Helsinki
Finland
A granite capital on the Baltic, built around the sauna and the sea, and where most Lapland trips change planes
Photo by Tapio Haaja on Unsplash
Photos by Alexandr Bormotin, Veikko Venemies, Julius Jansson and Alexandr Bormotin on Unsplash
Best time to visit all of Finland
June to August for the long light, and December for the dark, the lights and the sauna
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 Aug
Where it is
60.17°N, 24.94°E Open in Google Maps
Things to do
Several days- Take the ferry to Suomenlinna on a transport ticket rather than a tour boat
- Go to a public sauna and get into the sea afterwards, in any season
- Eat the weekday lunch buffet, which costs a fraction of dinner
- Walk the shore from Kaivopuisto to Hernesaari on a summer evening, when it is still light at eleven
- Do not plan a winter week here around the northern lights
Helsinki travel tipsthe general rules
Currency budget Finland
ExpensiveEuro, and close to cashless: cards and phones pay for the tram, the sauna and the market stall. There is no reason to arrive with cash or to change any.
ATMs & cards
Otto and Nosto machines are everywhere and you will rarely need one. Both charge foreign cards an access fee and show it on the screen before you agree. Decline the conversion.
Avoid these
- any machine that offers to charge you in your own currency
- exchange counters, since nothing here needs cash
Use these instead
- Otto
- Nosto
Both networks charge foreign cards an access fee and show it before you confirm. Cards and phones are taken everywhere, so most visitors withdraw nothing.
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 Finland
Very safeOne of the safest capitals in Europe. Late at night the area around the Central Railway Station has drunkenness rather than crime. In winter the risks are ice on the pavements and the frozen sea, which people do walk out on and which is thinner near the shore and the harbour channels than it looks. The gulls at Market Square take food out of hands. Helsinki is not an aurora destination: it is a night train or an hour’s flight north to where the odds are worth a trip.
Where to walk, and where to pay attention (9 areas)
Comfortable, including after dark
Worth more attention
- Helsinki Central Station — late at night, for drunkenness rather than anything aimed at visitors
- Market Square — pickpockets on cruise-ship days in summer, and the gulls, which take food out of hands
- the frozen sea — people walk out on it, and the ice near the shore and the shipping channels is thinner than it looks
- the pavements in winter — ice under fresh snow, from late autumn to the spring thaw
Our own assessment, not a sourced index.
Entry & visa Finland visa rules
No visa needed
Freedom of movement — no time limit, and no visa. Bring a passport or national ID card.
Other passports
No visa neededup to 90 days
90 days within any 180-day period, counted across the whole Schengen area, not per country. ETIAS, a paid online authorisation, is being introduced for these passports — check the official link for whether it applies to your travel dates.
Visa required in advance€90 (Schengen short-stay visa)
A Schengen short-stay visa is applied for before travel, at the consulate of your main destination.
How to get it: Apply at the consulate or visa centre of the country you will spend most time in, typically 15 working days ahead and no more than six months before travel.
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 Finland
Excellent and cheapRequired 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
- Tick-borne encephalitis for a summer on the coast, the archipelago or Åland
Getting treated
Excellent, and public. The EHIC and GHIC are accepted and visitors pay the same small fees residents do. In Lapland the distances are the issue: the central hospital is in Rovaniemi, and from the fells further north that is hours by road.
The cold, which is the whole health question in a Lapland winter: −25°C is ordinary, frostbite on a still night at a lake comes faster than people expect, and the thermal suits the operators lend are not a formality. Ticks in summer in the south and along the coast. Mosquitoes in Lapland in high summer, in numbers people do not believe until they arrive.
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 goodSalmon soup at the Old Market Hall, Karelian pies with egg butter, and rye bread with everything. Weekday lunch, lounas, is a fixed-price buffet in most restaurants and is how the city eats out without paying dinner prices; keep the new Nordic tasting menus for one evening.
Travel tipsNightlife
A real weekend scene of cheap bars, cocktail bars and a few clubs, quiet on weeknights and starting late on Friday and Saturday.
- Kallio — the cheap bars, along Helsinginkatu and the streets off it
- Punavuori — the cocktail bars and the wine bars
- Kamppi — the central clubs, a few minutes from the station
Closing: Most bars 02:00; clubs serve until 04:00 at weekends, which is the legal limit.
Shops sell drinks up to 8% until 21:00; anything stronger comes from Alko, the state chain, which keeps shop hours and is shut on Sundays in most places.
Getting around
Easy- UberWorks here
- BoltWorks here
- YangoWorks here
Yango Helsinki
- From the airport
- Helsinki airport to the centre around €40–48 by app, against under €5 on the train
- Against a taxi
- Usually under the meter, though the apps price dynamically and a busy night can turn that round.
The apps thin out the further north you go. Away from the cities the taxi is booked by phone or through the hotel, and in the fell resorts a transfer is often arranged with the stay.
Time zone and your working day
Europe/Helsinki — 7 hours ahead of you
1 hour of overlap with a 09:00–17:00 day where you are — 09:00–10:00 your time, 16:00–17:00 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 02:00 on your clock.
office hours both at once night
Their 09:00–17:00 is 02:00–10:00 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 Finland
What these numbers mean
Home broadband — Good. Comfortable for two people working, streaming in the evening, large downloads. Broadband here runs at about the global median of 130 Mbps.
Mobile data — Fast. Enough to work from a cafe or a beach on a hotspot all day. Mobile runs at 1.8× 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.
Source: Ookla Speedtest Global Index · measured June 2026
Travel tipseSIM
A data eSIM for Finland, installed before you fly and working the moment you land:
Works here
Works hereRevolutIn the app
Must-see
Travel tipsNearby day trips
Travel tipsSay a few words
Finnish
- HelloHeihay
- PleaseKiitosKEE-tos
- Thank youKiitos paljonKEE-tos PAHL-yon
- Yes / NoKyllä / EiKUL-la / ay
5 more phrases
- Excuse meAnteeksiAHN-teek-si
- How much is it?Paljonko se maksaa?PAHL-yon-ko seh MAHK-saa
- SaunaSaunaSOW-na, not SAW-na
- CheersKippisKIP-pis
- GoodbyeNäkemiinNA-keh-meen
Related to Estonian and Hungarian and to nothing else nearby, so nothing in it will look familiar. English is near-universal. Swedish is the second official language, and in the far north road signs are in Sámi as well.
Travel tipsReligion
Lutheran by heritage and by most people’s membership, and quietly secular in practice
About three in five Finns belong to the Lutheran church and very few attend. The Orthodox Church is the second national church, small but visible in the east and in Helsinki’s Uspenski Cathedral. In the far north the Sámi had their own beliefs long before either, and a sacred site such as Ukonsaari on Lake Inari is still treated as one.
Travel tipsDo's and don'ts
Do
- Take your shoes off in a home, always, and in a cabin you are renting too
- Shower before the sauna, and sit on the towel or paper seat cover you are given
- Let a silence be a silence — nobody is offended by it and filling it is not expected
- Be on time; a Finn will be
Don't
- Do not guess about swimwear: single-sex saunas are taken naked and public mixed ones in a costume, and the sign at the door says which
- Do not talk loudly on a bus or a train
- Do not touch reindeer, which are somebody’s herd, or drive fast where there are signs for them
- Do not tip expecting it to mean much; service is included and rounding up is plenty
Where to stay in Helsinki
No Holistay rentals in Helsinki 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 Helsinki 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 Helsinki-Vantaa HEL
35 minfrom the airport· 17 km as the crow flies
30 min by the I or P train to the Central Station.
Google Flights · Rome2Rio for the trains, buses and ferries as well as the flights
