
    Visited June 2024
    Travelled as a couple
    Written 19 June 2024
These reviews are the subjective opinion of Tripadvisor members and not of TripAdvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews.

Most Recent: Reviews ordered by most recent publish date in descending order.

Detailed Reviews: Reviews ordered by recency and descriptiveness of user-identified themes such as waiting time, length of visit, general tips, and location information.

Popular mentions

4.0
4.0 of 5 bubbles4,581 reviews
Excellent
2,434
Very good
1,083
Average
558
Poor
267
Terrible
240

Moko988
Cork, Ireland30 contributions
1.0 of 5 bubbles
Jan 2020 • Couples
First of all, I don't have any satisfaction in giving one star but I feel it's my duty to warn people what to expect here. We knew that museum will lack access to some sections as they were reconstructed and we were OK with it. However, the entrance fee is still the same and that is not fair to visitors in my honest opinion.

Having put that aside we decided to go in anyway as the subject is of great importance to human kind and we were eager to learn more of it.

We then had a very cold welcome by two female employees at reception. One assumed that we knew everything about procedure, security check etc. and was rolling her eyes on tiniest sign of our confusion about those things. Other one was extremely disinterested and was typing on her mobile phone the whole time just to turn her head at us to say: "You have your tickets, you can go!". I don't expect red carpet treatment but I do expect to be treated as a fellow citizen with manners of "please, thank you, you are welcome". Both of them failed at that, however the rest of the staff were at least professional.

Museum itself was just mostly empty space with very random almost artsy sections. Void room is the only thing worth mentioning as it is extremely powerful experience. The rest of it is really not worth mentioning and I am very sad to conclude that this museum is not worth visiting until they perhaps revamp it as it just looks like an insult to both Jewish people and visitors alike.
Written 25 January 2020
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

Pioneer577172
41 contributions
1.0 of 5 bubbles
Jan 2020
The Jewish museum of Berlin is a waste of money bordering on an insult. The building itself is beautifully architected, but it sort of stops there. Vast building with empty corridors with names of cities on the wall. Meaningless. They charge 8 EU but the main exhibition is being refurbished - so really a cheek. The exhibitions that are there are quite insulting to the memory of the Jews of Berlin who perished. Of course there are a few shows of silver and gold that were left behind or confiscated (a bit stereotypical and insulting). Very little mention of the real catastrophe faced, but a sort of skewed perspective. There is also a cafe with an insulting (and incorrected) account of kosher food. THe restiuarant is not kosher and defies kosher laws with unkosher meat served together with milk. The least respect they could show would be to provide a kosher restuarant. An odd outdoor area with several long crooked concrete columns to show the travails of exile, but very little for the next generation to understand why the exile and how few. A chimney shaped room to remind you of the experience of the gas chambers perhaps. Too awful to go in really. So a very disappointing and somewhat insulting experience. Not worth bothering.
Written 7 January 2020
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

Jo T
Sydney, Australia12 contributions
2.0 of 5 bubbles
Jan 2020 • Solo
I booked online and upon my arrival, was welcomed to the museum by staff telling me that 80% of the museum was unavailable. On that basis, I elected to not enter the museum and asked for a refund - only to be told that online purchases were non refundable. Feeling that I should try to get something worthwhile from the visit, I entered and downloaded the audio guide. The Axes visit was good, audio worthwhile but there really was nothing else in the museum of substance to appreciate.
Written 13 January 2020
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

oh_carolina_in wonderland
Frankfurt, Germany285 contributions
2.0 of 5 bubbles
Feb 2020 • Friends
We expected to get more Information on Holocaust or Jewish tradition. Focus of the museum was more on architecture and art of Jewish people. Simply nothing we were that much interested in.

You have to leave backpacks and coats in a wardrobe (it is free).
Written 11 February 2020
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

Robin K
1 contribution
2.0 of 5 bubbles
Jul 2023 • Couples
This is the most frustrating and confusing museum I've visited in my life, not because of the content but the way it's displayed. The content is actually interesting and impressive, which makes the difficulty of seeing it all the more frustrating.

After security, there is only one sign that says general entry is free and audioguides and special exhibitions have a (low) cost. There's a desk but it seems more for information and the lady there ignores us so we walk on. Next hallway has no signs so we walk into the cafe and garden before finding the stairs to the exhibit, where a guy tells us we need to go back to the entrance for a (free) ticket. Fine, but should've told us earlier. The lady gives us free tickets, but we still can't go in because bags need to be dropped. Once that's done we can finally enter, hoping to follow the Highlights tour on the app (free audioguide). The app recommends streaming audio but it starts in an underground concrete bunker, so I have to leave and return to the entrance to try and find the WiFi. I find it (good connection) and we can finally begin. At this point we passed security roughly 30 min ago.

I won't take you through everything from here, but I'll tell you, things don't get better or clearer. The audioguide tells us the museum is deliberately designed without any right corners, and most hallways look similar, so it's like a maze with interesting displays in it, but it's designed to make the most interesting parts the hardest to find. The guide contains a couple of 'tours' but it's simply a series of explainers without any connection, nor any guidance of where to go. I didn't make it to the 3rd entry before being completely lost, so I stopped trying to follow the tour and just put it in'stroll mode', listening to separate segments whenever something seemed interesting. This was hard to judge, and the most interesting parts seemed to not have any signs or explanation. Those best bits were also hidden in nooks and crannies without any signs.

After a short hour of trying to find something that was explained well, I gave up and left to read in the garden while my partner made her way through.

TLDR: fairly interesting collection, displayed by people who actively want to discourage you from seeing it.
Written 3 July 2023
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

Joanna C
London, UK99 contributions
1.0 of 5 bubbles
Apr 2022 • Friends
My friend and I were looking very forward to visiting this museum as it was something we feel very passionate about.

However after going through security (there is a bag scanner) and presenting our tickets, we were stopped and asked to leave our bags and jackets in the cloakroom. I had a very small backpack and a leather jacket, my friend had a medium sized shopper bag and a casual thin jacket. We asked why we had to leave our items as we had already been through security and we had our passports/money on us, so weren't keen to leave these in the cloakroom, especially after seeing lots of people in front of us go through with similar jackets and if not bigger bags !

We explained we had valuables on us, and the man said we could hold them which again we didn't feel comfortable with. We even offered for them to look in our bags which we shouldn't have had to do, and they still told us to leave them behind. Eventually the man said I could put my backpack on my front and take it through with me, BUT my friend still had to leave her bag in the cloakroom. I'd like to add at this point that my bag was bigger than my friend's, and I am white, whilst my friend is brown skinned (Asian). Everyone who was permitted with a bag in front of us was also white so we have no option to think that the staff were being prejudiced based on the colour of my friend's skin.

We decided not to go through with the visit and even asked again why this was a policy to the man on the door, who was incredibly rude to us and basically told us to take our complaints indoors.

We won't be visiting and if I could give 0 stars I would, purely for the rudeness of the staff and the fact that they could not explain to us why they let some people in with bags and others not (I.e. us). We were polite the whole time and only questioned their policy and they couldn't give us a reason. A real shame as I'm sure this does not reflect the museum itself.
Written 18 April 2022
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

Hillel G
9 contributions
1.0 of 5 bubbles
Jan 2020
As someone who studied history, and specifically Jewish history, I was almost ashamed at the quality of this museum. This is a museum attempting to be a modern art museum and failing spectacularly. The Holocaust memorial has very little in it, and the design below is given a lot of attention when it was deeply unimpressive. I'm not entirely sure why the artist is given so much credence. In terms of the other exhibits, it is mostly a collection of photos from Israel that do not even focus on the Jewish experience and was of the quality comparable to if you would hand a kid a fancy camera and let them take pictures of different places in Israel. For a museum that calls itself "the Jewish Museum of Berlin," there was very little Jewish content, very little content about Jews in Berlin (a subject that should have endless material) and for such an enormous building, such a waste. Highly disappointing to the point that I had to restrain myself from asking to speak with the curator to give them a piece of my mind.
Written 20 January 2020
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

Kmiotek C
Bridel, Luxembourg570 contributions
5.0 of 5 bubbles
Sept 2021 • Friends
Every few years I visit this place, not so much for the classic museum part but rather for the new addition by architect Liebeskind. This world renowned architect is every time able to impress and oppress me physically with his art of using concrete, iron, light, air and trees. From the voidness of the void of the holocaust to the garden of exile, uncertainty and hope. Worth the visit just for this basement.
Written 12 September 2021
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

Claudio
Rome, Italy27 contributions
5.0 of 5 bubbles
Sept 2020
Good and informative museum, starts with the basics of Jewish history and religion (which religiously-educated Jews like myself will find very boring), then shows some more modern history of Jewish life in Germany and then the Holocaust.

The museum is interesting and well designed for all kinds of visitors.

It is very similar to the Holocaust museum in Washington DC.
Written 28 September 2020
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

Poonam
London, UK117 contributions
3.0 of 5 bubbles
Mar 2020 • Couples
The Jewish museum wasn't quite what I was expecting, but it was a good surprise in some ways. Firstly the architectural structure of the building was very interesting, modern and smart! And there were several elements which were very symbolic. However, one thing my husband and I didn't like is that everything is down to your own interpretation - I want to know why this was built that way, or what the symbolism is behind it, I don't really want to have to figure it out myself! There wasn't a lot of 'history' rather a lot of memories and stories, which were very touching. Not sure if it was worth it as a paid for exhibition, but the building itself was really cool.
Written 26 March 2020
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.

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JEWISH MUSEUM BERLIN (2024) All You Need to Know BEFORE You Go (with Photos) - Tripadvisor

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