National Palace Museum

The National Palace Museum in Taipei showcases a vast collection of Chinese imperial artifacts, including calligraphy, paintings, and ceramics, spanning 8,000 years of history.

Planning your visit

The National Palace Museum in Taipei holds the imperial Chinese collection — nearly 700,000 objects spanning 8,000 years, moved from Beijing's Forbidden City during the wars of the twentieth century and eventually to Taiwan in 1949. Only a fraction is displayed at a time, rotating through the galleries, so no two visits are quite the same. The famous pieces are small: the Jadeite Cabbage and the Meat-Shaped Stone draw the longest queues in the building.

The museum sits in Shilin, north of central Taipei, so many bookable options include transport or fold it into a city itinerary — morning city tours with museum entry, or day tours combining it with Yangmingshan National Park. E-tickets cover independent visits, including for the Southern Branch in Chiayi, which is a separate museum several hours away. Combined tickets pair the museum with the nearby Shung Ye Museum of Formosan Aborigines. Guided tours help considerably given how little is labelled in depth. See current dates below.