Chocolate Museum Cologne
Photo: Self-photographed — CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
The Chocolate Museum Cologne offers a comprehensive journey through the 5,000-year cultural history of cocoa and chocolate, featuring exhibits from ancient civilizations to modern production methods.
Planning your visit
The Cologne Chocolate Museum sits on a peninsula in the Rhine, in a glass and steel building shaped like a ship, and it is among the most visited museums in Germany.
The exhibition covers 5,000 years: pre-Columbian material including Maya and Aztec vessels, the Spanish importation, baroque chocolate services in porcelain and silver from the courts where it was a luxury, and the nineteenth-century industrialisation that made it universal.
A tropical greenhouse grows cacao, coffee and vanilla, and a working production line runs through the building making chocolate on site, which visitors watch from beginning to end.
The three-metre chocolate fountain is the object everyone photographs, and wafers are dipped in it and handed out.
The museum was founded by Hans Imhoff, a Cologne chocolate manufacturer, and remains privately run.
Bookable options are entrance tickets. Current availability is listed below.
Before you book
Where is Chocolate Museum Cologne?
Chocolate Museum Cologne is in Cologne, Germany. The map on this page marks its exact location.
Do I need to book Chocolate Museum Cologne in advance?
Tickets can be bought on the door at quiet times, but booking ahead fixes the date and avoids the queue at busy ones. Live availability is shown on this page.
