Berlin is the self-proclaimed gay and lesbian capital of Europe. Given the large number of gay bars and parties, gay-friendly hotels, street festivals and Pride events year-round, Berlin is a mecca for LGBT travelers.
We've created this post to navigate you to the gay Berlin resources and activities you'll want to know about.
- Gay Walking Tours of Berlin
- Useful Gay Berlin Websites
- Gay Historical Sights
- Annual LGBT Events in Berlin
- Tips on Visiting Berlin
- Things to Do in Berlin
GAY WALKING TOURS
This 4-hour tour visits Schoeneberg, Berlin's primary gay neighborhood. Your guide will share stories of gay and lesbian German heros. You will stop at one of Berlin's oldest queer bars and also at the Gay Museum in Kreuzberg.
Gay Culture Bike Tour
Cover a lot of ground in 3 hours by riding through the gay neighborhood of Berlin, see the city's gay monuments and historic and modern gay bars. Ride past sites that were significant to prominent gay Berlin figures like David Bowie and Marlene Dietrich.
Out in Schöneberg
In this 90-minute tour, you will see a lot, including the Nationalhof, the gay rights movement's ballroom between 1924 and 1932 and learn about gay Berlin in the 1920s. You'll visit the lesbian quarter along the Schwerin Straße, and much more.
Rainbow Gay Tours
Offers several gay-friendly different tours including a City Center Tour, a Berlin Neighborhoods Tour, and a Gay Nightlife tour. When booking, try using the voucher code 'PATROC' to get a discount of 10%.
FREE TOURS FOR EVERYONE
Alternative Berlin
These free tip-based tours will take you beyond the tourist destinations to the heart and soul of the city. We recommend their highly regarded Street Art & Grafitti Tour, as Berlin is the capital of Street Art.
Free Tours by Foot
While our tours are not specifically geared towards gay culture and history in Berlin, our tours are inclusive and welcome everyone! We offer pay-what-you-wish walking tours and also have many self-guided tours of Berlin neighborhoods for you to enjoy for free.
USEFUL GAY BERLIN WEBSITES
Berlin Gay Travel Guide by Patroc
This extensive guide to Gay Berlin is presented in a very user-friendly website. It simply conveys a lot of information about the things you want to know.
Find out about gay hotels, cafes, and restaurants, bars, clubs & parties, cruising, cinemas, saunas and shops.
They offer online maps of the different LGBT friendly neighborhoods of Schöneberg, Prenzlauer Berg, Kreuzberg, Neukölln, Mitte and Friedrichshain.
OUT in Berlin
The ultimate resource to find out about all things LGBT happening in Berlin.
This site lists the of the usual suspects: gay neighborhoods, gay pride events, queer cinema, nightlife, hotels—and a handy calendar of what’s going on every night.
Gay Cities: Berlin
A fabulous guide with lots of listings of gay bars & clubs, restaurants, bathhouses, saunas & sex clubs, gay-friendly hotels, B&Bs, shops & boutiques.
Gay Welcome Berlin
Very useful site for its events calendar. It also has news articles about gay culture in Berlin.
Travel Gay Europe
A pretty good guide to Berlin with a helpful Gay Berlin Map and a cut-to-the-chase itinerary for "Two Days in Berlin".
This site has quite a bit of adverts, do your best to ignore them and you will find some juicy bits of information.
GAY HISTORICAL AND CULTURAL SIGHTS
Memorial to the Homosexuals Persecuted under Nazism
During the Nazi era, gay men were one of the many groups persecuted and killed under the regime.
These victims of Nazism were not officially recognized after 1945 and throughout the 1950s and 1960s the infamous Paragraph 175 (which made homosexuality a crime) was still included in German Criminal laws.
In 2003, after 10 years of prodding by gay activists, Berlin approved the erection of a memorial to the gay victims of the Nazis.
It wasn’t until 2008 that the memorial was completed. It is located in beautiful Tiergarten, near the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe.
Schwules Museum
Founded in 1985, in what was then still communist East Berlin, this non-profit museum in the Schöneberg neighborhood is one of the largest institutions that documents LGBT culture throughout the world, with a focus on Berlin and Germany.
In addition to its vast archive of relevant material, the Museum has rotating exhibits and events related to LGBT history, art and culture.
LGBT EVENTS IN BERLIN
Stadtfest Berlin - Europe’s biggest Lesbian-Gay City Festival every July.
Lesbian and Gay Festival Park in Friedrichshain - every August
XPOSED International Queer Film Festival - every May
Check our posts on things to do in Berlin by month for activities for everyone.
TIPS ON VISITING BERLIN
In addition to walking, bike, and bus sightseeing tours, there are many attractions to see as well as tips on how to travel around the city, how to save money or how to do things for free.
Below are some of the top articles from our Berlin blog.
- Berlin Public Transportation
- Top 13 Free Things to Do in Berlin
- How to Get Tickets to the Reichstag
- Things to Do at Night
- Welcome Card vs. City Tour Card
- Visit the East Side Gallery
- Go to the Top of the TV Tower