Interlaken & the Bernese Oberland
Switzerland
Two lakes, three of the great north faces, and a railway that goes to 3,454 metres
Find stays in Interlaken & the Bernese Oberland
Photos by Tucker Monticelli, allPhoto Bangkok, allPhoto Bangkok and subhashfcb on Unsplash
Best time to visit all of Switzerland
June to September for the mountains, December to March for the snow
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 155mm in Jul
Where it is
46.69°N, 7.85°E Open in Google Maps
Things to do
Weeks of it- Take the train to Jungfraujoch, which costs a great deal and is worth it once
- Walk from Mürren to Gimmelwald, an hour with the Eiger in front of you
- Paraglide off Beatenberg, which is what half of Interlaken is there for
- Swim in Lake Brienz, which is 16°C in August and looks unreal
- Ride the Schilthorn cable car and have breakfast in the revolving restaurant
Interlaken & the Bernese Oberland travel tipsthe general rules
Currency budget Switzerland
Very expensiveFrancs, not euros — though most tourist businesses accept euros at a rate that is quietly terrible and give change in francs. Pay by card, which gives the real rate, and do not change money at the station.
ATMs & cards
UBS, PostFinance and Raiffeisen machines are everywhere and reliable. Always decline the conversion — the machine's rate costs several per cent.
Avoid these
- changing euros at the station, which is a poor rate
Use these instead
- UBS
- PostFinance
- Raiffeisen
Many businesses accept euros and give change in francs at a rate that quietly costs you five to ten per cent. Pay by card, which converts at the real rate.
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 Switzerland
Very safeAs safe as anywhere on earth from crime. The mountains are the entire risk and they are serious: weather that turns in an hour, marked trails that are still exposed, and via ferrata and canyoning operators whose record here has not been perfect. Check the trail status and the forecast every morning, which is what the locals do.
Where to walk, and where to pay attention (9 areas)
Comfortable, including after dark
Worth more attention
- Mountain weather, which turns in an hour and closes the cable cars with you above them
- Marked trails that are still exposed — a white-red-white blaze means mountain path, not a walk
- Adventure operators for canyoning, rafting and paragliding, whose record here has not been perfect — check the licence
- Altitude on the Jungfraujoch, which is 3,454m reached in two hours from 570m
Our own assessment, not a sourced index.
Entry & visa Switzerland 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 Switzerland
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 in forest below 1,500m
Getting treated
Among the best in the world, and among the most expensive. Treatment is billed and there is no free emergency care for visitors — the EHIC covers EU citizens, everybody else needs insurance. Rega, the air rescue service, will fly you off a mountain and will invoice for it.
Nothing infectious. Altitude sickness above 3,000m, which the Jungfraujoch train reaches in two hours from 570m, and which catches people out. Ticks in summer woodland. And the sun at altitude, which burns through cloud.
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
GoodFondue and raclette are winter food and locals will tell you so, but every restaurant serves them year round to visitors. The better summer plate is rösti with an egg, or perch from the lake. Everything is expensive; a supermarket picnic from Coop is how the Swiss themselves eat on a mountain.
Nightlife
Après-ski in winter, a handful of bars for the adventure-sports crowd in summer, and mountain villages that are asleep by ten.
- Interlaken — Hauptstrasse, and the bars along it
- Grindelwald — après-ski, and the hotel bars
- Mürren — one bar, a terrace, and the Eiger opposite
Closing: 02:00 in Interlaken, 23:00 in the villages.
A beer in a bar: CHF 8–11
A beer costs eight to eleven francs almost everywhere, which is worth knowing before the first round.
Getting around
Easy and cheapNo ride-hailing in the Oberland. The mountain railways and the postbus reach everything, and the guest card from the hotel covers the local buses.
Time zone and your working day
Europe/Zurich — 6 hours ahead of you
2 hours of overlap with a 09:00–17:00 day where you are — 09:00–11:00 your time, 15:00–17:00 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 03:00 on your clock.
office hours both at once night
Their 09:00–17:00 is 03:00–11:00 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 Switzerland
Why these are Switzerland's numbers and not Interlaken & the Bernese Oberland's
Home broadband — Fast. Several people on calls at once, large uploads, 4K. Broadband here runs at 2.2× 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 about the global median of 109 Mbps.
Ookla publishes no separate figure for Interlaken & the Bernese Oberland, so these are medians for all of Switzerland. Cities usually beat the national number and remote islands and national parks fall well below it — treat this as the country's shape, not as a measurement of the street you will be staying on.
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: see the stays in Interlaken & the Bernese Oberland.
Getting online: Airalo or Holafly — a data eSIM for Switzerland, 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
Swiss German
- HelloGrüeziGROO-eh-tsee
- Hello (to a group)Grüezi mitenandGROO-eh-tsee MIT-eh-nand
- PleaseBitteBIT-uh
- Thank youMerci vielmalMER-see FEEL-mahl
5 more phrases
- Yes / NoJa / Neiyah / nay
- Excuse meEntschuldigungent-SHOOL-di-gung
- How much is it?Was choschtet das?vas KHOSH-tet dass
- CheersProschtprosht
- GoodbyeUf Wiederluegeoof VEE-der-loo-eh-guh
Written German, spoken Swiss German — and the spoken form is different enough that Germans need subtitles on Swiss television. Everybody in Interlaken speaks English. Grüezi is the one word that changes a room.
Religion
Catholic and Protestant in roughly equal parts, and increasingly neither
Split canton by canton since the Reformation, which is why two neighbouring valleys can look entirely different. Sunday is genuinely quiet everywhere — the shops shut and the noise rules apply.
Do's and don'ts
Do
- Be exactly on time. A dinner at seven means seven, and the trains mean it too
- Greet the room on entering a small shop or a mountain hut — grüezi in the German part, bonjour in the French
- Sort your rubbish, which is taken very seriously and is sometimes checked
- Say grüezi mitenand to a group, which is the plural and is noticed
Don't
- Do not make noise on a Sunday — no mowing, no drilling, and in many buildings no laundry
- Do not assume Switzerland is Germany or France; it is neither and the point matters
- Do not haggle, and do not ask for a discount
- Do not step onto a marked hiking trail in trainers and expect sympathy
Where to stay in Interlaken & the Bernese Oberland
All stays in Interlaken & the Bernese Oberland
Or search the sites with the rest of Interlaken & the Bernese Oberland's rentals on them:
- 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 Zurich ZRH
2hfrom the airport· 100 km as the crow flies
2h by train, and the train is the point.
Also worth pricing: Bern BRN — an hour away, with very few flights.
Google Flights · Rome2Rio for the trains, buses and ferries as well as the flights
