Visiting Auschwitz is unlike any other travel experience – and while it may not be as “fun” as other activities one may partake in while traveling, it’s incredibly enriching.

If you happen to find yourself in Krakow, this former Nazi concentration and extermination camp lies right outside the city. This sobering yet essential look into the atrocities of the Holocaust is one everyone should experience, with plenty of different ways to see it.

I’ve gone ahead and reviewed the 5 top Auschwitz tours from Krakow available, focusing on respect, education, and deep immersion. Let’s get started!

Best Tours of Auschwitz From Krakow

	Day Trip to Auschwitz-Birkenau and Wieliczka Salt Mine from Krakow including Lunch	Auschwitz-Birkenau Guided Tour with Private Transport from Kraków	Auschwitz Birkenau: Live-Guided Tour with Transportation and Hotel Pickup
Location:	Hotel pickup and drop-off included	Hotel pickup and drop-off included	Hotel pickup and drop-off included
Start:	7:00 AM	Between 7:00 AM & 1:00 PM	8:00 AM, 9:00 AM
Duration:	10 to 12 hours	6 to 8 hours	7 hours
Includes:	Door-to-door transportation (Free hotel Pick-up within Krakow city limits), Documentary movie, Lunch (depending on the option booked)	Air-conditioned vehicle, WiFi on board, Private transportation, Professional guide, Professional English-speaking driver	Local guide, professional art historian, transport by air-conditioned minivan, lunch
	Tour Information & Booking	Tour Information & Booking	Tour Information & Booking

Quick Answer: The 5 Best Rated Auschwitz Tours From Krakow For 2025

1. Day Trip to Auschwitz-Birkenau and Wieliczka Salt Mine from Krakow including Lunch
2. Auschwitz-Birkenau Guided Tour with Private Transport from Kraków
3. Auschwitz Birkenau: Live-Guided Tour with Transportation and Hotel Pickup
4. Auschwitz Birkenau: Complete Private Tour
5. Krakow to Auschwitz Birkenau and Salt Mine 1 Day Tour FREE ebook

Auschwitz from Krakow Tour Reviews

1. Day Trip to Auschwitz-Birkenau and Wieliczka Salt Mine from Krakow including Lunch

Whether you’re on a brief trip to Krakow or simply want to maximize your experience, this first tour does both quite nicely. The Day Trip to Auschwitz-Birkenau and Wieliczka Salt Mine from Krakow including Lunch excursion will surely change the way you see the planet and humanity.

If you want to fully grasp the weight of history and the resilience of the human spirit, this is a fantastic, well-curated offering I’d recommend to anyone.

Your tour starts off early in the morning with a convenient hotel pickup right from your lobby, with your guide escorting you to your comfortable, air-conditioned coach for the day. The ride out there was very smooth and scenic, with our guide offering an intriguing narration about the surrounding history and culture.

Our first destination was Auschwitz I, where upon arrival, we joined an English tour with the museum’s guide, which was knowledgeable and a good way to get acquainted with the area.

Next, we were transferred to the infamous Auschwitz II-Birkenau, which was expectedly harrowing to see and learn about, though our guide was very respectful and educational above all. Nothing is sugar-coated in this place of reverence, though I think that that was exactly how it should be.

You can choose to have your box lunch here (chicken pasta salad, sandwiches), though our group opted to eat on the coach on the way to the salt mines, which saved us an hour or so!

The Wieliczka Salt Mine was incredible – it’s one of the oldest operating mines of its kind, and we went deep underground for a 2.5-hour tour through the different chambers and labyrinth of paths.

It was crazy to see this other-worldly place, complete with salt carvings and statues – while this entire day is indeed long with a lot of walking involved, I can’t recommend it enough.

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100% refund for cancellations within 24 hours of tour experience

2. Auschwitz-Birkenau Guided Tour with Private Transport from Kraków

Perhaps you’re looking for a shorter tour or would like to leave the salt mines out and simply focus on seeing Auschwitz. Whatever the case may be, go in-depth with the Auschwitz-Birkenau Guided Tour with Private Transport from Krakow.

This tour lasts anywhere from 6 to 8 hours and has everything perfectly planned out in a seamless, educational look into this notorious place. Just a heads up – this tour definitely isn’t one that you go on for laughs or pure pleasure – it’s an unedited confrontation with history that really shows you humanity at its worst.

However, this tour is done right – without distractions, logistical hassles, and the time and space to really process what you’re witnessing. Your day starts out in the morning with a convenient pickup right from your hotel lobby; as it’s completely private transport, it’ll be just you, your guide, and the rest of your party.

Our driver was absolutely brilliant and shared an easy-to-follow historical and cultural narration during our journey to Auschwitz, and helped us with everything from entry tickets to our box lunch of sandwiches afterward.

As if that weren’t enough, our coach had onboard wifi and was super comfortable throughout the trip – so much so that I found myself falling asleep at times against my own will!

Once at Auschwitz, we had a fantastic guide take us through the haunting buildings and barracks, sharing thorough facts and stories, as well as how they related back to overall European history.This was a much more in-depth tour, where we got to see Auschwitz I (main camp), Birkenau, and Auschwitz III, the work camp.

While they each have their place in a horrifying history, Birkenau is definitely the one present in most media, as it was the concentration camp. Be prepared for a very powerful, emotional experience that you certainly won’t regret, but will always stay with you.

More Information & Tour Booking

100% refund for cancellations within 24 hours of tour experience

3. Auschwitz Birkenau: Live-Guided Tour with Transportation and Hotel Pickup

Next up, is the Auschwitz Birkenau: Live-Guided Tour with Transportation and Hotel Pickup, which is an experience every traveler should take. Whether you’re a WWII history buff or are simply curious about what really occurred here and why, you can expect a day filled with important information and shocking scenery.

This is one of the most sobering trips one could take – you shouldn’t have to worry about the logistics of getting there and touring. Your 7-hour tour starts off in Krakow, where your guide will pick you up in your air-conditioned minivan right from your hotel.

The minivan sat around 8 people and was spacious enough that I was quite comfortable the entire time. The only small complaint I did have was that we organized our pickup time a few days before and our guide ended up having to pick us up a couple of hours earlier; not anything crazy but still.

Upon arrival, our driver helped us with entry tickets and got us situated with an English-speaking group who were friendly and engaging. Standing beneath the infamous Arbeit Macht Frei gate was simply astonishing – there are no words for the effort it takes to really wrap your mind around this place being a reality.

The guide did a fantastic job of relaying the countless stories and historical facts of the area, walking us through the barracks where prisoners were stacked, execution walls, and even the gas chambers.

We took a well-deserved break for lunch and fueled up, then driving from Auschwitz to Birkenau to see the massive camp at a whopping 10 times larger than the first.

I felt like the tour was very well-structured but never rushed, which I appreciated, letting us have the space and time to really absorb what we were seeing and learning. While there is no real “closure”, it definitely offers a deep awareness into what humanity is capable of, and the importance of learning history.

More Information & Tour Booking

100% refund for cancellations within 24 hours of tour experience

4. Auschwitz Birkenau: Complete Private Tour

There are some places where you can just kind of skim over or see through a tour bus window, but this definitely isn’t one of them. You need to give Auschwitz the time and intimacy it demands in order to fully understand the weight of the atrocities that took place here.

The Auschwitz Birkenau: Complete Private Tour lets you experience this important place with the depth, respect, and gravity it deserves. While the small-group tours I covered here were quite nice, the fact that this one is a private tour does add something a bit special.

For one, you get your driver all to yourself, so you can ask all the questions you want without competing for attention. No chatter from strangers, no rigid group itinerary – there’s some more room for personalization and flexibility here.

Just like with the others, you can expect to be picked up right from your hotel in the morning and head out to Auschwitz with your driver sharing interesting historical information along the way.

Nothing your driver can really say will prepare you for stepping through the gates, standing on the same soil where over a million people perished. I appreciated the guides never dramatized the stories, though there’s no real need to – the truth is quite shocking enough.

You’ll move through Auschwitz I, then Birkenau, where the scale of horror is so vast it’s hard to comprehend – the personal stories were the hardest. Seeing the countless shoes left behind, the suitcases labeled with names, and the photographs of those imprisoned here go so much further beyond a history book or movie.

Our driver/guide was incredible, taking us to the quieter parts of Birkenau, showing us a couple railroad cars that took Jews to their death – still sitting there right on the tracks. The journey back to the hotel was a much quieter one, offering necessary reflection for a transformative experience.

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100% refund for cancellations within 24 hours of tour experience

5. Krakow to Auschwitz Birkenau and Salt Mine 1 Day Tour FREE ebook

I don’t think any introduction to Auschwitz is needed, nor do I need to explain why I believe everyone should pay a visit to this haunting place at least once. However, a lesser-known tourist site – the Wieliczka Salt Mines – dates back to the 13th century and is also worth visiting.

The Krakow to Auschwitz Birkenau and Salt Mine 1 Day Tour FREE ebook experience covers both in one seamless excursion, with professional, respectful guides there to lead the way. Your comprehensive day trip starts out by you being picked up by your air-conditioned coach in the morning, setting off first for Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum.

No worries about having to deal with renting cars and driving yourself – instead, listen to your guide’s educational commentary on WWII and what to expect once you arrive at the memorial site.

You’ll visit the 3 different camps within the complex, with an expert guide there to share larger stories about the state of the world during WWII but also plenty of personal stories of individual prisoners.

This was a group tour, but our group was small enough that it still felt respectful and “intimate”, with the opportunity to ask our guide questions as they came about.

You’ll see ruins of gas chambers and crematoria, along with belongings from countless prisoners, which almost feels too sad and brutal to be real. Afterward, we took a break to kind of soak in everything we just experienced and ate a filling lunch before making our way to Wieliczka Salt Mine.

The mines were a billion times more impressive than I could’ve ever imagined, with a history that extends all the way back to the 13th century, and that was once used by Nazis as an armament factory.

We got to see chapels, lakes, insane rock salt sculptures, and technology used over the centuries as our guide regaled us with fascinating storytelling. It was cool as I have asthma, to learn how the salt actually helps with the condition, and is quite healthy to breathe in, apparently!

More Information & Tour Booking

100% refund for cancellations within 24 hours of tour experience