China · Xinjiang
Kashgar
China's westernmost city and the Silk Road's great Pamir-foot oasis: the country's largest mosque, a Sunday livestock market, and the Karakoram Highway starting at the edge of town.
Kashgar is the westernmost city in China and the last great oasis before the Pamirs, sitting closer to Kabul and Tehran than to Beijing. For two thousand years it was where the caravan tracks skirting the Taklamakan to north and south came back together, and it is still a Uyghur city at heart: Id Kah Mosque on the central square is the largest in the country, and the Sunday livestock market on the edge of town runs much as it always has. The old quarter was largely rebuilt for earthquake safety from 2009, so much of what you walk now is reconstruction.
Suggested stay
3–5 days
Language
Mandarin Chinese
Currency
CNY
Timezone
UTC+6
Why you'll love Kashgar
Where the routes met Kashgar sat at the western hinge of the Silk Road, and the Central Asian slant of the food, the faces and the music still shows it before anything else does.
The bazaars Sunday brings the livestock market, where fat-tailed sheep, cattle and donkeys change hands on a slapped palm, while the covered Grand Bazaar trades carpets, hats, knives and dried fruit all week.
The Pamirs next door The Karakoram Highway runs south from the edge of town into the mountains, climbing past Karakul Lake to Tashkurgan under the ice dome of Muztagh Ata.
Craft that still works Coppersmiths, hat makers and instrument builders keep workshops on the old-town lanes, and the rawap and dutar hanging in the doorways are made to be played, not hung.
Best time to visit
Mar-Oct
15-32° days
39.467° N, 75.990° E
UTC+6 · Asia/Urumqi
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Weather & when to go to Kashgar
Month by month: typical highs and lows, rainfall and rain days.
✓ Best Mar-Oct
Cards tinted by calculated verdict · big number = typical daily high, small = low · hover for conditions
When to avoid Kashgar
Deep winter is the real gap: the oasis freezes hard, sunrise comes near mid-morning on Beijing clocks, and the road south is at its least dependable with the Khunjerab Pass shut for the season. The other thing to plan around is the week itself - the markets peak on Sunday, and arriving Monday costs you the best day here.
Top things to do in Kashgar
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Id Kah Mosque - the largest mosque in China
culture arts history 👍 PopularThe yellow-tiled gatehouse on the central square has anchored Kashgar since the 1400s, with a poplar-shaded courtyard and prayer hall behind it. Non-Muslim visitors have long been admitted outside prayer times, dressed modestly, but access here is one of the things that changes - check on the day.
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Kashgar Old City - the lanes off Ostangboyi Road
history culture arts 👍 PopularThe old quarter was largely demolished and rebuilt in reinforced brick from 2009 under an earthquake-safety programme, and now runs as a managed scenic area with a costumed opening ceremony at the east gate. It still works as a neighbourhood of workshops, bread ovens and kids on bikes, but the mud-brick city of the photographs is mostly gone.
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Sunday livestock market - the bazaar that still trades
culture arts off beaten path ⭐ Highly recommendedOut on the city's edge, Sunday brings fat-tailed sheep, cattle, donkeys and the occasional camel to a dusty yard where deals close with a handshake and a slapped palm. Loud, muddy and entirely unstaged. Go early, because it thins through the middle of the day, and note the yard has been moved further out more than once.
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Central Asia Grand Bazaar - carpets, knives and dried fruit
shopping culture arts 👍 PopularThe covered market northeast of the centre trades every day and swells on Sunday: Hotan carpets and felt, Yengisar knives, embroidered doppa caps, atlas silk, spice sacks and mounded apricots, raisins and walnuts. Bargaining is expected and good-natured.
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Apak Hoja Mausoleum - the tiled tomb of a Sufi dynasty
historyGreen and white tilework over a squat dome on the northeastern outskirts, holding generations of the Afaqi Khoja family who ruled Kashgaria in the 1600s. Signage sells it as the tomb of the Fragrant Concubine, a story historians do not support; the tilework needs no legend.
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Karakoram Highway - south to Karakul Lake and the Pamirs
scenic adventure ⭐ Highly recommendedThe road climbs out of the oasis through the Ghez canyon and onto the Pamir plateau, where Karakul Lake sits under Muztagh Ata and Kongur Tagh. That wall of ice is the single best half-day of a Kashgar trip. The route runs through a border zone, so the paperwork is arranged in town first.
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Yusuf Has Hajib Mausoleum - the poet of the Kutadgu Bilig
history culture artsA domed tomb in the south of the city for the eleventh-century vizier whose Kutadgu Bilig, the Wisdom of Royal Glory, is the earliest surviving major work written in a Turkic language. Quiet, and a real fixture of Uyghur literary pilgrimage rather than a sight laid on for visitors.
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Mor Pagoda - Buddhist ruins from before the mosques
history off beaten pathTwo eroded mud-brick stupas standing on open gravel northeast of the city, all that is easily visible of a Buddhist complex from the centuries when Kashgar was a Buddhist kingdom on the route. There is nothing out there but the ruins, the wind and a long view.
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Handicraft Street - coppersmiths, hatmakers and lute builders
culture arts shoppingOstangboyi Road and the lanes off it still hold working trades rather than souvenir counters: copper beaten into basins and teapots, doppa caps embroidered by hand, and rawap and dutar lutes strung up in the doorways. Ask to hear one played and you usually will.
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Uyghur food - laghman, polo and the tonur bread ovens
foodHand-pulled laghman under a lamb and pepper sauce, polo rice heavy with carrot and mutton, samsa slapped to the wall of a clay oven, and nan pressed with a carved stamp before it goes in. Tea arrives before you order it. This is Central Asian cooking, not Chinese.
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Gaotai - the high-platform quarter above the Tuman
history off beaten pathThe loess bluff on the river's edge carried the oldest surviving houses in Kashgar, stacked and tunnelled through over generations. It has been fenced and worked on for years now, so treat access as uncertain and take the view from below if the lanes are shut.
Best areas to stay in Kashgar
$ Budget $$ Mid-range $$$ Premium
Id Kah Square and Jiefang Road
First-time visitors $$Central blocks under the mosque's gatehouse
Explore hotels in Id Kah Square and Jiefang Road →
Kashgar Old City
Inside the lanes $$Rebuilt lanes, workshops and ticket gates
Explore hotels in Kashgar Old City →
Seman Road
Budget and overland $Old consulate quarter, agencies, budget beds
Explore hotels in Seman Road →
People's Square and the new city
Transit and business $$Wide boulevards, chain hotels, modern China
Explore hotels in People's Square and the new city →
Live nightly prices from Booking.com, Agoda and others, centred on Kashgar
Getting to & around Kashgar
Getting there
Fly into Kashgar (KHG) from Urumqi and a handful of other Chinese cities, or take the southern Xinjiang railway across the desert rim.
Flight
Kashgar Airport (KHG)
The airport sits about 10 km north of the centre, roughly 20-30 min by taxi or ride-hailing car. Almost all traffic routes through Urumqi. Passport checks begin at the terminal and continue at your hotel.
Train
Kashgar Railway Station
The southern Xinjiang line runs from Urumqi via Korla, Kuqa and Aksu, an overnight haul around the desert rim, and continues south to Hotan. The station is a short drive out from the centre.
Coach
Kashgar long-distance bus station
Buses serve the oasis towns of the southern Taklamakan - Yengisar, Yarkand, Hotan - and run south to Tashkurgan. Allow more time than the distance suggests, because road journeys here involve checkpoints.
Drive
The Karakoram Highway runs south to Tashkurgan and the Khunjerab Pass for Pakistan, and the Torugart and Irkeshtam passes cross west into Kyrgyzstan. All three are border zones with permit conditions and seasonal closures, and the rules change - confirm before planning around any of them.
Getting around
On foot
The old city, Id Kah Square and the central lanes are best walked, and distances in the centre are short.
Free
Taxi and ride-hailing
The practical way out to the bazaars, the mausoleums and the airport.
TBC
City bus
Covers the main roads between the centre, the new city and the market grounds; signage is in Chinese and Uyghur.
TBC
Electric three-wheeler
Battery rickshaws shuttle short hops around the old city and market lanes; agree the trip before you climb in.
TBC
Hired car with driver
How almost everyone does the Karakoram Highway; agencies arrange the vehicle and the border-zone paperwork together.
TBC
Day trips from Kashgar
Karakul Lake
1-2 daysPamir lake and peaks
The road climbs the Ghez canyon onto the Pamir plateau and reaches Karakul at around 3,600 m, with the ice dome of Muztagh Ata and the bulk of Kongur Tagh above it. Kyrgyz families run simple yurt and guesthouse stays on the shore. The whole route is a border zone, and conditions on it change.
Getting there
car | bus | tour
About 3-4 hr by road each way
Tashkurgan
1-2 daysTajik border town
The last town before Pakistan, at around 3,100 m among Sarikoli Tajik villages. The ruined Stone Fort stands over a green wetland plain laid with boardwalks, and the Khunjerab Pass runs on south to the border. A permit and a seasonal window both govern getting here.
Getting there
car | bus | tour
About 5-6 hr by road, beyond Karakul
Opal and the Mahmud al-Kashgari mausoleum
Half dayVillage and scholar's tomb
A farming village on the Karakoram Highway where the eleventh-century scholar Mahmud al-Kashgari is buried on a hill above the fields. He compiled the first great dictionary of the Turkic languages, and the tomb draws genuine pilgrims. Opal's own weekly bazaar fills the roadside when it runs.
Getting there
car | bus | tour
About 1 hr by road southwest
Shipton's Arch
Half dayNatural rock arch
Tushuk Tash, the hole in the rock, is among the tallest natural arches on earth, hidden in a maze of eroded canyon north of the city. The approach goes up a dry gorge on ladders and walkways. Flash flooding can wreck the route, so ask locally before setting out.
Getting there
car | tour | walk
About 1.5-2 hr by road, then a scramble
Yengisar and Yarkand
Full dayKnife town and khanate capital
Yengisar has made Uyghur knives for centuries and still has workshops on its main road, though buying one is easier than carrying it onward. Yarkand beyond it was the seat of the Yarkand Khanate: the Altun Mosque, a royal cemetery, and the tomb of Amannisa Khan, who gathered the Twelve Muqam.
Getting there
car | bus | tour
About 1-3 hr by road southeast
A little history of Kashgar
Kashgar is one of the oldest continuously inhabited oases on the Silk Road, the point where the caravan tracks skirting the Taklamakan to north and south came back together before the Pamir passes. Han envoys reached it in the second century BC. For centuries afterwards it was a Buddhist kingdom, and the monk Xuanzang passed through on his way home from India. Islam arrived with the Karakhanids around the turn of the eleventh century, and Kashgar became a centre of Turkic Islamic scholarship: Mahmud al-Kashgari's dictionary of the Turkic languages and Yusuf Has Hajib's Kutadgu Bilig were both written out of this world.
Later it passed through Mongol, Chagatai and Khoja rule, was taken into the Qing empire in the eighteenth century, broke away under Yakub Beg in the 1860s, and was reincorporated when Xinjiang was made a province in 1884. Through the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries it was a listening post of the Great Game, with British and Russian consulates facing each other across the oasis. Since 1949 it has sat inside the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and the last two decades have brought railways, an expressway toward the Pamirs, large-scale reconstruction of the old city, and a far-reaching security and surveillance apparatus.
Han envoys reach the oasis of Shule, already the hinge where the routes around the Taklamakan rejoin.
Xuanzang passes through on his return from India and records a Buddhist kingdom of monasteries and stupas.
The Karakhanids make Kashgar a capital, and Islam replaces Buddhism across the oasis.
Yusuf Has Hajib writes the Kutadgu Bilig and Mahmud al-Kashgari compiles his Turkic dictionary.
Qing armies take Kashgaria; the oasis is governed from Beijing for the first time.
Yakub Beg rules an independent emirate from Kashgar before Qing forces retake the region.
Xinjiang is constituted as a province; British and Russian consulates settle in for the Great Game.
Demolition and reconstruction of the old city begins under an earthquake-safety programme.
Know before you go
Payment
Cash preferred
English
Limited
Wifi
Workable
Power
Type A / I
230 V, 50 Hz
Dialing
+86
The months our climate read flags to avoid: the wettest, lowest-rated weather of the year.
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FAQs about Kashgar
▸ When is the best time to visit Kashgar?
The long stretch from early spring through autumn is the workable season, and autumn is when the fruit stalls are at their best - melons, grapes, figs and new walnuts. Deep winter is the one to avoid: the oasis freezes, and the high road south to the Pamirs is least dependable then. Whenever you come, try to have a Sunday in town.
▸ What should I expect in the way of checks and paperwork?
Xinjiang runs far more identity checking than the rest of China. Carry your passport at all times: it is scanned at stations, airports, hotels and scenic-area gates, and on the roads out of town. Only hotels licensed for foreign guests can register you. Do not photograph police, checkpoints or security equipment. Conditions here change, so check current advice close to your trip.
▸ What time does Kashgar actually run on?
The whole country is officially on Beijing time, which puts Kashgar roughly two hours ahead of the sun. Uyghur life largely keeps to unofficial local time, two hours behind the clock, so meals, shop hours and prayer follow daylight rather than the timetable. Transport and offices use Beijing time. When someone gives you a time here, ask which one they mean.
▸ Can I drive the Karakoram Highway to Pakistan?
The run south to Tashkurgan and the Khunjerab Pass is the classic trip, and the pass is the highest paved border crossing in the world. It sits inside a border zone needing a permit arranged in Kashgar, usually through an agency, and it closes for winter. Whether it is open to third-country travellers has changed more than once, so confirm before building a trip around it.
▸ Is the old town the real old town?
Mostly not. From 2009 the great majority of the mud-brick quarter was demolished and rebuilt in reinforced brick and concrete under an earthquake-safety programme, and the result now operates as a ticketed scenic area with a daily opening ceremony. It is still a working neighbourhood of workshops, bread ovens and children on bikes, just not the city in the old photographs.
▸ How long do I need, and does it work as a stopover?
Two days covers the city - the mosque, the old lanes, the mausoleums, the bazaars - and you want one of them to be a Sunday. Add two or three more for the Karakoram Highway to Karakul and Tashkurgan, which is what most people really come for. Getting here is a long haul from anywhere, so treat it as a destination, not a stop.
▸ Can I get by with cash?
Awkwardly. Everyday spending runs on QR-code phone payment apps and many small vendors carry no float for notes. Cash is legal tender and hotels take it, but sorting out a working payment method before you arrive removes most of the friction, and more so here, where you are paying small amounts at markets and for short hops.
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