Walking the Bird's Nest Plaza and Beijing's Olympic Green

The Bird's Nest and the museum beneath it

Beijing National Stadium (Bird's Nest) is a woven basket of raw grey steel ribbons wrapping a saddle-shaped bowl, lit deep red after dark. A standard tour costs ¥40 to ¥50. The panoramic ticket at ¥100 includes the Dingmei Skywalk, the walkway laid along the roof lattice. Guided walk-throughs are standard, and coach groups have their own entrances and travel-agency rates.

The stadium shuts to sightseers for whole days when an event takes the bowl. Check n-s.cn before you commit to a time.

Beijing Olympic Museum is in low-lit underground halls beneath the south side of the stadium, and entry is free. Torches and medal cases sit in glass vitrines, with curling and ski simulators and a Winter Olympic podium set up for photographs. It opens Tuesday to Sunday, 09:00 to 17:00, and closes Mondays. Free guided tours start at 10:00, 14:00 and 15:00. When the stadium above is closed for an event, the museum under it still opens, so keep it in reserve for the day the bowl is booked.

Water Cube, the Ice Ribbon and the arena next door

National Aquatics Centre (Water Cube / Ice Cube) is a translucent blue ETFE bubble-wrap cube that glows electric blue after dark. Inside is the 2008 Olympic competition pool under a ceiling of soap-bubble cells, with the coiled slides of the Happy Magic water park in the same blue light. The building served twice, as the 2008 pool and the 2022 curling Ice Cube. A tour is ¥30, or ¥48 with the Water Light show. The Happy Magic water park is ¥200. It is the cheapest of the park's big interiors.

National Speed Skating Oval (Ice Ribbon) wraps 22 curved glass bands in horizontal loops around an oval drum, like ribbons unspooling. The 400m speed oval inside is white and translucent under a slender cable-net roof. A tour ticket is ¥20 for an adult. For ¥120 you get the tour and ice time. It is the only venue built new on the Olympic Green for 2022, and the only one where you skate the Olympic ice yourself.

National Indoor Stadium is next to the Bird's Nest under an undulating grey roofline folded like a half-open Chinese fan, with a full ice hockey rink under the curve. It held the 2008 gymnastics and the 2022 ice hockey, and it is now home to the Beijing Royal Fighters and a working community rink. Its own figures put it at more than 60 major events and more than 1,000 amateur events a year. No tourist tour runs here. Come for an event or a public skate session, and check the calendar before you walk over. Prices run ¥ to ¥¥, with public skating at the cheap end.

Riding the central-axis loop

North Central Axis Cultural Landscape Sightseeing Bus runs a 6.5km loop calling at Minzuyuan, the National Stadium, the Linglong Pagoda, the China Science and Technology Museum, the Olympic Forest Park south gate and the Xin'ao mall. The open-sided 23-seater with a flat canopy roof and grab rails is ¥30. The enclosed air-conditioned 12-seater is ¥50. Electronic tickets re-scan all day, and one fare covers every stop on the loop.

The bus is built for visitors rather than commuters, and on a park this size it is the sensible way to reach the forest park gate and the science museum without walking the esplanade twice.

The museums on Beichen East Road

Museum of the Communist Party of China (9 Beichen East Road) has a monumental granite facade behind a colonnade of square piers, a gilt Party emblem over the entrance and a plaza of red flag sculptures. It is one of the biggest buildings in the park, and entry is free. Hours are 09:00 to 17:00, last entry 16:00, closed Mondays.

China Science and Technology Museum (5 Beichen East Road) is a vast grey cube scored with a deep square lattice, like interlocked blocks. Atrium-height kinetic exhibits and a spherical screen cinema fill it, and it is the park's wet-weather stop and the one that works with children. Main halls are ¥30. The Science Park is ¥20 for a child and ¥10 for an adult. It closes Mondays.

China National Arts and Crafts Museum (Chinese Intangible Cultural Heritage Museum) is a gmp-designed white building whose heavy upper volume floats on a slim colonnade like a lifted lid. Jade, lacquer and wood carvings sit in tall glass cases, alongside live opera and craft workshop sets. More than 100 national intangible heritage crafts and more than 600 exhibits are held here. Entry is free. Hours are Tuesday to Sunday, 09:00 to 17:00, last entry 16:00. It is 10 minutes' walk from Olympic Park station. Few international itineraries have picked it up, and it is the quiet half-day after a morning of stadium steel.

Free ground at the Sunken Garden and Yangshan

Olympic Green Sunken Garden cuts seven open-air courtyards below the esplanade on an "open Forbidden City" theme, with red Yudao Gongmen gate walls, grey brick, water channels and bronze studded doors. The Bird's Nest rises over the parapet. It is free, open public space with no door policy, and it connects straight into Olympic Park metro station. Toilets, the metro, an underground mall and the dragon-shaped water system all meet here. The courtyard gates are the best photograph in the park that costs nothing.

Beijing Olympic Forest Park covers 680 hectares and is Beijing's largest city park, free, unticketed and fenceless since the 2025 works. Yangshan, an artificial hill of stacked rock and pine, rises over Aohai lake with reed boardwalks below. From up there the Bird's Nest lattice reads back down the central axis. It is the only place in the district with height and a clear long view at the venues, so take it at the end of the walk rather than the start.

Eating in the park once the lights come on

Moonlight Wharf (月色码头) is a lakeside island plaza on Lake 6 of the dragon-shaped water system, with lit photo walls, a luminous gateway arch and neon shopfronts reflecting in black water. The Olympic Tower, the Bird's Nest and the Linglong Pagoda ring it. Separate restaurants and beer counters serve Chaoshan hand-made beef balls and Yanqing beer. It opens 17:00 to 00:00 only. Reckon on ¥¥, ¥80 to ¥200 a head. Book a table at the Chaoshan places on weekends.

POLPARK Beichenhui (北辰萃) opened to the public on 10 July 2026, an 8,000 sq m sunken courtyard street beneath the National Convention Center Phase II. An outer international street and an inner Chinese one run under open sky behind glass shopfronts, with Zhu Binggren's copper fruit sculptures on show. Michelin-starred Béni (French) and BAAN PHADTHAI (Thai) trade here, alongside national debut stores for Wagas Lab and Mood² and the Dadu Shufang cultural space. Prices run ¥¥ to ¥¥¥, casual counters up to the starred rooms. Underground access comes direct from Olympic Park station exit F on Lines 8 and 15, which keeps the walk dry in bad weather.

The tennis centre at Lincuiqiao

National Tennis Centre (Diamond Court) folds 16 steel petals open like a flower over the show court, with sunken outer courts stepped into the ground around it. Sessions are ticketed. A Ground Pass opens the outer courts and the practice areas. Premium Diamond Court seats start at ¥2,580. Lincuiqiao station on Line 8 serves it directly.

Tickets, passports and reservations

Two of the free museums now take a passport as the ticket. The Olympic Museum asks for a passport and a security check, with no advance reservation needed as of 2026. The Museum of the Communist Party of China dropped advance booking on 1 January 2026, and foreign visitors enter at the West Square south gate or the B1 north entrance after security.

The other two still want a booking. The China Science and Technology Museum takes real-name advance booking through its WeChat account, tickets drop daily at 18:00 for seven days ahead, and every person in a group has to be registered individually. The arts and crafts museum is free and still needs an advance reservation.

Ice time at the Ice Ribbon is booked through the venue's WeChat account, and entry is at north gate 12. A guide for the Water Cube is booked on 010-84370117. Guided tours of the park run seven days a week. Book the day you want well ahead of it.

Who the park suits

It suits a visitor who wants the 2008 and 2022 venues inside one walk and will pay for the roof walkway and for ice time. Anyone keeping the day free has the Sunken Garden courtyards, Yangshan and the passport-entry museums to work with.

Best time to go

Skating hours set the earliest limit on the day. Official hours at the Ice Ribbon since 4 March 2026 are weekdays 12:00 to 18:00 and holidays 10:00 to 18:00. Ice ticketing closes at 16:30.

The bus runs 09:00 to 22:30 in summer, every 15 minutes. In winter it runs 09:00 to 21:30, every 25 minutes. The Olympic Forest Park opens 06:00 to 21:00 from 15 March to 15 November. For the rest of the year it opens 06:00 to 20:00.

Three windows change the plan. The stadium is closed to sightseers on 17 and 18 October 2026 for the 13th Beijing International Equestrian Masters. Sightseeing access at the Water Cube is disrupted from 1 to 6 December 2026 for the World Aquatics Swimming Championships (25m). The China Open ran 28 September to 11 October 2026, and that is when park hotels and restaurants are hardest to get.

Before you go

Mondays close all four of the park's museums, and the stadium can be shut for a whole day by an event. Book the science museum and the arts and crafts museum before you travel, and check n-s.cn for the stadium's closures.

See the Beijing guide and the Beijing hotel search.