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Ubud

Cultural heart & rice terrace paradise (Central Bali)

About Ubud

Ubud is Bali's spiritual and cultural center, surrounded by lush rice terraces, sacred temples, and dense tropical forests. It's a haven for yoga, meditation, and traditional Balinese arts. The town buzzes with craft markets, museums, and organic cafes.

Best for: Wellness seekers, culture lovers & digital nomads

  • Rice terraces
  • Yoga & wellness
  • Art galleries
  • Monkey Forest

Ubud at a glance

  • Beach: None (0/5). No beach; the black-sand east coast beaches are 30–40 minutes away.
  • Nightlife: Fair (2/5). Live music bars and nightly dance performances, but most evenings end early.
  • Prices: $$ · Moderate. Good value: cheap warungs next to upscale restaurants, and villas at every price.
  • To the airport: 37 km · 60–90 min. By road to Bali airport (DPS), in usual traffic.
  • Climate: Warm & humid · 200 m

Ratings

  • Calm-water swimming: None (0/5)
  • Surfing: None (0/5)
  • Diving & snorkeling: None (0/5)
  • Sunsets: Poor (1/5)
  • Restaurants & cafés: Excellent (5/5)
  • Culture & temples: Excellent (5/5)
  • Nature & landscapes: Very good (4/5)
  • Yoga & wellness: Excellent (5/5)
  • Family-friendly: Very good (4/5)
  • Peace & quiet: Fair (2/5)
  • Remote work: Very good (4/5)
  • Walkability: Good (3/5)

Rated from 0 (none) to 5 (excellent), compared with Bali's other areas.

Resorts in Ubud

Sights in Ubud

  • Sacred Monkey Forest Sanctuary (wildlife). The Sacred Monkey Forest Sanctuary is a patch of forest at the south end of Ubud's Monkey Forest Road, home to more than a thousand long-tailed macaques and three Hindu temples dating from around the 14th century. Paths lead past moss-covered statues and banyan roots to a ravine crossed by a dragon-carved bridge. Keep food, sunglasses and loose bags out of sight: the monkeys grab whatever they can reach.
  • Ubud Palace (palace). Puri Saren Agung, the palace of Ubud's royal family, was built in the early 19th century, and members of the family still live in its inner compounds. Visitors can walk through the front courtyards, with their carved stone gateways and guardian figures, across the road from the art market. Most evenings a dance performance is staged in the courtyard, with the carved gate as its backdrop.
  • Ubud Art Market (market). Pasar Seni Ubud fills a market building and the lanes beside it, opposite the palace, with stalls of sarongs, woven bags, wood carvings, paintings and silver jewelry. Much of the stock repeats from stall to stall, so it pays to look around before buying. Prices start high and bargaining is expected; mornings are cooler and less crowded than the afternoons.
  • Saraswati Temple (temple). Pura Taman Saraswati honors Saraswati, the Hindu goddess of learning and the arts, and was designed in the early 1950s by the Ubud artist I Gusti Nyoman Lempad. A stone walkway crosses a large lotus pond to its red-brick gateway, a few steps off Jalan Raya Ubud. The lotuses are open in the morning, and dance performances are held in front of the temple in the evenings.
  • Campuhan Ridge Walk (nature). A paved path of about two kilometers follows a grassy ridge between two river valleys on the western edge of Ubud, starting beside the Gunung Lebah temple where the rivers meet. It ends among rice fields and small cafes in the village of Bangkiang Sidem. There is little shade along the way, so most walkers set out at sunrise or in the late afternoon.
  • Puri Lukisan Museum (museum). Opened in 1956, Puri Lukisan is the oldest art museum in Bali, set in gardens with ponds a short walk west of Ubud Palace. Its four galleries follow Balinese painting and woodcarving from the 1930s onward, including works by I Gusti Nyoman Lempad and the Pitamaha artists. An hour or so is enough to see the collection, and the grounds are quiet even when the main road is busy.
  • Setia Darma House of Masks and Puppets (museum). The Setia Darma House of Masks and Puppets, founded by the collector Hadi Sunyoto, lies in Mas, the woodcarving village south of Ubud. More than a thousand masks and several thousand wayang puppets, from Bali, Java and countries across Asia and beyond, fill a group of old Javanese wooden houses that were moved here and set in a quiet garden. An hour or two is enough to see it all.
  • Agung Rai Museum of Art (museum). The Agung Rai Museum of Art (ARMA) in Pengosekan, at the south end of Ubud, was founded by the art dealer Agung Rai. Its galleries follow Balinese and Indonesian painting, with works by Walter Spies and Raden Saleh, in large gardens with pavilions and rice fields. It also runs classes in Balinese painting, batik, wood carving, gamelan and dance, and local children practise dancing on its stages.
  • Bali Family Hangout (play & adventure). Bali Family Hangout, formerly Bali Kids Land, is a covered outdoor playground among the rice fields of Singakerta, a few kilometres southwest of central Ubud. Water slides, a splash pad, a trampoline, a sandpit, climbing nets and a bike path sit under its roof, with a toddler room and a café beside them, and a kids club runs on weekdays.
  • Sangeh Monkey Forest (wildlife). Sangeh Monkey Forest in Abiansemal, west of Ubud, is a sacred grove of tall nutmeg trees, some of them centuries old, home to about 700 long-tailed macaques. The 17th-century temple Pura Bukit Sari stands at its heart. Shadier and quieter than Ubud's monkey forest, it closed for a week in December 2025 after storm-felled trees damaged the temple, so it is best visited in calm weather.

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