Which Concentration Camps Should You Visit When Travelling Germany & Europe?
- Matti Geyer
- 3 days ago
- 7 min read
For many travellers, visiting a former concentration camp is one of the most meaningful — and difficult — experiences of a trip to Europe. These memorial sites are not tourist attractions, but places of remembrance that document how Nazi persecution, forced labour, and genocide were organised and carried out.
Visitors often ask:
Which concentration camp should I visit?
Is Sachsenhausen or Dachau better to visit?
Are all concentration camps more or less the same?
How do other camps compare to Auschwitz?
The answer depends on where you are travelling, how much time you have, and what historical perspective you want to gain. Below is an overview of the most visited and historically significant memorial sites — all described in the same structure to help you compare them properly.
Also check out my posts on the best WWII itinerary in Europe and the best private tour guides across the continent.
Location: Oranienburg, 35 minutes north of Berlin
Type: Concentration camp, SS model & administrative centre
Victims: Over 200,000 prisoners, up to 70,000 murdered
Brief History
Established in 1936, Sachsenhausen was designed as the model camp for the Nazi system. It later became the administrative headquarters for all concentration camps, meaning policies tested here were exported across Europe. Prisoners included political opponents, Jews, Roma, homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Soviet POWs.
What You See Today
Sachsenhausen is one of the most spatially understandable memorial sites in Europe:
Original triangular camp layout and roll-call square
Guard towers, perimeter walls, and watchtower “A”
Prisoner barracks with permanent exhibitions
Punishment cells, execution trench, and crematorium
Exhibitions explaining daily routines, forced labour, and SS hierarchy
Why Sachsenhausen Is Unique
Unlike Auschwitz, Sachsenhausen focuses less on industrial mass murder and more on how terror was organised and enforced. Its clarity makes it especially powerful when visited with a guide who explains what is no longer visible. For visitors based in Berlin, Sachsenhausen is the most comprehensive and accessible camp to visit on a day trip. I offer respectful walking tours there!
Dachau Concentration Camp (near Munich)
Location: Near Munich, Southern Germany
Type: Concentration camp
Victims: About 200,000 prisoners, at least 41,500 murdered
Brief History
Dachau, opened in 1933, was the first Nazi concentration camp. It served as a testing ground for repression and as a training site for SS guards who later staffed other camps.
What You See Today
Reconstructed prisoner barracks
Large museum in the former maintenance building
Crematorium area (not used for mass gassing)
Religious memorials added after the war
Sachsenhausen vs Dachau – Which Should You Visit?
This depends almost entirely on geography:
From Berlin → Sachsenhausen
From Munich → Dachau
Historically, Dachau represents the beginning of the camp system, while Sachsenhausen represents its fully developed form. They are similar in purpose but not identical in story. For most travellers, one well-explained visit is enough. My colleague Steve offers excellent tours there!
Ravensbrück Concentration Camp (north of Berlin)
Location: Brandenburg
Type: Women’s concentration camp
Victims: Around 130,000 prisoners, approx. 30,000–40,000 murdered
Brief History
Ravensbrück was the largest camp for women in Nazi Germany. Prisoners came from more than 30 countries and were subjected to forced labour, starvation, executions, and medical experiments.
What You See Today
Ravensbrück looks very different from Sachsenhausen:
Large open memorial grounds by the lake
Few reconstructed barracks
Museum exhibitions focusing on women’s biographies
Sculptural memorials rather than architecture
hauntingly empty as one of the lesser visited memorial grounds
Why Ravensbrück Is Unique
Ravensbrück tells the gendered history of persecution. It is quieter, more abstract, and emotionally powerful in a different way. It works best as a second visit rather than a first introduction. I can arrange guided tours there!
Buchenwald Concentration Camp (near Weimar)
Location: Central Germany (Thuringia)
Type: Concentration camp
Victims: About 280,000 prisoners, over 56,000 murdered
Brief History
Established in 1937, Buchenwald was one of the largest concentration camps on German soil. Prisoners included political opponents, Jews, Roma, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and forced labourers from across Europe. Buchenwald also became known for organised prisoner resistance and underground networks, which played a role in the camp’s partial self-liberation shortly before U.S. troops arrived in April 1945.
What You See Today
Buchenwald is a large, layered memorial site that combines original remains with post-war memorial architecture:
Remaining camp structures, including the gate and crematorium
Monumental memorial tower and sculptural landscape from the GDR era
Extensive museum exhibitions covering daily camp life, forced labour, and resistance
Exhibitions addressing post-war memory, including how the camp was remembered in East and West Germany
Why Visit
Buchenwald offers a broad overview of the concentration camp system and is particularly valuable for visitors interested in resistance, political prisoners, and how memory evolved after 1945. Its location near Weimar adds historical contrast between German culture and Nazi terror.
Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp (Germany)
Location: Lower Saxony, Northern Germany
Type: Concentration camp
Victims: About 120,000 prisoners, over 50,000 murdered
Brief History
Bergen-Belsen began as a prisoner-of-war camp and later became a concentration camp. It was never designed as an extermination camp, but catastrophic overcrowding, starvation, and disease — especially typhus — led to mass death, particularly in the final months of the war. Anne Frank and her sister Margot died here in early 1945.
What You See Today
Bergen-Belsen looks very different from camps with preserved barracks:
Vast open memorial grounds marking mass graves
Minimal remaining structures (most were destroyed after liberation due to disease)
A modern documentation centre with photographs, testimonies, and film material
Individual grave markers and symbolic remembrance stones
Why Visit
Bergen-Belsen powerfully illustrates how neglect, collapse, and indifference can be just as deadly as systematic killing. Its openness and silence make it one of the most emotionally confronting memorial sites in Germany.
Theresienstadt (Terezín) Ghetto and Camp (Czech Republic)
Location: Northern Czech Republic (between Prague and Dresden)
Type: Ghetto and transit camp
Victims: About 140,000 prisoners; over 33,000 died in the ghetto, most others deported to extermination camps
Brief History
Theresienstadt was established in 1941 as a Jewish ghetto and transit camp. The Nazis used it as a propaganda tool — presenting it as a “model settlement” to deceive international observers — while in reality it functioned as a waystation to Auschwitz, Treblinka, and other killing sites. Disease, overcrowding, and starvation caused tens of thousands of deaths.
What You See Today
Theresienstadt differs from concentration camps built outside cities:
Preserved fortress town layout and streets
Former barracks housing museum exhibitions
The Small Fortress, used as a Gestapo prison
Cemeteries, crematorium, and execution sites
Exhibitions explaining Nazi propaganda and deception
Why Visit
Theresienstadt is essential for understanding how the Holocaust was disguised and administrated. It shows the role of bureaucracy, lies, and international manipulation — making it especially relevant for visitors travelling between Berlin, Dresden, and Prague. It is an ideal stop en route to Prague from Berlin or Dresden. My colleague Petra offers tours here!
Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum (Poland)
Location: Southern Poland (Oświęcim)
Type: Concentration and extermination camp complex
Victims: Over 1.1 million murdered, the vast majority Jewish
Brief History
Auschwitz was the largest and deadliest camp complex created by Nazi Germany. Established in 1940, it expanded to include Auschwitz I (the original camp), Auschwitz II–Birkenau (the main extermination site), and numerous subcamps connected to forced labour and industry. Deportees arrived from across occupied Europe, with most murdered shortly after arrival.
What You See Today
Auschwitz is preserved on an unparalleled scale and consists of two main sites:
Auschwitz I
Original brick barracks with museum exhibitions
Prisoner belongings: shoes, suitcases, hair, personal items
Execution wall and punishment cells
Detailed documentation explaining deportation, selection, and daily camp life
Auschwitz II – Birkenau
Vast open landscape of barracks ruins
The railway ramp used during mass deportations
Ruins of gas chambers and crematoria
Memorial monuments at the killing sites
Why Visit
Auschwitz represents the industrialised murder at the centre of the Holocaust. It is unmatched in scale, documentation, and symbolism. However, because it shows the end point of Nazi policy, many visitors benefit from seeing Auschwitz in context — alongside camps that explain how the system developed and functioned before mass extermination. These private tour guides from Krakow can take you there!
How Other Camps Compare
Auschwitz represents the end point of Nazi policy. Camps like Sachsenhausen, Dachau, or Ravensbrück explain how the system evolved to that point. Visiting Auschwitz alone can feel overwhelming without context. It is one of the best preserved memorial sites.
Majdanek (Lublin, Poland)
Location: Lublin, Eastern Poland
Type: Concentration and extermination camp
Victims: About 78,000 murdered
Brief History
Majdanek functioned as both a labour camp and an extermination site. Unlike Auschwitz, it was not fully dismantled by the Nazis before liberation, leaving much of the original camp intact.
What You See Today
Majdanek is one of the best-preserved camps in Europe:
Original wooden barracks across the camp grounds
Gas chambers and crematoria still standing
A vast ash mausoleum containing victims’ remains
Museum exhibitions detailing deportations, labour, and mass murder
Why Visit
Majdanek provides one of the clearest physical impressions of how a Nazi camp functioned day to day — without reconstruction.
Treblinka Extermination Camp (Poland)
Location: Eastern Poland
Type: Extermination camp
Victims: Around 870,000 murdered
Brief History
Treblinka was built solely for mass murder as part of Operation Reinhard. Almost everyone deported there was killed within hours of arrival. The Nazis destroyed the camp in 1943 to erase evidence of their crimes.
What You See Today
Treblinka is a symbolic memorial rather than a preserved camp:
A vast memorial field marked with thousands of stones
No original barracks or buildings
Central monument marking the killing site
Minimal signage to encourage reflection rather than explanation
Why Visit
Treblinka confronts visitors with absence rather than structures. It represents genocide stripped of bureaucracy — a place designed only for killing.
Mauthausen Concentration Camp (Austria)
Location: Upper Austria, near Linz
Type: Concentration camp (with extermination through labour)
Victims: About 190,000 prisoners, approximately 90,000 murdered
Brief History
Mauthausen was one of the most brutal camps in the Nazi system and classified as a punishment camp for those considered “incorrigible.” Prisoners were forced to work in nearby granite quarries under extreme conditions. The camp’s mortality rate was among the highest in the system.
What You See Today
Mauthausen is one of the most intact former camps in Europe:
Original stone barracks and perimeter walls
The infamous “Stairs of Death” leading from the quarry
Gas chamber, crematorium, and execution sites
National memorials erected by former prisoner groups from across Europe
Why Visit
Mauthausen shows the lethal combination of forced labour and ideology. Its physical remains make the brutality of daily life immediately tangible and unforgettable.
Should You Visit More Than One Camp?
For most travellers: one is enough.
The camps are not “the same,” but the emotional weight is significant. A single visit with good historical explanation is often more meaningful than visiting several without context.
Why Berlin Is One of the Best Places to Start
Berlin allows visitors to understand:
Nazi decision-makers and institutions
Jewish life, resistance, and remembrance
Concentration camps within short day trips
A guided Sachsenhausen walking tour from Berlin offers structure, historical clarity, and respectful storytelling — especially important for first-time visitors.
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