Sydney travel guide

Top 10 sights in Sydney

Ranked by Wikipedia language editions — proven fame.

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   1© No machine-readable author provided. Roybb95~commonswiki assumed (based on copyr · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Sydney Opera House

   A performing arts centre whose roof of interlocking shells was won in a 1957 competition by an unknown Dane and finished in 1973, ten years late and fourteen times over budget. Over a million tiles cover it; it became World Heritage in 2007.

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   2© Sardaka · CC BY-SA 4.0

   Sydney Tower

   An observation and telecommunications tower of three hundred and nine metres, the tallest structure in Sydney, opened in 1981. Besides the enclosed deck it runs a glass-floored walkway outside the building, harnessed.

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   3© J Bar at English Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Australian Museum

   Australia's oldest museum, founded in 1827, covering natural history and the cultures of the First Nations. Its collections were assembled while the continent's species were still being described for the first time.

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   4© Maksym Kozlenko · CC BY-SA 4.0

   Taronga Zoo

   A zoo opened in 1916 on a hillside at Mosman, reached by ferry and then a cable car up from the wharf. The enclosures face across the water, so the giraffes stand against the opera house and the bridge.

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   5© Siegfried Nugent (talk) · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Art Gallery of New South Wales

   The state gallery of New South Wales, founded in 1872 and free to enter, strongest on Australian painting and on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art. A second building, Naala Badu, opened alongside it in December 2022 and doubled the space.

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   6© Photograph by Greg O'Beirne · CC BY 2.5

   Museum of Contemporary Art Australia

   The contemporary art museum at Circular Quay, in the art deco building put up for the Maritime Services Board in the 1950s. Entry is free, and the rooftop café looks straight across the water at the Opera House, which is the real reason for the queue.

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   7© Pavel from Sydney, AU · CC BY 2.0

   Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney

   Thirty hectares on Farm Cove where the colony first tried, and failed, to grow crops in 1788; the garden was founded in 1816 and is the oldest scientific institution in Australia. Mrs Macquarie's Chair at its point frames the harbour's two landmarks in one shot.

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   8© J Bar · CC BY 3.0

   Auburn Gallipoli Mosque

   A mosque in the western suburb of Auburn, built in Ottoman style with two minarets by Sydney's Turkish community and completed in the 1990s. Several hundred worship daily and around two thousand at Friday prayers.

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   9© The original uploader was XLerate at English Wikipedia. · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park

   A park of nearly fifteen thousand hectares on the northern edge of Sydney, between the Hawkesbury river and Pittwater. It holds hundreds of Aboriginal rock engravings, some of them on open sandstone platforms above the water.

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    10© Diego Delso · CC BY-SA 3.0

    St Mary’s Cathedral

    The Catholic cathedral of Sydney, begun in sandstone in 1868 in the English Gothic manner, though its twin spires were only added in 2000. It stands at the edge of Hyde Park and is floodlit at night.

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   1© [www.flickr.com/photos/luke_reynolds/ luke_reynolds] · CC BY-SA 2.0

   Kings Cross

   A dense inner-eastern quarter that was Sydney's nightlife district for half a century, and its red-light one. Licensing laws imposed in 2014 emptied the strip; cafés and small bars have been filling it back since.

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   Manly Beach

   A surf beach on the ocean side of the northern peninsula, thirty minutes by ferry from Circular Quay, lined with Norfolk Island pines. Daylight sea bathing was effectively legalised here in 1902 after a local editor deliberately swam in front of the police.

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   3© Edmund Blacket · CC BY-SA 3.0

   St Andrew's Cathedral

   The oldest cathedral in Australia, consecrated in 1868 beside the town hall, and the seat of the Anglican archbishop of Sydney. Its choir school has sung here since the 1880s.

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   4© Jorge Láscar from Melbourne, Australia · CC BY 2.0

   Hyde Park

   Sixteen hectares in the middle of the city and the oldest public parkland in Australia, set aside in 1810. An avenue of Hills figs runs its length, the Archibald Fountain of 1932 stands at the north end and the Anzac Memorial closes the south.

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   The Domain

   Thirty-four hectares of open ground between the botanic garden and the city, kept clear since the first governor claimed it. It takes the summer outdoor concerts and, historically, the political rallies.

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   6© The original uploader was J Bar at English Wikipedia. · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Hyde Park Barracks

   A barracks designed in 1819 by Francis Greenway, himself transported for forgery, to house convict men who had until then slept where they could. It later held immigrant women and a court; it became World Heritage in 2010 as one of eleven Australian convict sites.

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   Australian National Maritime Museum

   The national maritime museum, on Darling Harbour, whose best exhibits are moored outside — a destroyer, a submarine and a replica of Cook's Endeavour, all of which can be boarded.

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   St James’ Church, Sydney

   The oldest church in the city, consecrated in 1824 and designed by the convict architect Francis Greenway in colonial Georgian. It stands with the Hyde Park Barracks and the Mint in the row of Macquarie Street buildings from the same decade.

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   9© Dnalyensid · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Lakemba Mosque

   The largest mosque in Australia, in the southwestern suburb of Lakemba, run by the Lebanese Muslim Association. Its Ramadan night market draws tens of thousands from across the city each evening.

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    10© Moatazayman · CC BY-SA 4.0

    Sea Life Sydney Aquarium

    Aquarium in Sydney at Darling Harbour, opened in 1988, with tunnels under the tanks. It keeps dugongs and a reconstruction of the Great Barrier Reef.

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