Taiwan: the complete guide to planning your trip

That geography decides everything: where you can go in which month, how long the legs take, and why an itinerary that looks like a neat loop on a map can involve a five-hour drive over a pass. This Taiwan travel guide is the document our consultants open when a new Taiwan file lands on the desk, and it is not a list of sights.

The short version. Taiwan is the easiest country in Asia to travel independently, the food is among the best in the world for the money, the rail network is excellent, and the two things that ruin trips are the weather and the permits. Both are plannable.

Taiwan at a glance

When to travel

Taiwan does not have one climate. The north is subtropical and the south is tropical, the east gets the weather off the Pacific and the west sits in its rain shadow, and the mountains have their own rules entirely. A month that is wrong for Taipei can be right for Kenting.

October to December, the season we recommend

The best window on the island. The summer heat has gone, the typhoon risk falls away through October, the air is clearer than at any other time and the autumn light in the mountains is the reason photographers come. November is our single favourite month.

The caveat is the north-east. From roughly late October the north-east monsoon starts pushing damp air onto Taipei, Keelung and the Yilan coast, and December in Taipei can be a run of grey, drizzly days at around 63F (17C). It is not cold and it is not dramatic, it is simply wet in a low, persistent way. The south stays sunny. On a December trip we weight the itinerary southward.

March to April, the second window

Warm, mostly dry, and the tea and the mountains at their best. Late March and April are also when the Dajia Mazu pilgrimage moves across the west of the island, nine days and hundreds of thousands of people, and if your dates coincide we will build a day around it because there is nothing else like it in East Asia.

May and June, the plum rains

Meiyu, the plum rain season, runs from around May to mid-June and brings sustained frontal rain rather than short showers. It is not a washout and it is genuinely humid. Rates are lower. If your dates are fixed here we build indoors-first days and keep the mountains flexible.

July to October, typhoon season and the summer heat

Two separate problems that overlap.

Typhoons peak in August and September. A direct or near hit shuts the island down for a day or two: high speed rail suspends, the east coast line closes, ferries to the outer islands stop, mountain roads close and are often the last thing to reopen, and everyone sensibly stays indoors. Warning is usually two to four days, which is enough to rearrange but not enough to reroute a whole trip. We build an alternative for every exposed day at the quoting stage and our partner team executes it on the ground.

The heat is the other half. Taipei in July and August runs to around 95F (35C) with humidity that makes it feel considerably worse, and Tainan and Kaohsiung are hotter still. Summer is the right time for the high mountains, which run around 25F (14C) cooler, for the outer islands, and for Penghu, whose wind is unbearable in winter and welcome in July. It is the wrong time for a walking day in Tainan at two in the afternoon.

January and February

Cool, damp in the north, pleasant in the south, and the cheapest hotel rates outside the holidays. The exception is Lunar New Year, usually late January or February, when the whole country travels, trains sell out weeks ahead, hotel rates spike and a great many small restaurants close for several days. We plan around it or, if you want the festival itself, we plan into it deliberately.

Getting around

Rail, which is most of the answer

Taiwan High Speed Rail runs down the west from Taipei to Zuoying in Kaohsiung in under two hours, with stops at Taichung, Chiayi and Tainan. It is fast, frequent, punctual and easy, and the stations for Tainan and Chiayi sit outside the city centres with a shuttle connection, which is worth knowing when you plan a morning.

The conventional Taiwan Railway network does the rest, including the whole eastern and southern coast, which the high speed line does not reach. The east coast trains from Taipei through Yilan to Hualien and Taitung are the constraint on most itineraries. They sell out, especially at weekends and around holidays, and the booking window opens a set number of days ahead. We book the moment it opens. This is one of the specific things a ground team earns its keep on.

A car, for the parts rail does not reach

Alishan, Sun Moon Lake, the high mountain road over Hehuanshan, the tea country around Lugu, and the smaller east coast stops are all car days. We use a private car with an English-speaking driver rather than a self-drive, for two reasons: the mountain roads are narrow and busy with scooters, and a driver who knows which sections are closed after rain is worth more than the saving.

If you do want to drive yourself, Taiwan requires an international driving permit alongside your home licence and there are local formalities depending on nationality. We will tell you the current position rather than guess at it here.

In the cities

Taipei’s metro is excellent and the stored-value card works on the metro, the buses, most convenience stores and the city bike scheme. Kaohsiung has a smaller metro and a light rail. Tainan has neither and is walked, cycled or taxied.

Bicycles

Taiwan is one of the best cycling countries in Asia, with a signed round-island route, good bike shops in every town and rental networks that allow one-way drop-offs. We build cycling days into several itineraries and we can build a full cycling trip if that is what you want.

Entry requirements

Most Western passports, including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, all EU and Schengen states, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, South Korea and Israel, currently enter Taiwan visa-free for tourism, commonly for 90 days. There is normally no fee and no advance application.

Treat that as guidance rather than as a rule, because entry policy is a live area and the length of stay differs by nationality. There is also an online arrival card that saves a queue at the airport if you complete it before you fly. We confirm the current requirement for your specific passport before we quote and send the correct current links with your final documents rather than publishing them here, because they move.

The mountains, and how permits actually work

Taiwan has 268 peaks over 9,840 feet (3,000 m), which is more than most people expect from an island this size, and Yushan at 12,966 feet (3,952 m) is the highest point in Northeast Asia. The walking is superb and the system that governs it is bureaucratic in a way that catches visitors out.

There are two separate permits and they are not the same thing. A national park entry permit is required for routes inside Yushan, Taroko and Shei-Pa national parks. A police mountain entry permit is required for designated mountain areas, and for some routes you need both.

For Yushan’s main peak the entry permit and the bed at Paiyun Lodge are allocated by lottery, applications open months ahead, and demand far exceeds supply. We apply in the correct window and we tell you honestly what the odds look like. We do not sell a Yushan summit as though it were a booking.

What we do instead, and what most visitors are better served by: the Yushan foothills and the Tataka saddle, which is reached by road at around 8,560 feet (2,610 m) and gives you the mountain without the lottery. Hehuanshan, on the high road in the central range, where the pass reaches about 10,745 feet (3,275 m) and several short peaks are walkable in a morning with no permit at all. Shei-Pa’s lower trails. Alishan’s forest paths. All of these are excellent and none of them requires you to win anything.

Taroko Gorge, honestly

Taroko is a marble gorge on the east coast and it was, for decades, the single most spectacular half day in Taiwan. On 3 April 2024 a magnitude 7.2 earthquake struck off Hualien and caused severe rockfall and structural damage through the gorge. The national park has been reopening in stages, with some trails, some sections of road and some facilities available and others not, and the situation has continued to change.

We will not publish a list here that will be wrong by the time you read it. What we do is check the current position with our partner and with the park at the time we quote, build the day around what is genuinely open, and say plainly if the answer is not much.

The alternative on the same coast, and it is a good one rather than a consolation: Mugua River Gorge and the Sanzhan river south of Hualien, the East Rift Valley inland with its rice terraces and hot springs, Liyu Lake, and the coastal Highway 11 south to Shitiping and Sanxiantai. Several of our clients who have seen both have preferred the second.

What a trip to Taiwan costs

Figures are land only, per person, based on two people sharing, and exclude international flights. They cover accommodation, food, ground transport, entries and the guiding we would normally include.

Two things surprise people. The first is that food is very cheap for the quality: a superb bowl of beef noodle soup is around five dollars, and a night market dinner for two is under twenty. The second is that hotels are not cheap. Taipei room rates are closer to Tokyo than to Bangkok, and the good hot spring properties at Beitou and Jiaoxi price like Japanese ryokan because that is essentially what they are.

The three decisions that move the number: how many nights are in Taipei, whether the mountain days use a private car, and whether you take a hot spring property or a business hotel on the two nights where it makes a difference.

The places worth your time

Taipei. Three full days, four if you like cities. The National Palace Museum holds the imperial collection moved from Beijing in 1949 and it is one of the world’s great museums, though the famous small objects rotate and are sometimes on loan. Longshan Temple at dusk when it is a working temple rather than a sight. Dadaocheng and Dihua Street for the old merchant city. Beitou for hot springs inside the metro system. Elephant Mountain for the skyline. And the night markets, which are the point: Raohe and Ningxia are better eating than Shilin.

Jiufen and the north-east. A hillside town of stepped lanes and tea houses above the sea, and one of the most crowded places in Taiwan on a weekend afternoon. Go early or go in the evening after the coaches leave, or do not go. The Pingxi line and its sky lanterns sit nearby and we will tell you about the litter problem before you release one.

Hualien and the east coast. The reason to cross the mountains. Whale watching in season, the East Rift Valley, hot springs, rice terraces at Chishang, and Highway 11 down the coast with the Pacific on one side and the range on the other. Two to three nights minimum.

Taitung and the south-east. Quieter again, with the strongest indigenous cultural presence on the island and the departure point for Green Island and Orchid Island.

Alishan. Cypress forest at around 7,200 feet (2,200 m), a narrow-gauge forest railway up from Chiayi, a sea of clouds at dawn if you are lucky, and the high mountain oolong that comes off these slopes. One night, not a day trip.

Sun Moon Lake. Genuinely beautiful and genuinely very busy. Stay overnight, cycle the western shore early, and treat the middle of the day as time to be elsewhere.

Tainan. The oldest city and the best eating in Taiwan, which is a strong claim in a country that eats this well. Fort Zeelandia at Anping, the Confucius temple from 1665, Shennong Street, and about forty things you should order. Two nights.

Kaohsiung. A harbour city with a good metro, the Pier-2 art district, and Fo Guang Shan outside it. One or two nights, often as the southern end of a rail route.

Kenting. The southern tip, beaches and coral. Pleasant in winter, packed at weekends and in summer, and skippable on a short trip.

The outer islands. Penghu in summer for beaches and basalt, Green Island for snorkelling and a saltwater hot spring, Orchid Island for the Tao people and a culture unlike the main island’s, Matsu and Kinmen for a very different history. All are weather-dependent and boats cancel. Third-week material.

Eating in Taiwan

Start with beef noodle soup, which is the national dish and is argued about the way ramen is in Japan. Then lu rou fan, braised pork over rice, which costs a dollar and is one of the great cheap plates anywhere. Then the night markets, where you order oyster omelette, gua bao, pepper buns straight off the oven wall, and stinky tofu if you are brave, which is better than it smells and only just.

Xiaolongbao are excellent here. Bubble tea was invented in Taichung in the 1980s. Hakka food in Miaoli and Beipu is a different cuisine again, sour and salty, with pounded tea that you grind yourself. Indigenous cooking in the east uses millet, mountain vegetables and smoked pork, and it is worth a meal.

Tea is the other half of the story: Baozhong in Pinglin, Tieguanyin in Maokong above Taipei, high mountain oolong from Alishan and Lishan, Dongding from Lugu, and black tea from Sun Moon Lake. A proper tasting with a farmer takes two hours and is one of the best things we book.

Vegetarian is unusually easy in Taiwan because of a strong Buddhist vegetarian tradition, and the word to look for is a swastika symbol on the shopfront, which here is a Buddhist sign and nothing else.

Practical notes from our specialist

• Convenience stores. There are tens of thousands of them and they are genuinely useful: coffee, hot food, ticket collection, parcel drops, cash machines and toilets.
• Cash. Cards work in cities and hotels. Night markets, small restaurants and rural buses want cash. Carry some.
• The stored-value card. Buy one at the airport. It covers metros, buses, bikes and convenience stores across most of the island.
• Earthquakes. Taiwan is seismically active and buildings are constructed for it. Follow the instructions in your hotel room and do not panic at a tremor.
• Language. Mandarin, with Taiwanese Hokkien widely spoken and sixteen recognised indigenous languages. Transport signage is good in English, small-town restaurants are not, and a guide changes what you can order.
• Shoes off. In homes, some temples, some guesthouses and every hot spring.
• Hot spring etiquette. Public pools are usually single sex and unclothed, wash thoroughly first, and tattoos are less of an issue than in Japan but not a non-issue. We book private baths where it matters.

How we build a Taiwan trip

Taiwan is not one of our own offices, and we say so on every page. Our offices are in Japan, Vietnam, India and the Philippines. Taiwan we run through a Taiwanese partner we have worked with for years: their staff meet your flight, drive you, guide you and answer the phone at two in the morning.

The itinerary is written here, by a named person. Asaf Zamshtein, our Southeast Asia and China specialist, builds most of them, with Mai Est, our Head of Consulting. Group and business travel goes to Daniella Eitan. The first draft is free, carries no obligation and is written for you rather than pulled from a shelf.

When you travel we open a WhatsApp group with your consultant here and our partner team there, and it stays open until you are home.

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Keep reading

• The eight Taiwan itineraries we build most often
• Classic Taiwan in 10 days
• Taiwan by rail in 14 days
• Taiwan food and culture in 12 days

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