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Berlin Cold War Walking TourThe gold tent roof of the Berlin PhilharmonieOffice towers beyond the park lawn at Potsdamer Platz

Berlin Cold War Audio Walking Tour

A self-guided Berlin walk from the Philharmonie across Potsdamer Platz and past the Topography of Terror to Checkpoint Charlie and the Jewish Museum.

2.7 km walk37 min walking5 stopsFrom Berlin Philharmonie to Jewish Museum Berlin12 min of stories6 languages: English, German, French, Spanish, Japanese, Arabic
$7.99
  • 5 stops and 12 minutes of stories, told as you reach each place
  • The intro and stop 1 are free in the app: try before you buy
  • Download before you go; the audio plays without signal (the street map needs a connection)
  • Walking with friends? Pick 1 to 10 seats; everyone hears each stop on their own phone, at the same moment
Hear stop 1
30 seconds of the real narration

Plays in the free Walk With Me app on iPhone and Android.

What you'll see

The gold tent roof of the Berlin Philharmonie
The gold tent roof of the Berlin PhilharmonieThe tent shape follows the hall inside, where the orchestra plays at the center and the audience rises around it in stepped rows.
Office towers beyond the park lawn at Potsdamer Platz
Office towers beyond the park lawn at Potsdamer PlatzUntil 1989 this was sand and watchtowers; near the station entrances, original Wall slabs stand beside panels on what happened here.
The US Army checkpoint hut at Checkpoint Charlie
The US Army checkpoint hut at Checkpoint CharlieThe C comes from the military alphabet, not a person, and in October 1961 American and Soviet tanks faced each other on this junction.

About this tour

The Wall is gone from almost every street on this route, and that is exactly why it is worth walking. On foot you notice how close everything was: a concert hall, a museum and a secret police headquarters, all within a few minutes of a border that split families for a generation. You feel the scale of Potsdamer Platz, the narrowness of the street where tanks faced each other, and the silence that settles once you step into the Jewish Museum. A car or a bus would carry you past all of it in a few minutes, but walking gives each place the time it asks for. Afterward, Kreuzberg's cafes are all around you, and it is good to sit down somewhere and talk over what you have seen. If you would like company for your next walk, open the Walk With Me live map to find other people out walking Berlin.

The route

2.7 km in walking order from Berlin Philharmonie to Jewish Museum Berlin. Stop 1 is free in the app.

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  1. 1Berlin PhilharmonieScharoun's golden, tent-shaped concert hall, meant for the city center but opened beside the Wall, and a blue glass memorial nearby.Free in the app
  2. 2Potsdamer PlatzGlass towers on a junction once jammed with trams, then left as a sandy no man's land, and a copied traffic light to spot.
  3. 3Martin-Gropius-BauAn ornate brick museum from 1881 whose front door once faced the Wall, a long surviving stretch of it, and the Gestapo site behind.
  4. 4Checkpoint CharlieThe copied American guardhouse in the middle of Friedrichstrasse, where the name really came from, and an October standoff of tanks.
  5. 5Jewish Museum BerlinLibeskind's zigzag zinc building, reached through a Baroque courthouse, and three sloping corridors below that each end somewhere very different.

Before you go

The walking itself takes around forty minutes, but give yourself half a day. The Topography of Terror, the museum at Checkpoint Charlie and above all the Jewish Museum can each hold you for an hour or more, and the Jewish Museum deserves a proper visit rather than a quick look. The route is flat and paved the whole way, with some busy road crossings around Potsdamer Platz, so keep your eyes up there. There is little shade between the big buildings, and in winter the wind cuts across the open squares, so dress for the weather. Mornings are calmer at Checkpoint Charlie, which gets crowded by midday. The Jewish Museum has airport-style security at the entrance and sometimes asks you to book a time slot, so check before you go. As you walk, look down now and then for small brass plaques set into the pavement in front of doorways. They are Stolpersteine, stumbling stones, each one carrying the name of a person who lived in that building and was deported or murdered under the Nazis. There are thousands of them across Berlin.

Is it for you?

Good ifYou want Wall, Cold War and Nazi-era sites in one short, flat walk, with time left over for the Topography of Terror and the Jewish Museum.
Maybe not ifYou want a light sightseeing stroll: much of what you hear is heavy, and the walk ends at the Jewish Museum, which deserves a proper visit.

Toilets and water on the way

3 public toilets (2 free) and 3 drinking fountains within 150 m of the route.

StopNearest toiletNearest water
1. Berlin Philharmonie121 m, free357 m
2. Potsdamer Platz214 m191 m
3. Martin-Gropius-Bau137 m, free327 m
4. Checkpoint Charlie361 m, free61 m
5. Jewish Museum Berlin636 m, free350 m

The full map is in our Berlin guide. Data © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Not quite this one?

  • Berlin 1945 Fall of the City Walk, 5.1 km, $16.99

Before you walk Berlin

Our Berlin city guideWhat's shut on which day, free toilets and water, what's worth it and what it costs.
Open the guideToilets and water

By Yahya, founder of Walk With Me · Written · How we write

Photos: Bengt Oberger / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0; Dirk Le / Pexels.