Pick one palace. That's my advice if you've got a single free afternoon in Seoul, and I know it sounds stingy. On a map the five Joseon palaces look like neighbors (Gyeongbokgung, Changdeokgung, Changgyeonggung, Deoksugung and Gyeonghuigung), so it's tempting to think you'll knock out all five before dinner. Your feet will vote against that by about 3 p.m. One palace, maybe two if you skip lunch. That's the real number for most people.
So which one? "It depends" is a lazy thing to read on a travel blog, so here's my straight answer up front. Never been to Seoul before? Gyeongbokgung. Hate crowds and love trees? Changdeokgung. Only free after dinner? Deoksugung. Now the details.
Quick facts
- Closed days: Gyeongbokgung on Tuesdays, Changdeokgung and Deoksugung on Mondays
- Admission: Gyeongbokgung and Changdeokgung 3,000 won, Deoksugung 1,000 won
- Deoksugung and Changgyeonggung stay open until 9 p.m.
- Secret Garden: guided visit only, extra 5,000 won
- Royal Palace Pass: 10,000 won, valid six months, hanbok wearers enter free
First, check the day of the week
This is the boring part that ruins plans. Gyeongbokgung closes on Tuesdays (Jongmyo Shrine too). Changdeokgung, Deoksugung and Changgyeonggung close on Mondays. So there's never a day when all of them are shut, which is nice, but there's also no day when you can wander in anywhere without checking. One wrinkle: if a public holiday lands on a closing day, the palace stays open and closes on the next regular day instead. Koreans get caught by this too, so don't feel bad.
And if you're reading this right now, early October is a pretty good window. The fall K-Royal Culture Festival runs October 7 to 11, 2026, at the four main palaces plus Jongmyo, and Hangul Day falls on Friday the 9th. Lovely atmosphere. Not so lovely if you were hoping for an empty courtyard.
Gyeongbokgung, the one on every postcard
If it's your first trip, go here. Nobody in Seoul is going to argue with you on that one. Joseon kings built it back in 1395 as their main palace, and it is big. Really big. (King Sejong, the guy who gave us the Korean alphabet, ran the country from here, so it has some bragging rights.) You come in through Gwanghwamun gate, cross a couple of courtyards to Geunjeongjeon (the throne hall, see those little stone markers in rows? officials stood by them according to rank), and then you keep walking, and walking, until there's Gyeonghoeru floating on its pond. That pond shot is basically the national screensaver.
A little honesty, though. Much of what you're looking at is rebuilt. Fire took it in 1592 when Japan invaded. It stayed a ruin for ages. King Gojong's court rebuilt it in the 1860s, and then during the colonial years a lot of it got knocked down again. They've been putting it back together since 1990 and they're still at it. Some visitors feel a bit cheated when they learn this. I'd call it a very ambitious repair job that's still in progress, which is kind of a Korean specialty anyway.
Okay, money and hours. It's 3,000 won for an adult. In September and October the gates open at 9 and close at 6, though they stop letting people in at 5. Want the guards? The changing ceremony at Gwanghwamun happens at 10 and again at 2, around twenty minutes each time. Big drums, very bright costumes, and a forest of phones held up over everybody's head. Getting there's easy: orange Line 3, Gyeongbokgung Station, Exit 5. You pop up basically at the wall.
The catch? Crowds. Tour buses unloading, kids on school trips, somebody doing a hanbok photo shoot in every single doorway. Get there at 9 if you can drag yourself out of bed. By midday it gets loud.
Changdeokgung and the Secret Garden
This is my favorite, and I suspect plenty of Seoul people my age would say the same if you asked. Changdeokgung doesn't line everything up on one grand straight axis. Its halls kind of follow the slope and tuck in wherever the hill lets them, and UNESCO liked that enough to list it in 1997. You get the sense that somebody actually lived here, had bad days here, argued about dinner here.
Fall color inside the Secret Garden at Changdeokgung. Photo: Julie / Unsplash
Same 3,000 won to get in. Don't go on a Monday. Anguk Station, Exit 3, then a short walk.
Then there's the Secret Garden, Huwon. You can't just stroll in. You go with a guide, at a set time, and you pay another 5,000 won on top of the palace ticket for the privilege. English groups leave at 10:30, 11:30, 2:30 and 3:30 (that's the March to November schedule; winter has fewer). Only 100 people per group. Half the spots go online, half get sold at the gate on the day. Show up late and that's it, no entry, no refund, and the guide will not wait for you. Harsh? A bit. But in late autumn, with the maples going red around the ponds, it's worth setting an alarm for.
Deoksugung, for when you only have an evening
Deoksugung is the small one right across from Seoul City Hall (City Hall Station, Lines 1 and 2). Tickets cost 1,000 won. You can't buy a decent latte around City Hall for that. Mondays it's shut. Every other day, though? Open till 9 at night (get in by 8). If your day is all meetings or shopping, this is the palace that waits for you.
It's also the odd one. Next to the traditional halls sits Seokjojeon, a Western-style stone building that looks like it wandered over from a European bank district. Going inside needs a reservation, so don't assume your palace ticket covers it. Out front at Daehanmun gate there's a guard changing ceremony at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. (no Mondays). After that, walk the stone-wall road along the palace, Deoksugung doldam-gil. Office workers use it as a lunch-break escape and honestly, they're onto something.
Changgyeonggung, by the way, also stays open until 9 p.m. and has an old glass greenhouse that looks great after dark. Worth knowing if you're near Changdeokgung, since the two sit side by side.
Hanbok, the pass and festival week
Wear a hanbok and you get in free at all the palaces. The rule is you need a proper top (jeogori) and a bottom, either a skirt or pants. Modern hanbok counts. A jeogori thrown over jeans doesn't. Anyone 18 or under gets in free, so do people 65 and up, and on the last Wednesday of every month everybody does.
There's also a combo ticket, the Royal Palace Pass, for 10,000 won. It gets you into all four big palaces plus Jongmyo. It's valid for six months and you can buy it at any of those ticket offices. The Secret Garden? Not on it. Sorry. Quick math, though. Two of the 3,000-won palaces already add up to 6,000, so unless you're doing three places or more, you're just buying a nice piece of paper.
Festival week has extras. On the nights of the 9th and 10th (7 to 9 p.m.) Gyeongbokgung hosts a hanbok banquet program after dark. Changdeokgung opens a special exhibition inside Huijeongdang hall. Over at Jongmyo, gatekeepers in old uniforms march a patrol from the 9th through the 11th. There's a stamp tour across the sites too. And the evening before it all kicks off, October 6 at 5 p.m., KBS is putting on a special Immortal Songs concert at Gyeongbokgung. So if you see a stage and a lot of folding chairs near the gate that day, that's why.
Official info
Opening days, hours and festival programs can change, so check before you go (details as of October 6, 2026).
- Royal Palaces and Tombs Center: opening hours and regular closing days (Korean)
- K-Royal Culture Festival official site (Korean, English available)
More from this blog:
- Korea's October Long Weekend 2026: What Locals Actually Do
- Hangul Day in Korea (October 9): Why an Alphabet Gets Its Own National Holiday
Which one would you pick?
Top photo: Gyeonghoeru pavilion at Gyeongbokgung on a clear winter day. Photo: Fili Santillán / Unsplash
Comments