Along with being the capital of Belgium and the administrative centre of the EU, Brussels is full of incredible beauty! Whether you’re using it as a hub to see more of this small but mighty country or you’ve got several days of your holiday dedicated to seeing Brussels in its entirety, there are some great things to see and do. From a fabulous old town, to great museums, to a famous landmark, there’s heaps to keep you busy!

Cost: Free (or €15 – €25 for panoramic views at the Town Hall)

Brussels has both a new town and an old town and the old town is absolutely beautiful. It all centres around the Grand Place which is a large town square with the most incredible 14th century buildings all around. Its actually quite odd to see these ornate buildings with a Starbucks and a Hard Rock Cafe in them. The centre of the Grand Place is the amazing Brussels Town Hall (pictured above) which runs guided visits inside. You can book here for €15 or €25 for panoramic views on Saturdays only.

Some other great things to keep an eye out for when walking around the city is the Royal Gallery of Saint Hubert. This is a shopping centre with a beautiful glass dome walkway and lots of eateries and shops to look at. The Pharmacie Delacre, built for the pharmacist Charles Delacre in 1898, is a short walk away. It’s a neo-gothic, neo-renaissance building and is now an art gallery where you can admire the amazing building from inside.

Around the corner is the Royal Palace of Brussels, which is the official palace of the King and Queen of Belgium. It’s a beautiful building with a lovely garden of manicured hedges out the front. They run limited tours where visitors can go inside and explore some of the beautiful rooms. Due to renovations, the Palace wasn’t running the tours during our visit, but they will start again in summer 2024. When they’re up and running, they can be booked here.

Cost: Free

Brussels has a unique trio of famous sculptures, two of which are also fountains. Manneken Pis is a little boy peeing, Jeanneke Pis is a little girl peeing, and Het Zinneke is a dog peeing.

The original of the trio is the fountain of a little boy, which dates back to as early as the mid 15th century. It stands at 55.5cm and was a key part in the distribution of fresh water in the 1400s. The one you will see on the street now is actually a replica from 1965, with the original now in the Brussels City Museum.

If you’re lucky, you might get to see him while he is dressed up in fun costumes, which happens regularly. The non profit organisation The Order of the Friends of Manneken Pis have been managing his outfits since 1954. They choose, create and dress him in his 1000+ outfits! Manneken Pis is on the corner of Rue du Chêne and Rue de l’Etuve.

Jeanneke Pis is the fountain of the little peeing girl, and actually means ‘Little Pissing Joan’ in Dutch. It stands at 50cm and was created as a counterpoint to Manneken Pis in 1987. You can find it on Impasse de la Fidélité which is a little alley that comes off Rue des Bouchers. It is quite a common activity to throw coins into the fountain, with lovers who throw in coins believing the action will keep their love long and faithful. The coins are collected are donated to charities looking to find a treatment for AIDS, UNICEF and the National Fund for Scientific Research.

The final statue is Het Zinneke, which is the only peeing statue which is not a fountain. It depicts a dog peeing on a pole and is the newest of the statues, built in 1998. The name comes from the Zinne river that runs through Brussels, as well as the nickname for Brussels mongrel dogs, Zinneke. You can find it on the corner of Rue des Chartreux and Rue Saint-Christophe so you can finish your tour of the cities peeing statues.

Cost: Free

This big park, built in 1880, celebrates the 50th anniversary of Belgium’s independence. The name actually means ‘Park of the Fiftieth Anniversary’ in French. There is a pond and lots of beautiful gardens to sit and relax in, as well as a running track and a playground. The park is also regularly used for events such as festivals, concerts, drive in cinemas, sporting events, fireworks and is also the starting location for the Brussels marathon. It is a 40 minute walk from the Grand Place in the middle of the city, or just an 8 minute metro ride.

The main feature of the park is the Cinquantenaire Arch, a memorial centrepiece finished in 1905. The arch is 45 metres high and 30 metres wide and is made of stone with a giant bronze horse drawn chariot on top. Off each side of the archway are two long buildings, which hold three museums. These are the Art & History Museum, the Royal Military Museum and the Autoworld vintage car museum. The Royal Military Museum ticket also provides access to the Jubilee Park Arcades, two viewing platforms on top of the archway. Tickets are €12 per adult and the platforms give you a beautiful view over Brussels.

Cost: Free

While walking around the city, you’ll probably wander past the Mont des Arts which is a hill located between a couple of important buildings. These include the Royal Library of Belgium, the Fine Arts Museum, the Musée Magritte Museum and the Palais de Charles de Lorraine. The best thing about the Mont des Arts is the view over the city and the Mont des Arts Garden. Dating back to 1910, the current garden there today was restored in 2001. It’s a sort of transition between the lower and upper parts of the city and is a great place to sit and relax before heading up to see the view.

Cost: Free to visit

The Place du Jeu de Balle, also known as the ‘old market’, is a great flea market with over 300 sellers. It’s primarily a vintage and antique market, but also sells furniture, clothing, books, records and other accessories. Objects are often laid out on blankets on the ground or sold from the back of cars. The market is popular with both locals and tourists. If you’re in the mood to purchase something, you might have to take the time to rummage through everything. The market is located a 20 minute walk from the centre of Brussels, or is a short metro ride away. It’s open every day from 9am-2pm on weekdays and 9am-3pm on weekends.

Cost: from €16

This is a famous Brussels landmark located a 20 minute drive out of the city, or 2 metros away. It’s shaped like an atomic model structure and, as you would expect, is a tribute to scientific progress. It was created for the Brussels World’s Fair in 1958 and it stands at 102 meters tall. It’s the most popular tourist attraction in Brussels and is also a museum and an art centre, as well as being a great photo spot!

Visiting the Atomium gets you entry to the viewpoint and the panorama which are on levels 6 and 7 and have beautiful views over the city. You also get to walk inside the metal frame, which is said to be like something out of a science fiction movie. Lastly you get entry to the design museum which is a permanent exhibition showing the 60 year history of the pavilion. It is open every day of the week from 10am to 6pm, but be sure to check out their website as they have certain days with adapted opening hours.

There are three ticket levels with entry to other nearby attractions included. For entry to the Atomium and the design museum, tickets are €16 for adults. For entry to the Atomium, the design museum and a visit to Mini-Europe tickets are €32,20. Mini-Europe is a miniature park with reproductions of well known European monuments and is just across the road from the Atomium. There is also a ticket for groups of 20 or more only which includes entry to the Atomium and the nearby planetarium for €17 per adult.

If you’re interested in visiting the Mini-Europe park or the Planetarium without going to the Atomium, you can buy tickets on their websites.

Cost: €13-€15

Like many European cities we’ve visited, there are some great museums to visit in Brussels.

Cost: €13

With over 700 comic strip artists, Belgium has more than any other country per capita! This museum is dedicated to comic strips from both Belgian artists, and artists all over Europe. The museum collects old and new comic strips and preserves them for visitors to enjoy. The exhibits take visitors through the history of comic strips, and explains how they are made. It is open Tuesday to Sunday from 10-6pm and is also open on Mondays in July and the first half of August.

Cost: €13

The first chocolate museum in Brussels, here you can learn about the history and evolution of chocolate. It goes all the way back to the discovery of cocoa beans up to how Belgian praline was created. There are also workshops where Belgian chocolate makers will show you how chocolate is made. As well as tastings where you can try real Belgian praline. The museum is open 10am-6pm every day and there is of course a shop at the end to satisfy all your chocolate needs!

Cost: €15

This museum has over 8000 musical instruments from all over the world spread out over four floors. They are accompanied by an audio guide where you can hear what every single one sounds like when played. The actual building is also stunning to look at, as it is the former Old England department store. Built in 1899, it has an art nouveau style built out of girded steel and glass and is so beautiful. It’s open Tuesday – Friday 9:30am – 5pm and 10am-5pm on the weekend.

Cost: €13

This is a classic natural history museum, with the worlds largest dinosaur hall! There are permanent and temporary exhibitions that show the evolution of both human and animal life. There is also a mineral hall where there are some wonderful and interesting geological finds, including a lunar rock. The museum is open Tuesday – Friday 9:30am – 5pm and 10am-6pm on the weekend.

Because Belgium is so small, one of the best things to do when staying in Brussels is to go on day trips. We visited three other cities in Belgium, all of which can be reached as a day trip from Brussels. For all of our trains around Belgium, we booked on this website. There are heaps of trains going between cities every day so nothing needs to be booked too far in advance. If you’ve already seen Belgium’s major cities, you might consider a day trip to Leuven, Dinant or Mechelen, which are also reachable as a day trip from Brussels.

Bruges is one of our favourite places that we visited on our entire 15 month trip around the world. As soon as we left we wanted to go back. We spent a couple of days in Bruges, and we actually have a whole blog post about what to do in Bruges if you want more ideas!

Trains from Brussels to Bruges are about 1 hour 5 minutes on an intercity (IC) train each way. Bruges was originally a walled city, and while the walls aren’t up anymore, everything inside where the walls were is so well preserved! The whole city is a UNESCO world heritage site, and has an incredible vibe to it.

One of the best things to do is just walk around the streets because the whole city just feels like a fairy tale town. There’s lots to see including Gruuthuse Hof, the Basilica of the Holy Blood, and a very interesting area called Beguinage. You can also climb the Belfry Tower for €15 per person, which can be found in Grote Markt. It is 366 steps to the top of the tower which has a wonderful view of the city below.

There are also some interesting and different museums in Bruges that are worth visiting if you’ve got time. These are the fry museum, the chocolate museum, the beer museum, the torture museum and the diamond museum. There is so much to do in Bruges that we’re sure you’ll want to end up staying the night!

Ghent is a beautiful city and is only 35 to 40 minutes each way on the IC train. It is a pretty big city with a mix of newer buildings and some older buildings with incredible architecture. The nicest part of the city is along the Leie river where you can see Graslei, which is a famous street, and the Saint Michael’s Bridge. Wandering along the river and through the cute old town was definitely our favourite thing to do.

Another highlight was visiting the Gravensteen, a 10th century castle with a great museum inside. Tickets cost €13 each and are available at the castle entry or online. One of the best reasons to visit is because the museum includes an absolutely fantastic audio guide. They’ve created scenes via audio to really help take you back in time. A local comedian narrates the tour, and makes it so entertaining. The whole thing takes about an hour and a half and was really memorable for us. There is also a fantastic view of Ghent from the top level of the castle so it’s definitely worth a visit.

The last day trip recommendation from Brussels is Antwerp which is another beautiful Belgian city. It can again be reached on an IC train, and it takes between 41 and 52 minutes each way. If you take the train in, you’ll get the chance to see one of the cities best sights, the train station! It has a beautiful iron and glass dome on top and the whole station shows a wide range of architectural styles. It was originally opened in 1905 and is a really beautiful welcome to the city.

The best place to start is to walk directly down De Keyserlei street from the station. This will take you through a lot of the old town down to the Scheldt River. Some churches worth seeing are the St. James’ Church, the Saint Charles Borromeo Church, and the Cathedral of Our Lady. However, the Cathedral of Our Lady does have a €12 per person entrance fee.

Just around the corner of the Cathedral in the main square of Antwerp is Brabo’s Monument. This is a fountain-sculpture of the city’s famous founder, Silvius Brabo, that’s been there since 1887 and is definitely worth seeing. Another thing worth seeing is the Medieval fortress Het Steen, which is down on the Scheldt river. It is free to enter and also has free bathrooms, which you may know is hard to find in Europe!

If you’re anything like us, you’ve probably been thinking about the food you’ll eat on your trip for about as long as you’ve been planning! For Belgium in particular, we had been looking forward to waffles and chocolate for months. We ended up learning a thing or two while we were there about what to choose.

When you first get to Belgium, you’ll see these delicious looking rectangular shaped waffles everywhere covered in fancy toppings. While these are great, they have nothing on the other type of Belgian waffle! These rectangular waffles are the Brussels waffles and the other ones are the Liège waffles. The Brussels waffles are bigger and fluffier and are not as sweet. The Liège waffles are very sweet and are more of a pastry consistency than a normal waffle. The way they are cooked means they often have bits of caramelisation on the edges. Because of this, in our opinion, they’re best eaten plain so you can really appreciate the texture!

We went to a place called Australian – Belgian Waffles and Ice Cream in the city. We have no idea what makes it Australian, but we wish we had a place like this at home! The Liège waffles here are absolutely amazing and cost about €3 each.

As well as waffles, chocolate is obviously a must in Belgium and you can find it EVERYWHERE. In Brussels there is a section in the city where quite literally every 3rd or 4th shop sells chocolate. Quite often, shops will hand out samples so you can find what you like. We found two kinds that we loved, some delicious dark and creamy truffles and some seashell truffles. Both of these were amazing but there are so many different kinds of chocolate to try there!

We hope this guide has helped you on your visit to Brussels and given you some great budget ideas of what to see and do! If you want to see what we got up to in more detail, you can check out our vlog from our time in Belgium: