Bali, without the guesswork
Honest guides to what is worth your time on this island, and what is not. Written from Bali, with the opening hour that changes what you see and the caveats the booking pages leave out.
What Visit Bali Guide is
Most Bali guides are a listicle recycled from other listicles, or a booking page wearing a guide's clothes. This one is written to be useful the week before you fly and the morning you set out.
Written from the island
Opening hours, access rules and what a place actually looks like when you get there, checked on the ground rather than copied from another guide.
A verdict, not a listicle
Every guide says who a place suits and who should skip it. Some of the most famous sights on Bali get a qualified no, and we say why.
Orders of magnitude, never fake precision
Prices on Bali move. You get a realistic range and what it covers, not a figure invented two years ago and never checked again.
Funded by bookings, not by coverage
When a tour is genuinely the easier option we link to it, and we earn a commission at no cost to you. What we recommend does not change because of it, and free things stay free here.
Start with one of these
Four parts of the island, each with a hub that says what deserves your time and detailed guides underneath it.
Six worth the drive
Temples
Bali has over ten thousand temples and about six worth planning a day around. Which ones, what the dress code really means, and how to combine them without spending the day in a car.
Read the guide
Where you can swim
Waterfalls
Three of the best sit within twenty minutes of each other east of Ubud. The order that works, where the water is actually clean, and the one whose light only appears at midday.
Read the guide
The base that works
Ubud
The cultural centre of the island and its worst traffic. How long to stay, what to be careful of, and why staying here saves you two hours of driving a day.
Read the guide
Worth it, with caveats
Nusa Penida
Spectacular cliffs, bad roads and a day that is mostly transfers. Whether it earns the trip, why swimming is banned at the famous beaches, and the one thing here that beats its photographs.
Read the guideTwo decisions before anything else
When to come, and how to split the days you have. Get these two right and the rest of the trip mostly falls into place.
Rain, crowds and price, month by month
These three do not move together, and that gap is where the good months hide. The driest weeks are the most expensive and the most crowded, and the emptiest weeks are the wettest. Pick the month you are looking at.
April, Start of the dry season
Rain
Mixed
Drying out fast, occasional heavy afternoons
Crowds
Quiet
Still low, the high season has not started
What you pay
Low
Shoulder rates, well below June to September
Sea state, which decides the boat days: Settling, crossings run normally most days
The best value month of the year and the one most people overlook. The island is still soaked green from the wet season, the falls still run hard, the sea has calmed enough for the islands, and neither the crowds nor the prices have arrived. If you can choose your month freely, choose this one.
Best use of this month: Manta rays at Nusa PenidaDays, split across the island
Tell it how long you have and what you came for. It splits the trip across the parts of Bali that are actually worth basing yourself in, and points at the guide for each one.
How many days on the island
What the trip is for
You want the island's greatest hits without spending the week in a car, and you have not decided yet whether you are a beach person or a rice terrace person.
Ten days is the number at which Bali stops feeling like a series of transfers. Three bases become reasonable, and you can afford one day that goes wrong without it costing you a headline sight.
2
days
The south coast
Canggu, Seminyak, Uluwatu or Sanur
Where you land, where the surf is, and where the sunsets and the food scene live. It is also the flattest, busiest and least Balinese looking part of the island, which is why very few good trips are spent entirely here. One or two days at the start recovers the flight, and one at the end puts you close to the airport.
3
days
Ubud and the terraces
Ubud, ideally outside the centre
The cultural middle of the island and the practical middle of the map. Sleeping here removes about two hours of driving a day from everything in the interior, and the town itself takes a full day on foot before you have driven anywhere.
Ubud guide · Tegallalang rice terrace · Campuhan Ridge Walk · Ubud Palace
1
day
The waterfall belt, east of Ubud
Day trips from Ubud
Three of the best falls on the island sit within twenty minutes of each other, which turns them into one genuine half day rather than three separate expeditions. Add the purification spring at Tirta Empul on the way back and the day is full.
Waterfalls guide · Tukad Cepung · Tibumana · Kanto Lampo · Tegenungan
1
day
East Bali
Day trips from Ubud, or a night in Sidemen or Amed
The mother temple on the flank of Agung, the Gates of Heaven above the clouds and the water palace in the rice fields all sit within an hour of each other. It is the longest driving day of a normal Bali trip and the one people most often say afterwards was worth it.
1
day
The lakes and the west
Day trip from Ubud, or a night at Bedugul or Munduk
The highland lakes are a different climate: cool, misty and green in a way the coast never is. The lake temple at Beratan is the photograph everyone has seen, and the royal temple at Mengwi on the way back is the quietest good temple on the island.
Ulun Danu Beratan · Taman Ayun · All the temples worth the drive
2
days
Nusa Penida and the islands
A night on the island, or a long day trip from Sanur
The cliffs are genuinely spectacular and the day is genuinely mostly transfers. Sleeping one night turns a punishing day trip into a good two days, and it is the only way to be at the famous viewpoints without a hundred other people. The manta rays are the part that beats its own photographs.
That is 6 blocks, several of which are day trips from a base you are already sleeping in rather than a move. Each actual change of hotel costs roughly half a day once you count packing, checking out, the drive and checking in again, so aim for two or three bases across the whole trip and run the rest as days out.
When a tour is simply the easier option
Not for everything. But a driver for a day removes the parking, the navigation and the heat, and costs little more than two scooters once you count fuel and entrance parking at each site.
One driver, one day, four sights
Free cancellationDay tours and activities across Bali
- ✓Hotel pickup, which removes the parking problem at every site on this site
- ✓Temples, terraces and waterfalls combine into one day instead of three
- ✓The pre dawn departures, which are the only version of a sunrise trek worth doing
- ✓Free cancellation on most listings if the sea or the sky turns
Affiliate link. Booking through GetYourGuide costs you nothing extra and supports the guide. Prices are indicative and vary by option and season.
Or start with one question
The things people actually arrive wondering about, answered in full on the page behind each one.
Snorkelling with manta rays
No certification needed, and there is no manta season to plan around.
The Gates of Heaven, and the mirror
There is no lake. Here is how the photograph is actually made.
The waterfall inside a canyon
The only site on Bali where arriving at sunrise is a mistake.
Do you have to pay at Tegallalang?
You pay at the gate, and then again on the way down.
How the purification ritual works
The order of the spouts, and the two you skip.
The best free thing in Ubud
Two kilometres along a ridge, if you can find where it starts.
Plan it properly
Every guide here says what a place is really like, what it costs, and the hour of the morning that changes what you see. Start with the part of the island you are least sure about.