Discover Austria

Austria packs an extraordinary range into a small country: Vienna’s Habsburg palaces and world-class concert halls, Salzburg’s baroque old town and festival summer, and the Tyrolean Alps around Innsbruck offering some of the continent’s best skiing and hiking. The landscape shifts from the Danube valley and lake districts of the Salzkammergut to high mountain passes within a few hours’ drive.

Vienna rewards slow exploration — the Kunsthistorisches Museum, the Belvedere, the Naschmarkt food hall and the coffeehouse circuit all repay a long stay. Away from the capital, Hallstatt’s lakeside beauty, the Sound of Music routes around Salzburg and cable-car ascents above Innsbruck make Austria a year-round, multi-interest destination.

Top places in Austria

• Vienna — Imperial palaces, grand museums, the Staatsoper and a legendary coffeehouse-and-wine-bar culture.
• Salzburg — Mozart’s birthplace — a baroque old town beneath a fortress, best known for its summer music festival.
• Innsbruck — Tyrolean capital with a golden roof, a compact medieval centre and cable cars rising straight from the city to the Alps.
• Hallstatt & the Salzkammergut — The postcard lakeside village in a UNESCO alpine lake district — one of Austria’s most photographed spots.
• Graz — Austria’s second city: Renaissance courtyards, a Schlossberg clock tower and a buzzing design-and-food scene.