Hungary
Pecs
A painted Roman necropolis under the cathedral, an Ottoman mosque still working as a church, and a university town in between.
Pecs sits on the southern slope of the Mecsek hills near the Croatian border, and it has the most layered centre in Hungary. A four-towered cathedral stands over a set of fourth-century Christian burial chambers painted with biblical scenes, and five minutes downhill, on the main square, is the largest surviving Ottoman building in the country: a mosque that has served as a Catholic church for three centuries. Between them run the streets of a university town, roofed with the iridescent glazed tiles the local ceramics works sent all over the empire.
Suggested stay
2–3 days
Language
Hungarian
Currency
HUF
Timezone
UTC+2
Why you'll love Pecs
The layers Roman, Ottoman, Habsburg and Hungarian buildings all inside about ten minutes' walk of one another
The necropolis fourth-century burial chambers under the cathedral square, painted inside with Adam and Eve and Jonah, and open to walk down into
The mosque the largest Ottoman building left in Hungary, its prayer niche still in the wall and a cross above the dome
The tiles the local works invented the iridescent glaze that roofs landmark buildings across Hungary, and its old factory is now a quarter of museums and workshops
Best time to visit
Apr-Oct
17-28° days
46.077° N, 18.228° E
UTC+2 · Europe/Budapest
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Weather & when to go to Pecs
Month by month: typical highs and lows, rainfall and rain days.
✓ Best Apr-Oct
Cards tinted by calculated verdict · big number = typical daily high, small = low · hover for conditions
When to avoid Pecs
Winter here is grey and damp rather than crisp, and Pecs is one of the wetter corners of Hungary through the year; the compensation is that most of what you have come for is indoors. The city empties over the summer when the university is out, which takes a good deal of the life out of Kiraly utca even as the terraces fill with visitors. Spring and early autumn are the pick, and the vineyards south of town are working then.
Top things to do in Pecs
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The cathedral on Dom ter
history 👍 PopularFour corner towers over an eleventh-century core that was rebuilt in heavy neo-Romanesque in the nineteenth, with a frescoed interior and a crypt beneath. The square outside, walled and half-empty, is the calmest space in the city.
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The early Christian necropolis
history ⭐ Highly recommendedRoman burial chambers of the fourth century under the cathedral square, painted inside with Adam and Eve, Jonah and Christian monograms, entered down steps under a modern hall built over the largest of them. UNESCO-listed and unlike anything else north of the Alps.
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The mosque of Pasha Gazi Kasim
history 👍 PopularThe biggest Ottoman building left in Hungary, a square domed mosque at the top of the main square, built partly from the stones of the church it replaced and turned back into a church afterwards. The prayer niche and Koranic inscriptions are still in the walls under the Catholic fittings.
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Szechenyi ter
culture artsThe long sloping main square with the mosque closing the top of it, a Trinity column in the middle and, at the lower end, an ox-head drinking fountain glazed in the local iridescent green.
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Kiraly utca
nightlife musicThe pedestrian street running east off the main square, lined with nineteenth-century facades, the national theatre and the cafes and bars that carry the student life when term is on.
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The old ceramics works
culture arts 👍 PopularThe nineteenth-century porcelain factory east of the centre, rebuilt as a cultural quarter: museums of the ceramics and the family that made them, a puppet theatre, artists' studios and streets of tiled and glazed brick among the old kilns.
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The Csontvary Museum
culture artsThe biggest canvases of Csontvary Kosztka Tivadar, a pharmacist turned visionary painter who worked alone and enormous, hung in a townhouse below the cathedral.
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The Vasarely Museum
culture artsOp art by Victor Vasarely, installed in the house in the old town where he was born, with the geometric works that made him and a room of the pieces that read as three-dimensional.
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The synagogue on Kossuth ter
historyA large Romantic-style synagogue of the 1860s with its painted interior and ark intact, kept by a community that was almost entirely deported in 1944 and never returned to its former size.
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Tettye and the Mecsek slopes
scenic ⭐ Highly recommendedThe ruin of a Renaissance bishop's summer palace on a terrace above the town, with paths climbing on into beech woods and up to the lookout tower on Misina peak, which has the whole city and the plain below it.
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Villany reds and Baranya cooking
foodThe red wine country half an hour south pours in every bar here, cabernet franc above all; the local kitchen leans on paprika, freshwater fish from the Drava, and strudel pulled thin enough to read through.
Best areas to stay in Pecs
$ Budget $$ Mid-range $$$ Premium
Belvaros
First-time visitors $$The old town around Szechenyi square
Explore hotels in Belvaros →
Dom ter and the cathedral quarter
Quiet & central $$Quiet, leafy, walls and museums
Explore hotels in Dom ter and the cathedral quarter →
Tettye and the Mecsek slopes
Hills & views $Hillside streets above the town
Explore hotels in Tettye and the Mecsek slopes →
The old ceramics quarter
Best value $East of the centre, kilns and culture
Explore hotels in The old ceramics quarter →
Live nightly prices from Booking.com, Agoda and others, centred on Pecs
Getting to & around Pecs
Getting there
No usable airport: about three hours by direct train from Budapest, or under three by motorway
Train
Pecs station
Direct trains from Budapest take around three hours across the plain and through the hills, arriving south of the centre, about fifteen minutes' walk or a short bus ride from the main square
Coach
Pecs bus station
Coaches from Budapest run to a similar timing and serve the Baranya villages, Villany and the Croatian border towns
Drive
The M6 motorway
The motorway runs south from Budapest along the Danube and cuts the drive to under three hours; a car is also what you want for Villany and the Mecsek
Getting around
Walking
The old town is compact and mostly pedestrian, though it is built on a slope and the cathedral end is uphill from the square
Free
Bus
There are no trams here; buses are the whole network and reach the station, the ceramics quarter and the Mecsek slopes
TBC
Taxi
Easy to find on the main square and the usual way back up the hill late
TBC
Car
Worth having for the wine country, Siklos and the lakes on the far side of the Mecsek
TBC
Bicycle
Fine along the flat southern streets, less so once the ground starts climbing to Tettye
TBC
Day trips from Pecs
Villany
Half dayRed wine region
Hungary's warmest red wine country, where cabernet franc has become the regional signature, with a whole street of cellar doors cut into the hillside at Villanykovesd and tastings poured at the barrel.
Getting there
car | train | tour
40 min by car or train south
Siklos and Harkany
Full dayCastle & thermal baths
A castle that was never ruined, still roofed and inhabited above its town, with a Gothic chapel inside it, and a few minutes down the road the sulphurous thermal baths at Harkany that people come to for their skin and joints.
Getting there
car | bus
50 min by car or bus south
Mohacs
Half dayBattlefield memorial
The field where the Hungarian kingdom was broken by the Ottomans in 1526, now a memorial park where carved wooden grave markers stand over the excavated burial pits.
Getting there
car | bus | train
45 min by car or bus east
Orfu and Abaliget
Half dayLakes & cave
A chain of small reservoirs on the far side of the Mecsek used for swimming, rowing and cycling in summer, with a dripstone cave and a bat colony at Abaliget next door.
Getting there
car | bus
30 min by car or bus north
Szigetvar
Half daySiege fortress
The brick fortress where a small garrison under Miklos Zrinyi held out in 1566 long enough that the sultan died at its walls and the campaign toward Vienna stalled; the town keeps both Hungarian and Turkish memorials to it.
Getting there
car | train | bus
45 min by car or train west
A little history of Pecs
The Romans built Sopianae here and made it a provincial capital, and the Christian community of the fourth century cut and painted the burial chambers that are now the city's oldest and strangest sight. Stephen I founded the bishopric in 1009, and in 1367 Louis I established Hungary's first university in the town. The Ottomans took Pecs in 1543 and held it for a century and a half, which is where the mosque on the main square and the smaller one to the west come from.
After the reconquest the town rebuilt as a bishops' seat and later grew on coal from the Mecsek and on a ceramics works founded in the 1850s, whose frost-proof pyrogranite and iridescent eosin glaze ended up on landmark roofs across the empire. Uranium mining north-west of the centre built a whole district in the socialist decades and then closed. Pecs was a European Capital of Culture in 2010, which is when the old factory became the cultural quarter it is now.
The Romans build Sopianae, later a provincial capital
Christian burial chambers are cut and painted beneath the cemetery
Stephen I founds the bishopric of Pecs
Hungary's first university is founded here
The Ottomans take the city and hold it for a century and a half
A ceramics works is founded that will tile roofs across the empire
Pecs is a European Capital of Culture and the old factory becomes a cultural quarter
Know before you go
Payment
Cards & cash mixed
English
Widely spoken
Wifi
Reliable
Power
Type C / F
230 V, 50 Hz
Dialing
+36
The months our climate read flags to avoid: the wettest, lowest-rated weather of the year.
FAQs about Pecs
▸ How many days do you need in Pecs?
Two is comfortable: one for the cathedral, the necropolis and the mosque, and one for the museums, the ceramics quarter and a walk up to Tettye. A third buys Villany or Siklos.
▸ Is Pecs worth the trip from Budapest?
It is three hours each way, so not as a day trip. As an overnight or two it earns it: no other Hungarian city puts a painted Roman necropolis, a working Ottoman mosque and a nineteenth-century art collection within a ten-minute walk of each other.
▸ Can you go inside the mosque on the main square?
Yes. It functions as a Catholic church, so it keeps church visiting hours and asks for the usual quiet and covered shoulders. The Ottoman prayer niche and the inscriptions are still visible in the walls alongside the Christian fittings.
▸ What is the local wine?
Villany, half an hour south, is Hungary's warmest red region and its cabernet franc is the wine the country now shows off with. Szekszard, further east, makes a softer red. Both pour widely in Pecs, which is the easiest place to compare them without driving.
▸ Is Pecs walkable?
The old town is, and mostly pedestrian, but it sits on a slope: the cathedral and Tettye end is a real climb from the main square, and the station is a fifteen-minute walk downhill from it.
More in Hungary
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