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The 10 Best Museums in Israel (2026)

Updated August 2026 · 10 picks

The best museums in Israel are the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, which holds the Dead Sea Scrolls and the model of Second Temple Jerusalem, Yad Vashem, which is free, and ANU and the Tel Aviv Museum of Art on the coast. Between the two cities there is more than a week of museum-going here. Ten, below.

1. The Israel Museum — Givat Ram, Jerusalem

The country's national museum — Dead Sea Scrolls, the Temple model, and far more than a day's worth.

₪₪ Mid-rangeBest for Families · Couples · Groups

The Israel Museum is the largest cultural institution in the country and one of the leading encyclopaedic museums in the region, spread across a hillside campus at Givat Ram with archaeology, Judaica, fine art and design wings.

Two things bring most visitors: the Shrine of the Book, the distinctive white dome housing the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the Second Temple Model — a 1:50 scale reconstruction of Jerusalem in 66 CE that makes the Old City legible in a way no map does. Do the model before you walk the Old City, not after.

The archaeology wing alone justifies the trip, and the sculpture garden is one of the better ones anywhere. Allow a minimum of three hours; a full day is not excessive.

Good to know: Do the Second Temple Model early in your Jerusalem trip — everything in the Old City makes more sense afterwards.

Google Maps Website

2. Yad Vashem — Mount Herzl, Jerusalem

The world's central Holocaust memorial and museum — free, and unlike anything else.

₪ BudgetBest for Couples · Groups

Yad Vashem occupies a large campus on the western slope of Mount Herzl, and it is the world's central institution for Holocaust remembrance, documentation and research.

The Holocaust History Museum is a prism-shaped structure cut through the hillside, designed by Moshe Safdie, that narrows as it descends and opens at the far end onto a view over the Jerusalem hills. The Hall of Names, the Children's Memorial and the Avenue of the Righteous Among the Nations sit across the surrounding grounds.

Entry is free. It is emotionally demanding and should not be scheduled alongside anything else that day.

Good to know: Children under ten are not admitted to the History Museum — plan around that if you are travelling as a family.

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3. ANU – Museum of the Jewish People — Tel Aviv University campus, Ramat Aviv

The most ambitious museum in the city — 4,000 years of Jewish life, told well.

₪₪ Mid-rangeBest for Families · Couples · Groups

ANU, on the Tel Aviv University campus, reopened after a complete rebuild as the largest Jewish museum in the world, telling the story of Jewish peoplehood across three floors rather than the story of a single country or period.

It is deliberately expansive — culture, faith, language, humour, food and diaspora communities from Kaifeng to Cochin to Brooklyn — and it works because it is built around people rather than artefacts. The synagogue models from the original Beit Hatfutsot are still there.

Allow three hours minimum; most people underestimate it. It sits next to the Eretz Israel Museum, so the two can be combined into a full day in Ramat Aviv.

Good to know: Start on the top floor and work down — that is the order the narrative is designed to be read in.

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4. Tel Aviv Museum of Art — Shaul HaMelech Boulevard, HaKirya, Tel Aviv

The country's leading modern and contemporary art museum, in a genuinely great building.

₪₪ Mid-rangeBest for Couples · Solo

The Tel Aviv Museum of Art holds the most important collection of Israeli art in the country alongside significant European and American modernism, spread across the original 1971 building and the Herta and Paul Amir Building, a folded concrete structure that is worth the visit on its own.

The Israeli galleries are the reason to come: they trace the country's art from the early Bezalel period through to the present, and they make far more sense of what you see elsewhere in Israel than any guidebook.

Allow two to three hours. The temporary exhibitions are consistently strong and the building rewards wandering.

Good to know: The Amir Building's central atrium is the single best piece of contemporary architecture in Tel Aviv — do not rush past it.

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5. Tower of David Museum — Jaffa Gate, Old City, Jerusalem

Four thousand years of Jerusalem, inside the citadel by the Jaffa Gate.

₪₪ Mid-rangeBest for Families · Couples · Groups

The Tower of David Museum occupies the medieval citadel just inside the Jaffa Gate, on a site fortified since the Second Temple period, and it tells the story of Jerusalem across every era that has ruled it.

After a major redevelopment the displays are considerably more ambitious than they were, but the building itself remains the main event — the ramparts and the tower give the best rooftop view of the Old City available to a ticket-holder.

It also runs a night show projected onto the citadel walls, which is genuinely well done and worth a separate evening.

Good to know: Go up onto the ramparts for the view — most visitors do the galleries and miss the roof.

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6. Eretz Israel Museum — Ramat Aviv, Tel Aviv

A campus of pavilions built around a real archaeological tel — the best museum for families.

₪₪ Mid-rangeBest for Families · Groups

The Eretz Israel Museum is less a single museum than a park of separate pavilions — glass, ceramics, coins, crafts, ethnography, a planetarium — arranged around Tel Qasile, an excavated mound with remains going back to the twelfth century BCE.

That layout is its strength. You move between indoor collections and open ground, which makes it far easier with children than a conventional museum, and the tel itself gives a rare chance to walk through an actual excavation inside a city.

Allow two to three hours and treat it as an outdoor visit as much as an indoor one.

Good to know: Check the planetarium schedule before you arrive — sessions run at fixed times and sell out at weekends.

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7. Museum of Islamic Art — Palmach Street, Talbiya, Jerusalem

A world-class Islamic collection plus one of the great clock and watch collections.

₪₪ Mid-rangeBest for Couples · Solo

The L.A. Mayer Museum for Islamic Art in Talbiya holds a serious collection of Islamic art spanning a thousand years and the whole Muslim world — ceramics, metalwork, glass, textiles, manuscripts and jewellery.

It also holds the Sir David Salomons collection of antique clocks and watches, including exceptional Breguet pieces, which was the subject of one of the great art heists of the twentieth century and its eventual partial recovery.

It is well off the standard tourist route, which means you will have the galleries largely to yourself. Allow ninety minutes.

Good to know: The clock and watch collection is the surprise here — do not skip it for the ceramics.

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8. Ilana Goor Museum — Old Jaffa, Tel Aviv

A working artist's house in Old Jaffa, crammed floor to roof, with the best terrace in the city.

₪₪ Mid-rangeBest for Couples · Solo

The Ilana Goor Museum occupies an eighteenth-century building in Old Jaffa that was once an inn for pilgrims arriving at the port, and is now the sculptor's home, studio and personal collection all at once.

It is idiosyncratic in the best way — Goor's own sculpture alongside several hundred works she has collected, arranged with no curatorial distance whatsoever across a warren of rooms and staircases. Nothing about it feels institutional.

The rooftop terrace looks straight out over the sea and the Tel Aviv skyline, and is worth the ticket by itself. Allow an hour.

Good to know: Go up to the roof first, before the building distracts you — the view is the thing people forget to see.

Google Maps Website

9. Bible Lands Museum — Givat Ram, Jerusalem

The ancient Near East arranged chronologically — the best context for everything else you'll see.

₪₪ Mid-rangeBest for Couples · Families

The Bible Lands Museum sits beside the Israel Museum at Givat Ram and holds a collection of ancient Near Eastern artefacts arranged chronologically across the civilisations of the region — Egypt, Mesopotamia, Persia, Canaan and the rest.

That chronological arrangement is the point, and it is unusual. Rather than sorting objects by culture, it lets you walk forward through time and see what was happening simultaneously in different places, which turns a collection of pots into an argument.

It is smaller and quieter than its neighbour and pairs naturally with it. Allow ninety minutes to two hours.

Good to know: Combine with the Israel Museum next door — but do this one first if you want the chronology to help.

Google Maps Website

10. Palmach Museum — Ramat Aviv, Tel Aviv

An immersive walk-through history of the pre-state strike force — no glass cases at all.

₪₪ Mid-rangeBest for Families · Groups

The Palmach Museum tells the story of the pre-state Palmach through a guided, timed walk-through experience rather than a conventional display: you follow one group of recruits through a sequence of built sets and film.

The format is unusual and effective, particularly for people who find object-based history museums hard going. It is unashamedly a national narrative, which is worth knowing going in.

Visits are on scheduled tours in fixed languages and must be booked in advance — you cannot simply turn up. Allow ninety minutes.

Good to know: Book ahead and confirm an English-language session; entry is by timed tour only.

Google Maps Website

Frequently asked questions

Which is the best museum in Israel?

The Israel Museum in Jerusalem, by scale and by collection — the Shrine of the Book with the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Second Temple model, and archaeology, art and Judaica wings that each merit their own visit. Yad Vashem is the other essential, and it is a memorial as much as a museum.

How much do museums cost in Israel?

Roughly ₪50–₪65 for the national and major city museums, less for the small ones, with student, child and senior reductions. Yad Vashem is free. Several museums run a discounted or free evening or day each week, and a combined ticket exists for some of the Jerusalem sites.

Are museums in Israel open on Shabbat?

It varies by city and matters. The Israel Museum and the Tel Aviv Museum of Art both open on Saturday, and Saturday is one of their busiest days. Most Jerusalem municipal museums and Yad Vashem close for Shabbat. Friday is a short day almost everywhere — many close by 2pm.

Which museum in Israel is best with children?

The Bloomfield Science Museum in Jerusalem and the Eretz Israel Museum in Tel Aviv, both hands-on and both built for it. The Palmach Museum is an immersive walk-through with no glass cases at all, which works well for older children. The Israel Museum has a dedicated youth wing.

Do Israeli museums have English signage?

The national and major city museums are fully trilingual in Hebrew, Arabic and English, with English audio guides. The smaller municipal and specialist museums are more variable — Hebrew with partial English is common — so check before making a special trip to a small one.

How long do you need at the Israel Museum?

Half a day at an absolute minimum, and a full day if you want the archaeology and art wings as well as the Scrolls and the model. It is genuinely large. If you only have two hours, do the Shrine of the Book, the model and one wing, and accept that you are coming back.

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