Eighteen pools in a yellow neo-Baroque palace, including the outdoor ones where men play chess in the steam.
Budapest sits on more than a hundred thermal springs, which is why there has been a bathing culture here since the Romans and why the Ottomans, who took the city in 1541, built domed bathhouses that are still in use. Széchenyi is not one of the old ones. It opened in 1913, was extended in 1927, and is the largest medicinal bath complex in Europe.
The water comes up from two wells, the deeper at around 1,250 metres, at 74 to 77°C, and is cooled before it reaches the pools. It is rich in sulphate, calcium, magnesium and fluoride, and it smells faintly of it.
The pools
There are three outdoor pools and fifteen indoor. The outdoor ones are the image everyone knows: a hot pool at about 38°C, a cooler one at 27°C with a circular current channel that pulls you round, and a lap pool between them at 26–28°C, where a cap is compulsory. In winter these are the ones to be in — steam coming off the water, snow on the balustrades, and the chess players who set up boards on the ledges of the hot pool.
Indoors is a warren of smaller thermal pools at different temperatures, saunas, steam rooms and plunge pools. The temperature of each is posted on the wall. Some of the hottest are 38–40°C and should be taken in short sittings.
Tickets and cabins
You buy either a locker or a cabin; a cabin is a private changing cubicle and worth the small extra cost, particularly in a group. Entry is cheaper on weekdays and after a certain hour in the afternoon. Book online to skip the ticket queue, which in summer is long.
When to go
Early morning, from opening, is the quietest by a wide margin. Weekend afternoons are packed. Winter is genuinely better than summer — the outdoor pools are more atmospheric and the indoor complex is less crowded.
The “sparty” night events, held in the complex on some Saturdays, are a different proposition entirely and nothing like the daytime experience. If you want the baths, do not go to those.
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