India · Delhi NCR
Plan your Delhi trip
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01Your itinerary
02Where to stay
Lodhi Colony, Jor Bagh and Sunder Nagar
Best for first-timers who want central without the noiseLow-rise, tree-lined, quiet central South Delhi around Lodhi Gardens and the Habitat Centre. Embassies, bungalows, good bakeries and the shortest walk in the city to a Mughal-era park. Expensive, and the most restful base Delhi offers.
The Claridges New Delhi
Waking up beside the tombs and being in the park before 7am is the single best hour Delhi has, and you cannot manufacture it from anywhere else.
€€€€Jorbagh BnB
Metro on the doorstep, Khan Market a ten-minute walk, and residential quiet at night — a rare combination this close to the centre.
€€€Hauz Khas and Green Park
Best for second visits, longer stays, and eating well every nightSouth Delhi's going-out district: the medieval reservoir and madrasa ruins on one side, a lane of rooftop bars and boutiques on the other, and the wider residential streets of Green Park and Gulmohar Park around it. Loud at the village end, entirely calm three blocks out.
Olive Service Apartments, Green Park
Ten minutes' walk from the ruins and the restaurants, but on a street where nothing happens after 10pm. Two metro stations within reach.
€€Haveli Hauz Khas
Puts the Yellow Line — which runs straight up to Chandni Chowk and Old Delhi — about four minutes from your door, which is worth more than any taxi.
€€€Connaught Place and Central Delhi
Best for short trips and anyone leaning hard on the metroThe white Georgian colonnades of Delhi's commercial core, walkable to Janpath, Agrasen ki Baoli, Bangla Sahib and the Rajiv Chowk metro interchange, which connects to nearly everything. Busy, functional, heavy on business hotels rather than charm.
Radisson Blu Marina Hotel, Connaught Place
Rajiv Chowk station is the network's main interchange; from here Old Delhi is fifteen minutes and Qutb Minar is under forty, without touching a road.
€€€Nizamuddin East
Best for history-first travellers and anyone taking the train to AgraA small, leafy residential colony sitting between Humayun's Tomb, Sunder Nursery and the Nizamuddin dargah, with the railway station for Agra trains at the end of the road. Almost no nightlife, and the call to prayer and the qawwali carry across it.
A homestay or small B&B in the colony
Nizamuddin East is mostly private houses letting rooms rather than hotels, which is exactly why it stays quiet. Book well ahead.
€€A hotel near Hazrat Nizamuddin railway station
The fast Agra trains leave from here rather than New Delhi station, which saves an early-morning cross-city taxi on Taj Mahal day.
€€Aerocity
Best for layovers, very early departures and fog seasonA purpose-built hotel district beside Terminal 3, sterile and entirely without a neighbourhood, but well-run and ten minutes from the airport gate. It exists for one reason and does that reason very well.
Novotel New Delhi Aerocity
In December and January, when fog turns a 5am airport run into a gamble, sleeping this close to the terminal is worth the lack of character.
€€€Affiliate notePostcardRoute is reader-supported. Some links to Booking.com (stays, flights, car hire, tickets and tours, airport transfers) are affiliate links, tracked through CJ Affiliate: if you book through them we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. We only recommend places we would send a friend.
03Tickets & tours
Humayun's Tomb
The 1570 garden tomb of the second Mughal emperor, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the direct architectural prototype for the Taj Mahal sixty years…
Tip Go in the last two hours before sunset, when the sandstone goes orange, and combine it with adjacent Sunder Nursery on the same trip — they are a five-minute walk apart…
Qutb Minar and the Mehrauli complex
A 73-metre victory tower begun in 1193, the tallest brick minaret in the world, standing over the ruins of Delhi's first Islamic capital — including…
Tip Walk on into the Mehrauli Archaeological Park next door. It is free, largely unvisited, and holds Balban's tomb, the Jamali Kamali mosque and the Rajon ki Baoli stepwell…
Jama Masjid and Old Delhi
Shah Jahan's great congregational mosque, finished in 1656, with a courtyard that holds twenty-five thousand people and a southern minaret you can…
Tip Enter by Gate 1, respect the dress code (robes are lent at the entrance), and time the minaret climb for late afternoon.
Nizamuddin Dargah, Thursday qawwali
The shrine of the 14th-century Sufi saint Nizamuddin Auliya, buried in the middle of a dense medieval basti.
Tip Arrive around sunset on a Thursday, after maghrib prayers. Cover your head, leave shoes at the stalls outside, sit on the floor with everyone else, and give the singers…
Lodhi Gardens and the Lodhi Art District
Ninety acres of park scattered with the 15th and 16th-century tombs of Sayyid and Lodi rulers, used daily by Delhi as a running track, picnic ground…
Tip Come at 7am, when the light is low, the air is at its best and the park belongs to joggers and the parakeets.
Chandni Chowk and Khari Baoli
The 17th-century main street of Old Delhi and the specialist bazaars running off it — silver at Dariba Kalan, wedding trim at Kinari, paper at…
Tip Between 7 and 10am the lanes are being loaded rather than gridlocked, which is the only time this is enjoyable rather than survivable.
Gurudwara Bangla Sahib
A working Sikh temple near Connaught Place with a gold dome, a large sarovar tank, and a langar kitchen serving free meals to tens of thousands of…
Tip Ask to help in the kitchen. Visitors are genuinely welcome to sit and roll rotis, and it is the most direct route into understanding what the place is actually for.
Hauz Khas ruins and reservoir
A 13th-century royal water tank with Firoz Shah Tughlaq's madrasa and tomb along its edge, a deer park behind, and a village of bars and restaurants…
Tip Go for sunset over the water from the madrasa colonnade, then eat in the village. The ruins close at dusk, the village is only getting started.
Red Fort (Lal Qila)
Shah Jahan's massive red sandstone fortress-palace, the seat of Mughal power for two centuries and the place the Prime Minister still addresses the…
Tip Go early to beat both the heat and the tour groups, and pair it with a walk through the Meena Bazaar lane inside the Lahore Gate before the crowds build — the fort…
Day trips from Delhi
Agra and the Taj Mahal
The fast trains from Hazrat Nizamuddin — the Gatimaan Express and the Vande Bharat services — reach Agra in around one hundred minutes, which makes…
Day tripJaipur
Four to five hours by Vande Bharat train or a little over three by car on the Delhi-Mumbai expressway.
Day tripNeemrana and the Aravalli foothills
About two and a half hours southwest into Rajasthan, where a 15th-century hill fort has been converted into a stepped hotel with views over the…
Day tripBrowse tickets, tours and activities
Skip-the-line tickets, guided tours and day trips, all in one place on Booking.com.
04Getting there & around
Getting around without losing the day
Delhi is enormous — the National Capital Territory covers around 1,500 square kilometres and the wider NCR including Gurugram and Noida is far bigger — and distances on a map bear no relation to time. Eight kilometres across central Delhi at 6pm can take fifty minutes.
Flights
Compare fares into Delhi and pick dates that suit the days you planned.
Airport transfers
Book a private or shared ride from the airport so the first evening starts at your door, not at a ticket queue.
Car hire
Only worth it for day trips beyond the city — in town, the plan above works on foot and public transport.
Affiliate notePostcardRoute is reader-supported. Some links to Booking.com (stays, flights, car hire, tickets and tours, airport transfers) are affiliate links, tracked through CJ Affiliate: if you book through them we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. We only recommend places we would send a friend.