Dublin
Ireland
A small capital with a very large literature, and a pub for every page of it
Photo by Leonhard Niederwimmer on Unsplash
Photos by Jeremy Matteo, Diogo Palhais, Alex Block and Jean Vella on Unsplash
Best time to visit all of Ireland
May to September (and it will rain in all of them)
Climate month by month
The next sixteen daysOpen-Meteo
Average high and low · °C
Rainfall · mm per month
Best months to visit This month · wettest 80mm in Oct
Where it is
53.35°N, 6.26°W Open in Google Maps
Things to do
A week easily- See the Book of Kells and then the Long Room, which is the better half
- Walk the Howth cliff path and eat crab afterwards
- Take the tour of Kilmainham Gaol, which explains the country
- Find a pub with a session rather than a band — the Cobblestone in Smithfield
- Ride the DART south to Dalkey on a clear afternoon
Dublin travel tipsthe general rules
Currency budget Ireland
ExpensiveEuros in the Republic and pounds in Northern Ireland, which is ninety minutes up the road — a day trip to Belfast needs both or a card. Cards and phones are taken everywhere, including for a two-euro coffee.
ATMs & cards
AIB, Bank of Ireland and Permanent TSB machines are free to use. The private machines in convenience shops charge a fee that is disclosed on screen — read it.
Avoid these
- the private machines in convenience shops, which charge a disclosed fee
Use these instead
- AIB
- Bank of Ireland
- Permanent TSB
Bank machines are free. If a screen tells you there is a charge, that is a private operator — walk to a bank branch instead.
Wherever you are: if the machine offers to charge you in your home currency, decline. That is dynamic currency conversion and the rate is set by the ATM's operator, not your bank.
Safety all of Ireland
SafeGenerally safe and easy to walk, with a rougher edge after closing time around the north inner city and parts of Temple Bar. Bike theft is endemic and phone snatching has risen. The one thing visitors misjudge is the weather: it changes four times a day and a jacket in July is not optional.
Where to walk, and where to pay attention (9 areas)
Comfortable, including after dark
- Ranelagh
- Rathmines
- Ballsbridge
- Portobello
- Temple Bar — by day
Worth more attention
- Temple Bar — at closing time, which is drunk crowds rather than crime — and is where every pint costs double
- North Inner City — and around Connolly late at night
- Bike theft, which is endemic, and phone snatching, which has risen sharply
- The weather, which changes four times a day and which people underestimate on a coastal walk
Our own assessment, not a sourced index.
Entry & visa Ireland visa rules
No visa needed
Freedom of movement, and no time limit. Ireland is not in Schengen, so there is a passport check on arrival even from an EU country.
Other passports
No visa neededup to 90 days
Ireland is outside Schengen, so days here do not count against a Schengen 90-in-180 allowance — which makes it a useful place to spend a fortnight mid-trip.
No visa needed
The Common Travel Area predates both countries’ EU membership and survived Brexit: British citizens can live and work here without any permission at all.
Visa required in advance
Entry rules change often and depend on your passport, not where you live — the official page above is the authority, and the airline checks before you board.
Health & emergencies all of Ireland
Good and affordableRequired to enter
No vaccinations are required for entry from Europe or North America.
Jabs worth having, and what happens if you need a doctor
Worth having
- Tetanus up to date
Getting treated
Good, and free at the point of use in an emergency for EU and UK visitors. Non-emergency GP visits are paid and cost €50–70. Waiting times in public emergency departments are long and well documented.
Nothing to plan around. The weather is what catches people: hypothermia on coastal walks in what looked like a mild day, and the Cliffs of Moher in wind.
Orientation, not medical advice — entry rules change and what you need depends on your own history. Check with a travel clinic four to six weeks before you go.
Food tip
Very goodDublin has quietly become good: seafood from Howth, the Fumbally and the market cafés, and a bakery scene that would surprise anyone who last came in 2005. A proper pint of Guinness is poured in two parts and takes two minutes — if it arrives in one, it was not.
Nightlife
The pub, which is the social institution rather than a venue — and a live music session, which is not a gig.
- Temple Bar — the tourist version, and the expensive one
- The Cobblestone — Smithfield, and the traditional session that matters
- Camden Street — where Dubliners actually drink
- Portobello — the canal bars, and the walk along it
Closing: Pubs 23:30 midweek, 00:30 at the weekend; late bars to 02:30.
A beer in a bar: €6–8
A session is musicians playing for each other, not a performance — sit, listen, and do not talk over it.
Getting around
Easy- UberWorks here
- BoltWorks here
- FREE NOWWorks here
FREE NOW taxis only; Ireland licenses no private hire · Uber also taxis only, same cars
- From the airport
- Dublin airport to the centre €25–35
- Against a taxi
- Identical, because they are the same metered taxis. The app saves the wait, not the fare.
Every fare is on the national taxi meter, so no app can undercut another.
Time zone and your working day
Europe/Dublin — 5 hours ahead of you
3 hours of overlap with a 09:00–17:00 day where you are — 09:00–12:00 your time, 14:00–17:00 theirs.
No overlap with a 09:00–17:00 day where you are. Working from here means one of you keeps odd hours — their day starts at 04:00 on your clock.
office hours both at once night
Their 09:00–17:00 is 04:00–12:00 on yours.
The difference from the UK, Europe, the US and ten more
Worked out against America/New York, which is where this request looks like it came from.
Internet speedall of Ireland
What these numbers mean
Home broadband — Fast. Several people on calls at once, large uploads, 4K. Broadband here runs at 1.6× the global median of 130 Mbps.
Mobile data — Good. Maps, calls and streaming, and enough to tether a laptop for an afternoon. Mobile runs at 1.4× the global median of 109 Mbps.
A median is the middle of every connection tested there, old copper and new fibre together — so in a country part-way through laying fibre it sits well below what a fibre line actually delivers, and a rental on one can run several times this number. Half of the connections are slower; a fibre flat is rarely one of them. It says what a place can do, not what your rental does, so every listing on Holistay carries its own measured speed and the date it was tested.
Getting online: Airalo or Holafly — a data eSIM for Ireland, installed before you fly and working the moment you land.
Source: Ookla Speedtest Global Index · measured June 2026
Must-see
Nearby day trips
Say a few words
Irish English, and a little Irish
- HelloDia duitDEE-a gwitch
- Thank youGo raibh maith agatguh rev mah AG-ut
- Cheers / good healthSláinteSLAWN-cha
- WelcomeFáilteFAWL-cha
5 more phrases
- How are you?How's the craic?hows the crack
- Fun, good timesThe craicthe crack
- GrandGrandmeans fine, and is the answer to almost anything
- Your roundYour shoutand it will be noticed if it is not
- GoodbyeSlánslawn
English is the working language everywhere. Irish is a living first language in the Gaeltacht areas of the west and is on every road sign in the country. A word or two of it is heard as a courtesy rather than a performance.
Religion
Roman Catholic, in a country that has changed fast
Still nominally around 70% Catholic and with a fraction of that attending. The church’s authority collapsed within a generation, and the referendums of 2015 and 2018 are the shorthand for it. The buildings are worth visiting; the assumptions are out of date.
Do's and don'ts
Do
- Buy your round, and buy it in turn — this is the one social rule that genuinely matters
- Take the conversation; a stranger talking to you in a pub is being friendly, not strange
- Let a pint of stout settle for the two minutes it takes
- Say thanks to the bus driver as you get off, which everybody does
Don't
- Do not skip your round, which is remembered
- Do not call it England, or the British Isles, or ask which part of Britain it is
- Do not order an Irish car bomb, which is a name Americans invented and nobody here finds funny
- Do not talk over live music in a pub session, which is a performance rather than a background
Where to stay in Dublin
No Holistay rentals in Dublin yet — the platform is just opening up. Every listing here will have a video tour and the option to negotiate the nightly price directly with the host.
In the meantime, here is Dublin on the sites that do have the inventory — each search is already filled in:
- Booking.com hotels, guesthouses and apartments — the widest coverage almost everywhere
- Airbnb whole homes and apartments, and the better option for a week or more
How to get there
Fly into Dublin DUB
30 minfrom the airport· 9 km as the crow flies
30 min by Airlink bus — there is no rail link.
Google Flights · Rome2Rio for the trains, buses and ferries as well as the flights
