Your visit

Golden Temple (Harmandir Sahib)Laid out in the order pilgrims move through it.

Amritsar, Punjab · Sikh shrine. The stops below are the shrines, gates and halls of the place itself, in the order pilgrims move through them.

You wroteGolden Temple (Harmandir Sahib)

The visit, in the order the place takes it

Our suggestion is two days here. How long to stay is our suggestion, not a temple-published figure. No shrine publishes a length of visit — group the stops to suit your own party.

First

into the complex, and the langar

The entrance — joda ghar, head cover, water channelFootwear is left at the joda ghar and the head is covered before you go in; head coverings are available at the entrance. You walk through a shallow channel that washes the feet, then down steps — the shrine sits below street level, and you descend to it.the clock-tower gate, from the old city outside.
The parikrama around the Amrit SarovarThe marble walkway around the sacred pool that gives Amritsar its name. Walk it before joining the causeway queue.the walkway ringing the pool, immediately inside the gate.
Harmandir SahibThe gilded central shrine, reached along the causeway. Its four doors face the four directions as a sign that it is open to everyone. Inside, the Guru Granth Sahib is read and Gurbani is sung.along the causeway from the parikrama.
Karah prasadTaken in cupped hands on the way out, and given to everyone alike regardless of who they are.at the causeway end.
Akal TakhtFacing the causeway, the seat of temporal authority in Sikhism and the second of the complex's great buildings.directly across from the Harmandir Sahib.
Guru-ka-LangarThe kitchen that feeds everyone who comes, seated in rows on the floor without distinction of caste, faith or means. Visitors may take a turn at the kneading, the serving or the washing-up.in the complex, past the far side of the sarovar.

The Palki SahibThe Guru Granth Sahib is carried in a palanquin between the Harmandir Sahib and the Akal Takht, and sangat take a turn at the poles as it passes. The hour shifts with the season and with festival days — check SGPC before you plan an evening around it.along the causeway; stand on the parikrama to watch.
Gurdwara Baba Atal SahibThe tall tiered tower gurdwara standing just beside the main complex.a short walk from the sarovar, outside the main wall.
Central Sikh MuseumInside the clock-tower entrance, holding paintings, arms and manuscripts of Sikh history.at the main gate of the complex.
Jallianwala BaghThe walled garden where the 1919 massacre took place. It adjoins the temple complex, and the narrow entry lane is still there.adjoining the complex, a walk from the main gate.
Partition MuseumIn the old town hall, on the story of 1947 as it fell on Punjab.in the old town, near the complex.

Before you go

THE RITE

Langar sewa

At Guru-ka-Langar, inside the complex

Not a puja — a service. Everyone sits on the floor in rows and eats the same food, and anyone may join the kneading, the cooking or the washing-up. It is the practical form of the Sikh teaching that nobody stands above anybody else.

THE GIVING

Where a gift goes

Sewa with your own hands in the langar, a contribution of grain or funds to the kitchen, or the golak offering inside the shrine. Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC), which manages the complex, its langar and its sarais. Give inside the complex, not through a third party.

THE SEASON

When to come

Vaisakhi in April and Guru Nanak's Gurpurab in the late autumn draw the largest sangat of the year, and the complex is lit for Bandi Chhor Divas. SGPC publishes the dates.

The town around the shrine

The complex is walled and entered on foot, with the old city's bazaars immediately outside the gates.
SGPC runs sarais — pilgrim lodgings — next to the complex. Book them and check what they charge through SGPC, not through an agent.
Heads stay covered and feet bare everywhere inside. Tobacco and alcohol are not carried in at all.
Jallianwala Bagh adjoins the complex and the Partition Museum is in the same old town, so the second day needs no vehicle.
The Wagah border ceremony, in the evening, is the usual excursion out of Amritsar.

This plan is free, and nothing on this page is sold. We work out the visit, then hand you to the temple's own desk.

The plan ends hereand the temple takes it from you.

A booking, a seva, a room, a fee — every one of those is the shrine's own, taken at its own counter or on its own site. We do not stand between you and it, and we take nothing from what you give.

Open the temple page The shrine's own site

The town around the shrine