City guide · Netherlands

🇳🇱Amsterdam

More than 100 km of canal runs through Amsterdam, and the three that shape a visit — Herengracht, Keizersgracht, Prinsengracht — were dug in the seventeenth century as concentric half-circles around the medieval core. That belt, the Grachtengordel, went onto the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2010, and it is why the city reads as a set of rings rather than as a grid. The municipality covers 219.32 km² and held 946,447 people in May 2026, with 1,496,215 in the urban area. The museums are not inside the rings: Museumplein and the Vondelpark lie beyond them, as do Jordaan and de Pijp, which is usually where a second day goes.