Champ de Mars

What it is

The Champ de Mars is a parade ground that became a lawn, and the Eiffel Tower stands at one end of it.

It runs through the 7th arrondissement from the tower at the north-west to the École Militaire at the south-east. The site was made when the École Militaire was built in 1765: the ground was levelled, ringed with a ditch and planted with a long avenue of elms, as an esplanade for drilling soldiers.

The name is Latin — the field of Mars, the god of war — and it was accurate.

It is now a public park, and the largest open green space in central Paris that is not a formal garden.

Checked 2026-08-23 · Source

What's inside

Grass, gravel walks and the most photographed view in France.

What is here is mostly what happened here. The first hydrogen balloon went up from this ground on 27 August 1783. The first Bastille Day, the Fête de la Fédération, was held here on 14 July 1790, and the massacre followed on 17 July 1791. The Festival of the Supreme Being was staged here on 8 June 1794.

Five Expositions Universelles used the field — 1867, 1878, 1889, 1900 and 1937 — and the Eiffel Tower is what the 1889 one left behind.

The 2024 Olympics put the Eiffel Tower Stadium on the field for beach volleyball and blind football, with the Grand Palais Éphémère at the south end.

Checked 2026-08-23 · Source

How long to spend

Half an hour, and it is the best half hour near the Eiffel Tower.

The lawns face the tower directly, which makes this the place people sit for an hour with something to eat. Nobody queues for a lawn.

Walking the full length from the tower to the École Militaire takes fifteen minutes and gives the tower shrinking behind you, which is the only way to feel how large the thing actually is.

The Trocadéro across the river is the other free viewpoint and is twenty minutes away over the Pont d'Iéna.

Checked 2026-08-23 · Source

Season and crowds

Early morning for the empty lawns, or the hour before sunset for the tower.

This is where people come to watch the Eiffel Tower's hourly illumination after dark, and it is crowded but not unpleasantly so — the field is large enough to absorb it.

The Eiffel Tower takes around seven million visitors a year and all of them cross this ground, so the north-west end is busy from mid-morning; the École Militaire end almost never is.

There is no shade on the central lawns.

Checked 2026-08-23 · Source

Tickets

Free. It is a public park.

The Eiffel Tower at the north-west end is ticketed by level and by lift or stairs; the figure shown on the tower's own page is the one currently published.

The École Militaire at the south-east end is a working military academy and is not open to visitors.

Checked 2026-08-23 · Source

Getting there

The 7th arrondissement, between the Eiffel Tower and the École Militaire.

École Militaire on Métro line 8 is at the south-east end and is the quiet arrival. Champ de Mars–Tour Eiffel on RER C and La Motte-Picquet–Grenelle on lines 6, 8 and 10 both serve the sides.

The Métro runs 16 lines across 321 stations, with stations 548 m apart on average — a two-stop journey is usually faster walked.

Checked 2026-08-23 · Source

What to watch out for

The end nearest the Eiffel Tower carries the same street operations as the tower itself: the petition clipboard, the string bracelet, the three-cup game. They do not work the far end.

Sections of the lawn are fenced for restoration in rotation and the fencing moves.

Events close large parts of the field for days at a time, with hoarding.

There is no shade on the central lawns and limited drinking water.

Sitting on the grass is allowed where it is not fenced, which is the opposite of the rule in most formal Paris gardens.

The park is open at night and is much emptier and darker at the École Militaire end.

Checked 2026-08-23 · Source

Photography

The tower from the middle of the field, with lawn in the foreground, is the standard shot and it is better in the morning, when the sun is behind the photographer rather than behind the tower.

From the far south-east end near the École Militaire, a longer lens compresses the avenue and puts the tower at the end of a corridor of trees. Almost nobody walks that far.

For the tower's structure rather than its silhouette, stand under the four legs at the north-west end and shoot straight up.

The hourly night illumination is photographable from anywhere on the field; commercial use of images of the lit tower is restricted, which does not affect personal photographs.

Checked 2026-08-23 · Source

Where it is

• 1 hour

  5 min walk · Paris 7e Arrondissement

  Le Jules Verne

  • Notable
  • Restaurant or café
• 2 hours

  5 min walk · Paris 7e Arrondissement

  Eiffel Tower

  • Must see · Heritage site
  • Historic monument
• 1 hour

  5 min walk · Paris 7e Arrondissement

  Immeuble de la Société théosophique

  • High · Heritage site
  • Art and culture venue

External links

• View on Wikidata