5 guides, each rated 1 to 5 with the reason — and two lists per place, where you are comfortable and where to pay attention. Nowhere is called dangerous; the specific thing is what helps.
Very comfortable and small. The mountain road to Ilisu has drops and the weather; the border zone with Russia begins beyond it and is not for wandering. That is the list.
Comfortable: the old town · the caravanserai quarter
Very comfortable and family-oriented. The cable car closes in wind; the waterfall paths are wet rock; the resort roads are driven fast. Nothing else.
Comfortable: the resort area · Nohur lake
Very comfortable and tiny. The gorge road is the hazard — narrow, unbarriered, and cut by landslides after rain — and the driver from Ismayilli knows it. The village itself is a street.
Comfortable: the village
Very comfortable in the town. The Khinalug road is the hazard: drops, weather, and a village at 2,300 m where the nights are cold in August. A driver who knows the road, and a jacket.
Comfortable: the town · Qırmızı Qəsəbə
Very comfortable, orderly and walked at night along the boulevard. Taxi overcharging off the app is the complaint; the police are polite and everywhere. The war with Armenia is recent and the subject is not a joke; Armenian stamps in a passport are asked about. Do not photograph anything military or the oil installations.
Comfortable: Icherisheher, the old city · the seaside boulevard · Nizami street · Fountains Square
The ratings are this site's own, from the guides' authors and the corrections readers send in; they are not an index. Read the general advice in travel safety tips.
BakuAzerbaijanA walled medieval city inside an oil-boom city on the Caspian: Flame Towers over a Zoroastrian tower, a boulevard along the sea, and mud volcanoes and fire temples an hour out
ShekiAzerbaijanA Silk Road town in the Caucasus foothills with a khan’s palace of stained glass and no nails, a caravanserai to sleep in, and a sweet the town is named for
GabalaAzerbaijanThe country’s mountain resort: a cable car up the Caucasus, ski runs in winter, a lake and waterfalls in summer, and the ruins of the ancient capital beside it
LahijAzerbaijanA coppersmiths’ village up a gorge, cobbled by hand a thousand years ago, with a sewer system older than most capitals and the hammers still going
QubaAzerbaijanApple orchards under the Caucasus, a Jewish town across the river that has been there for centuries, and Khinalug, a village at 2,300 m that speaks its own language