Is Leipzig Zoo Worth Visiting?

Yes, if you can give it most of a day. Zoo Leipzig is ranked the best zoo in Germany and the second-best in Europe, after Vienna, and one ticket covers a rainforest hall larger than two football pitches, an ape enclosure where Max Planck researchers work, and, since 1 September 2026, an underwater tunnel more than 100 metres long in the new Feuerland. It is about a 10-minute walk from the central station in Leipzig, so you do not need a car to fit it into a city trip.

What not to miss

Featured location Zoo Leipzig Leipzig, Germany VDZWAZA A rebuilding programme is running until 2028, the year of the zoo's 150th anniversary. In Anthony Sheridan's ranking of European zoos it is placed second, behind Tiergarten Schönbrunn.

The zoo first opened in 1878 and now covers about 27 hectares, with about 850 animal species and subspecies by its own count. That is too much for a rushed afternoon, so pick your priorities before you go.

Gondwanaland

The zoo's tropical hall recreates the rainforests of Africa, Asia and South America under a roof larger than two football pitches, with almost 170 animal species and about 500 plant species. Climb up to the treetop path, where suspension bridges look out over the canopy, and look for the Komodo dragon, the largest living lizard, which can grow up to three metres long. Near the waterfall, two pygmy hippos share their enclosure with Diana monkeys.

The boat on the river Gamanile takes you on a journey through the Earth's history and through the rainforest. It is charged on top of admission: €3 for adults and €2.50 for children, as of September 2026.

Pongoland

Pongoland, opened in 2001, keeps chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas and orangutans. The Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology runs its Wolfgang Köhler Primate Research Center here, and you can watch its researchers studying the apes' behaviour, perception and communication. Come in the morning: the zoo says that is the best time to see them at work.

At the gate to Pongoland, the Gorilla Trek is a 360-degree virtual-reality experience in a moving cinema seat, recommended from age 6. It costs €7 for adults and €5 for children.

Feuerland and the new aviaries

Feuerland, in the southern tip of the zoo, opened on 1 September as a coastal and marine landscape that takes you to South America's Pacific coast. Its pool holds more than five million litres of water, with rugged rock faces and beach sections, and a tunnel more than 100 metres long runs through it, giving you 360-degree views of the seals and Humboldt penguins. You need no extra ticket.

Since 2 April 2026 you can also walk through two huge parrot aviaries, Amazonien and Loriversum. At about 830 square metres, Amazonien is the largest macaw aviary in central Germany.

Elephants, tigers and the savannah

In the elephant temple Ganesha Mandir you can regularly watch the elephants swimming underwater through a transparent screen in the temple cellar. Amur tigers prowl the wooded Tiger Taiga, and the Himalaya mountain landscape, opened in August 2017, was built for snow leopards and red pandas. In the Africa area, the 25,000-square-metre Kiwara Savannah is shared by Grévy's zebras, Rothschild's giraffes, Thomson's gazelles, Nile lechwes and ostriches.

Tickets and saving money

The zoo charges one price in summer, from 21 March to 31 October, and a lower one in winter, from 1 November to 20 March. These were the prices in September 2026:

• Adults: €27 in summer, €23 in winter.
• Children aged 6-16: €18 in summer, €15 in winter; children under 6 go free.
• Family, two adults and up to four children aged 6-16: €70 in summer, €60 in winter.
• Evening ticket, sold from three hours before closing: €21 for adults in summer, €19 in winter.

Prices rose on 1 April 2026, by €1 for single tickets and €3 for the family ticket.

If you have a Leipzig-Card, show it: card holders pay €23 per adult in summer and €19 in winter. Reduced tickets for school pupils, students, apprentices and holders of a severe-disability pass are sold only at the ticket desk on the day of your visit, not online.

Best time to visit

Summer gives you the longest day: the zoo closes at 7pm from 1 May to 30 September, against 5pm from November to 20 March and 3pm on Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve. Leipzig's summers average 19 °C, with daytime temperatures of 24 °C, while its winters are cold, averaging around 1 °C.

Winter is cheaper, and Gondwanaland is a covered hall, so a cold day costs you less here than at an open-air zoo. In early 2026 the zoo also ran an evening light festival, the Magisches Tropenleuchten, from 8 January to 8 February.

Plan around Saxony's school holidays: the autumn break runs from 12 to 24 October 2026 and the winter break from 8 to 19 February 2027.

Getting there

The zoo is at Pfaffendorfer Straße 29, 04105 Leipzig, close to the central station: take tram 12 or walk for about 10 minutes. Leipzig is about 150 km southwest of Berlin, which puts the zoo within day-trip range of the capital.

If you drive, two covered car parks directly opposite the main entrance have 1,375 spaces, open around the clock. Parking costs €1 for each hour started, or €8 for a day ticket of up to 12 hours. Dogs are not allowed in the zoo.

With kids and accessibility

The zoo's paths are wide, with ramps suited to wheelchairs and buggies, and it lends wheelchairs free of charge against a deposit, bookable by phone. There is a lift in the elephant temple Ganesha Mandir and another up to the viewing platform in Gondwanaland, the jungle-river boat takes wheelchairs, and every part of Feuerland is step-free, with lifts at both ends of the underwater tunnel. Visitors with disabilities can buy tickets without queuing at the desk in the safari office.

Pushchairs need planning. You can hire a stroller or cart for €5 a day plus a €10 deposit, but the zoo asks you to leave it outside Gondwanaland, where the paths are narrow, and pushchairs are banned on Feuerland's penguin coast and in the whole tunnel. If your child cannot walk yet, bring a baby carrier or sling. Scooters and balance bikes cannot come in, but the service point will keep them. Lockers are free, though the lock needs a €1 coin.

For small children, the petting kraal in the Kiwara village has Damara goats and pot-bellied pigs, and the El Ranchito petting area, opposite the flamingo lagoon, has rabbits and pygmy goats.

Other wildlife nearby

For a cheaper second outing, Wildpark Leipzig charges no admission at all. It covers 42 hectares on the city's southern outskirts in Connewitz and shows about 250 animals of around 25 species that live, or once lived, in Central Europe. There are large enclosures for deer, wild boar, elk and European bison, while lynxes, otters, wildcats, raccoons, red foxes and European mink live in open outdoor enclosures. Its two playgrounds make it an easy half day with children.

The Wildpark sits inside the Leipzig Riverside Forest, one of the largest lowland riparian forests in Central Europe, stretching a good 30 km along the White Elster, Pleiße and Luppe rivers. Paddlers should note that some of its waterways close during the kingfisher's breeding season.