Delhi
Delhi is two cities with one name, the Mughal walled city of Old Delhi and the wide colonial grid of New Delhi, with three UNESCO sites, a metro that makes it navigable and air that is a medical question in winter. Two or three nights, not on the first day off a long flight, and Old Delhi on foot with a guide.
Delhi in a nutshell
Delhi: what to expect
This is what 60,000+ planned stops in India on Stippl say about Delhi.
Two nights in Delhi, three with the full monument day, and the Old Delhi lanes come first. A guided walk through Chandni Chowk, the spice market and the Jama Masjid lanes at food-tour pace is what every guide ranks above the monuments, Humayun's Tomb is the Persian-plan mausoleum the Taj was modelled on, the Red Fort is a walled city in itself, Qutub Minar is the tallest brick minaret anywhere with the iron pillar that has never rusted, and Akshardham is the largest Hindu temple complex in the world. Most travellers give Delhi 2 nights on Stippl.
Nearly half of Indian trips start in Delhi, and the numbers say the capital is the door rather than the room. The capital opens 48.9% of the 6,230 trips carrying it of the trips it appears on, of everyone who plans it on Stippl, and sits on 44.77% of N of all Indian trips, because the airport is the main gateway and the Golden Triangle starts here, and 10.37% of stops are no night at all, the layover between the flight and the train.
Sleep in Karol Bagh or Connaught Place for a first visit, buy the metro tourist card and travel without a backpack, walk Old Delhi with a guide in the evening, and sequence the city outside November to January if the lungs are a question. Skip arriving jetlagged into Paharganj, since that is how people end up hating India, and skip the helpful stranger who says the hotel has closed, because that is the airport scam.
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Download the appWho Delhi is for
First-timers in India
The gateway and the start of the Golden Triangle, opening 48.9% of the 6,230 trips carrying it of the Stippl trips it appears on, with the metro making it navigable without a driver.
Food travellers
The whole classification for Delhi is culinary, and Old Delhi at food-tour pace is the argument, from the paranthe lane to the kebabs by the mosque.
History and architecture people
Three UNESCO sites, eight historic cities and a hundred and seventy-four scheduled monuments in one municipality.
Budget travellers
The cheapest beds and food of any major Indian city, and the metro to match at a couple of euros a day.
Transit travellers
10.37% of Stippl stops here are no night at all, the layover between the flight in and the train out, and the airport express makes it work.
Golden Triangle planners
Jaipur and Agra read at nearly twice their expected rate on Delhi trips on Stippl, because the circuit starts and ends here.
Maybe not for you: a first day off a long flight, since arriving jetlagged into Paharganj is how people end up hating India; and anyone with a respiratory condition in winter, because the air from November to January is a medical question.
The best time to visit Delhi
The cool season
November to February
Daily maxima in the twenties and nights down to eight, the season the city is booked and priced around, and the season its air is at its worst.
The hot season
March to June
Climbing from pleasant to forty, with the Red Fort, Qutub Minar and Humayun's Tomb open stone with almost no shade, so the gate at opening is the answer.
The monsoon
July to September
Two very wet months and one clearing one, with the year's cleanest air, its lowest prices and its emptiest monuments.
The smog window
November to January
A separate axis from the weather, when the burning season and the cold trap the air, and the deciding factor for anyone with lungs to protect.
- Most travellers give Delhi 2 nights on Stippl, and 41.99% of stops are a single night. One night with a food walk and one full day of monuments is a real, complete visit.
- 59.59% of trips start October to March (n = 3,637), against 54.61% for trips without Delhi of Delhi trips on Stippl start between October and March. The cool season is the season, and it is also when the air is at its worst, so February is the month that gets both right.
- The Sufi singing is every Thursday evening. Qawwali at the Nizamuddin shrine, devotional and at a working dargah rather than a performance, with the head covered and the shoes at the counter.
- Diwali turns the air toxic. The festival of lights in autumn brings the fireworks on top of the burning season, and the week after is the one to be elsewhere.
- Most travellers plan Delhi about 60 days ahead on Stippl, and 22.78% created ≤14 days ahead inside a fortnight. The e-visa takes days, and the city needs no other booking but the train out.
- Republic Day closes the centre. On 26 January the parade takes the ceremonial avenue, the security is at its heaviest and the alcohol sales stop, so the monuments wait a day.
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Things to do in Delhi
Photo by Shubham Sharma via Unsplash
Photo by Lalit Krishna via Unsplash
Photo by Aamir Ahmad via UnsplashOld Delhi on foot with a guide
Chandni Chowk, the spice market, Jama Masjid and the lanes between them, ideally at food-tour pace in the evening when the kebab stalls light.
Humayun's Tomb
The Persian-plan Mughal mausoleum the Taj was modelled on, in a walled garden, and the one to choose over the Taj if time is short.
The Red Fort
The Mughal citadel that was a walled city in itself, with the audience halls and the marble pavilions inside, and the audio guide for the empty rooms.
Qutub Minar
A seventy-two-metre brick minaret begun in the twelfth century and the tallest of its kind anywhere, in a complex with the iron pillar that has never rusted.
Akshardham
A Hindu temple complex completed in 2005 and the largest in the world, with the evening water show, and nothing allowed inside including phones.
A dawn cycle through Nizamuddin
A guided ride through the old quarter before the traffic wakes, taking in the Sufi shrine and the restored gardens, and the only mode anyone recommends for it.
The neighbourhoods of Delhi
Paharganj
The backpacker strip
The hippie-trail strip opposite New Delhi railway station, gritty and cheap, with the hostels, the cafés and the touts in one street. For budgets and short stays.
The cheapest beds in the city and a walk to the train, but the harshest introduction to the country.
Karol Bagh
The first-timer's compromise
A busy market district between a railway and a metro line, local rather than touristed, with mid-range hotels and the metro to everything. For a first visit.
Well connected, cleaner and quieter than Paharganj, though nothing to see in the district itself.
Connaught Place
The colonnaded circle
The white colonnades at the centre of the colonial plan with the bars and restaurants multiplying and the best metro access in the city. For nightlife and transport.
The best metro access and the densest bar scene, at the rates of a central business district.
Lodi Colony
The art district
A quiet nineteen-forties colony that is now the country's first open-air public art district, with fifty murals and the Lodhi gardens next door. For a slow morning.
The murals and the gardens on the doorstep, but the traffic back to the old city.
Old Delhi
The Mughal walled city
Shahjahanabad, with the spice bazaars, the food lanes and the crumbling mansions at maximum density, walked rather than slept in. For sightseeing.
The Red Fort, the mosque and the lanes in one walk, and no reason to sleep in the noise.
New Delhi
The colonial grid
The British-planned capital of wide boulevards and government blocks, with the museums, India Gate and the Khan Market restaurants inside it. For museums and calm.
The museums and the calm, though the distances need the metro or a car.
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Where to stay in Delhi
Paharganj is the budget default and Karol Bagh the first-timer's compromise, with south Delhi and Lodi Colony where the quality is and where the traffic back to the sights is worst. Most travellers give Delhi 2 nights on Stippl, and the metro is what makes any of the districts work.
Paharganj
€8–25
Hostels and cheap guesthouses opposite the station, €5 to €30 a night.
Karol Bagh
€12–40
Mid-range hotels in the market district, €20 to €60 a night.
Connaught Place
€25–90
Business hotels and heritage chains around the circle, €40 to €150 a night.
Lodi Colony
€25–80
Boutique hotels and guesthouses in the colony, €50 to €120 a night.
Old Delhi
A handful of restored mansions, €30 to €90 a night, in the noise.
New Delhi
Five-star hotels on the boulevards, €90 to €300 a night.
What to eat in Delhi
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Delhi customs and what not to do
Shoes off, head covered
Most temples and every gurdwara and dargah require bare feet, with the head covered at Sikh and Muslim sites, and cloths lent at the door.
Photography is the charged part
Many temples ban it outright, the metro bans it underground, and the great mosque charges a camera fee enforced firmly on foreign visitors.
Shoulders and knees
The working rule for religious sites across the city, for men as well as women.
A langar is a real meal
The community kitchen at a gurdwara feeds thousands daily, and visitors walking through are guests in a working operation.
Staring is not aggression
Sustained staring at foreign visitors, particularly in Paharganj, is ordinary curiosity rather than a threat.
Do
- Buy the metro tourist card on arrival and travel without a backpack
- Walk Old Delhi with a guide, in the evening at food-tour pace
- Cover your head and go barefoot at the gurdwaras and the dargahs
- Sequence the city outside November to January if the lungs are a question
Don't
- Arrive jetlagged into Paharganj on the first night in India
- Believe the driver who says the hotel has closed; it is the airport scam
- Follow a helpful stranger to a tourist office near the station; the official one is the only one
What a Delhi trip costs
Budget
€18–30
A Paharganj bed or a hostel dorm, street food, the metro and shared rickshaws and two or three monuments.
Mid-range
€40–75
A Karol Bagh or Connaught Place hotel, sit-down restaurants, app cars and a guided Old Delhi walk.
High-end
€90+
A south Delhi or Lodi Colony design hotel, the restaurant belt and a car and driver for the day.
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Fun facts about Delhi
The Iron Pillar in Delhi's Qutub complex has stood 1,600 years without rusting. And why it has not is still argued over by materials scientists.
Qutub Minar in Delhi is the tallest brick minaret in the world at 72.5 metres. Begun in 1193 and finished in stages over the next century, and closed to climbing after a stampede.
Humayun's Tomb in Delhi is the prototype of the Taj Mahal, eighty years older. Its garden walls are each 99 metres long with eight gates, for the eight gates of paradise.
Delhi is one of very few capitals with three UNESCO World Heritage sites inside it. The Red Fort, Humayun's Tomb and the Qutub complex, in three different quarters.
Lodhi Art District in Delhi is India's first open-air public art gallery. More than fifty large murals across a nineteen-forties residential colony, walked in a morning.
Delhi opens 48.9% of the 6,230 trips carrying it of the Stippl trips it appears on. The door into the country, and 10.37% of its stops are the layover between the flight and the train.
Local tips for Delhi
The metro makes the city work
Ten colour-coded lines from five in the morning to half past eleven, and the tourist card is two prices because one of them is a refundable deposit.
Tickets are on the app now
Paper QR tickets have replaced tokens on most of the network and can be bought in the metro app, which removes the ticket-counter queue.
Every station has a scanner
Airport-style security with a bag check at every metro station, so the city is travelled without a backpack where possible.
The arrival is the scam
The pattern is a driver who says your hotel has closed or burned down and steers you elsewhere, and the answer is the pre-booked pickup or the airport express.
Fake tourist offices are next
Helpful strangers near Connaught Place and the station steer you to an unofficial office selling overpriced tours, and only the government office counts.
Two nights, and the door
41.99% of Stippl stops here are a single night and 31.8% of trips end here, because the airport is where India starts and finishes.
Delhi questions, answered
Two to three nights is what people plan and what the sights support: most travellers give Delhi 2 nights on Stippl, and one night with a food walk and one full day of monuments is a real, complete visit before the train to Agra or Jaipur.
It depends on the flight: arriving jetlagged into Paharganj is how people end up hating the country, and arriving rested into Karol Bagh with the metro card is fine. The capital opens 48.9% of the 6,230 trips carrying it of the trips it appears on, of everyone who plans it on Stippl, so most people do not get the choice.
In November, December and January, yes, for anyone with a respiratory condition or young children, and February, March, September and October buy the same city with cleaner air. Put the capital into Stippl at the end of a winter trip rather than the start, then ask people in subreddits like r/IndiaTravel how the air was the week they landed.
Both, on the same day if you like: they are ten minutes apart on the metro and the contrast is the point, with the Mughal lanes in the morning and the colonial boulevards and the museums in the afternoon. 59.59% of trips start October to March (n = 3,637), against 54.61% for trips without Delhi of Delhi trips on Stippl start between October and March, when the walking is bearable.
Yes, the courtyard and the minaret are open to visitors outside prayer times with the head covered and the shoes at the counter, and the prayer hall is not a place to wander. The camera fee is charged firmly to foreign visitors, and the view from the minaret is the old city from above.
The Old Delhi lanes, which every guide that ranks them puts first and the monuments second, walked with a guide at food-tour pace in the evening. Only 5.8% of Delhi trips on Stippl stop nowhere else in India, and the lanes are what the capital adds to the rest.
Every guide is written by the Stippl editors and checked against the trips our travellers actually plan. Spotted something out of date? Let us know.
Plan Delhi in Stippl
Day-by-day planning, stays and budget in one app, with every place from this guide already on the map.
Download the app