New Town Hall

What it is

The Neues Rathaus fills the whole north side of Marienplatz and is a working building rather than a monument: the mayor, the city council and part of Munich's administration sit here, and the city counts more than 600 staff across roughly 400 rooms. Its neo-Gothic front reads as medieval and is not. Georg von Hauberrisser, twenty-five years old when he won the competition, built it in three phases across nearly forty years, 1867 to 1874, 1889 to 1892 and 1898 to 1905, taking his model from the town halls of Flanders. The keystone went onto the tower in December 1905 and the last offices were occupied by the end of 1906. The complex is an irregular quadrilateral of 9,159 square metres with frontages of 98.5 metres on Marienplatz, 85 on Dienerstrasse, 111 on Landschaftstrasse and 86 on Weinstrasse. Two things bring visitors: the Rathaus-Glockenspiel in the tower, which plays daily at 11am and noon and, from March through October, again at 5pm, and costs nothing to watch from the square; and the viewing gallery on the 85-metre tower, reached by lift and sold in twenty-minute slots from 7 euros.

Checked 2026-08-26 · Source

What's inside

Six courtyards sit inside the block, and one of them, the Prunkhof, is open to anyone through the tower portal on Marienplatz or the Weinstrasse entrance. Its floor mosaic is a large labyrinth; the Staircase of the Ages on the west side runs from a small boy to a bent old man; at the door of the former cash hall a stone dog wags at people bringing money into the city coffers while a pug opposite growls at those taking it out. That cash hall is now the Rathausgalerie, 245 square metres under a glass roof carried on twenty granite columns and pillars, an exhibition space since 1979. The Law Library is the other reason to walk in: nearly ten metres high, 120 square metres, with gilded wrought-iron spiral staircases and balustrades in Munich's floral Art Nouveau, designed by Hauberrisser as a deliberate contrast to the Gothic around it, and open to the public. The Grand Council Chamber, where the plenary sessions run, is dominated by Karl von Piloty's Monachia, over fifteen metres wide, 128 figures from 700 years of the city, back in place since 2004. Small shops line the ground-floor arcades all the way round; the Ratskeller in the basement is currently closed.

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How long to spend

An hour covers this place properly, and the hour splits into three unequal parts. The tower visit is the only fixed one: the city sells it in twenty-minute time slots with a maximum of thirty people on the platform at once, so the platform itself is twenty minutes, plus the two lift rides and the walk to the meeting point on the fourth floor. The Glockenspiel is the unpredictable part. The city publishes the start times but not a running time, so this guide does not give one; what the city does say is to arrive a few minutes early in peak season if a clear view of the tower matters, and on a July morning at 10.55 that is optimistic advice. Fifteen minutes for the show and the standing about is a safe allowance. The Prunkhof, the labyrinth mosaic and the Law Library take ten to fifteen minutes at a walking pace. A visitor who wants the council chambers, the Monachia and the interiors needs a different budget entirely: the guided tours run 90 to 120 minutes and run only Friday to Sunday, so they are a separate decision rather than an extension of a casual visit.

Checked 2026-08-26

Season and crowds

The building's timetable is really the Glockenspiel's. It plays every day at 11am and noon, and from March through October at 5pm as well. There is also a night performance every evening at 9pm, when the night watchman and the angel appear and the Münchner Kindl is put to bed to Wagner's Meistersinger watchman's call and Brahms's lullaby; the city notes that this one is quieter and less well known than the midday shows, which makes it the pick for anyone who dislikes a packed square. On Good Friday the Glockenspiel stays silent all day. Marienplatz fills fast around the midday times, worst in the morning and in the school holidays, so the March-to-October 5pm slot is the compromise: still daylight, thinner crowd, and it sits neatly beside a walk to the Viktualienmarkt. The tower is open all year, daily from 10am to 8pm, with the last ascent at 7:40pm, so a late-afternoon Glockenspiel and a tower slot afterwards fit together in one visit. Winter is the cheaper time for a clear view of the Alps from the platform; the city only promises the Alps on a clear day, and does not promise how many of those there are.

Checked 2026-08-26 · Source

Tickets

Most of what a visitor does here is free. Watching the Glockenspiel from Marienplatz costs nothing, and so do the Prunkhof, the arcades and the Law Library. The tower is the charged part: tickets start at 7 euros for a twenty-minute time slot, bought online, which skips the queue, or in person at the Tourist Information inside the Rathaus arcades during its own opening hours. Cancellation is free up to 24 hours before the booked ascent. Reduced tickets are only valid with proof; visitors with a disability pay the reduced price, and where the pass carries a B, one companion rides the tower free. The city's page states the tower price as "from 7 euros" and does not publish the full adult, child and reduced table on the page itself — that sits in the booking system, which could not be read on the day this guide was checked, so no other figure is given here. Guided tours of the interiors are run by Munich Tourism and start at 28 euros a head, with discounts including children; they go on Fridays at 6pm, Saturdays at 10:30am, 11:30am and 3:30pm, and Sundays at 11:30am and 1:30pm, and the meeting point is the Tourist Information in front of the building on Marienplatz, about ten minutes before the start.

Checked 2026-08-26 · Source

Getting there

The address is Marienplatz 8, 80331 Munich, and the building is its own landmark: the main entrance opens straight onto the square. Every S-Bahn trunk line stops at Marienplatz, as do the U3 and U6, and bus 132 serves the same stop. From the Hauptbahnhof it is a few minutes by S-Bahn or U-Bahn, or a walk of about fifteen to twenty minutes through the pedestrianised centre. Do not drive. The Rathaus stands inside the pedestrian zone and the city's own page says plainly that arriving by car is not worth it; a visitor with a car is better off leaving it at a park-and-ride and taking the S-Bahn in. For step-free arrival there are six accessible parking spaces nearby, four of them on Dienerstrasse. Coming in on the S-Bahn from the direction of the Hauptbahnhof, get out towards the left of the train for the lift. Once on the square, the tower entrance is not the ceremonial portal it looks like from outside: the first tower lift is in the passageway leading through to the Prunkhof, and the meeting point for a booked slot is on the fourth floor, where the second lift starts.

Checked 2026-08-26 · Source

What to watch out for

Backpacks and larger bags are not allowed on the tower at all; they go to the attendant at the entrance, which costs time a twenty-minute slot does not have. The last ascent is at 7:40pm, not 8pm, so arriving at ten to eight means the tower is closed even though the published closing time has not passed. The tower is shut on 1 January, 6 January, Shrove Tuesday, 1 May, 1 November, 25 December and 26 December — three of those fall in the weeks visitors are most likely to be in Munich. The Glockenspiel is silent all day on Good Friday, and the city warns that maintenance, technical work or events on Marienplatz can change the schedule without much notice. Accessibility is genuinely mixed: the council chambers, the Grütznerstube and the Ratstrinkstube are step-free by lift, but the tower route is only partly accessible, with ramps at 21 per cent to the first lift and 24 per cent onto the platform, and a narrowest point up there of 75 centimetres. The Ratskeller in the basement is closed. The mayor's office can only be seen on the annual open house day, not on a normal visit or on the standard tour.

Checked 2026-08-26 · Source

Photography

For the Glockenspiel, the mistake is standing directly under the tower, where the figures are foreshortened into nothing. The city's own advice is to keep back — mid-square, or slightly over towards the Mariensäule — and that is right: from there the two levels of the mechanism, the jousting knights above and the coopers below, sit in one frame with the tower under them. A long lens earns its place here more than anywhere else in central Munich, because the figures are up at roof height. Look up before queueing for the lift and the tower clock is worth a frame of its own; its dial is a mosaic, restored by the city's works department in 2025 with a 57-metre lifting platform parked on the square to do it. From the platform at 85 metres, with the Münchner Kindl above, the Frauenkirche, Alter Peter, the Altes Rathaus and the Theatinerkirche are all below the horizon line, and the twenty-minute slot means choosing directions rather than working round slowly. The one shot not available from up here is the Rathaus itself: for that, cross to Alter Peter opposite and climb its stairs, which the city recommends for exactly this reason.

Checked 2026-08-26 · Source

Where it is

• 1 hr 30 min

  2 min walk

  Spielzeugmuseum

  • High
  • Museum
• 30 min

  2 min walk

  St. Peter's Church

  • Must see · Heritage site
  • Place of worship
• 30 min

  3 min walk

  Frauenkirche

  • Must see · Heritage site
  • Place of worship

External links

• View on Wikidata