Songzanlin Monastery is the most iconic landmark in Shangri-La. It’s the largest Tibetan Buddhist monastery in Yunnan, and unless you’ve just been to Tibet, visiting it is a must when you’re in Shangri-La. There’s no better way to experience Tibetan buddhism while in Yunnan. This is how we visited, what to bring, and how much it cost.
How to get to Songzanlin monastery
To get to Songzanlin Monastery, you can take a taxi or use Didi. We paid 20 yuan to get there from the North Gate in the Ancient Town. If you’re using Didi, just type in “Songzanlin Scenic Area”. The taxi ride took 17 minutes for us.
The monastery is located inside a large park, and the entrance is at the southern gate of the park. This is also where you buy your tickets. There is an official website for booking tickets in advance, but when we visited in August 2025, a Chinese phone number was required to make a booking. Luckily, buying tickets on-site was quick and easy. Even though there were a lot of people, the line at the ticket counter moved fast and took about 10-15 minutes.
👉 Important: You need to bring your ID to enter. We didn’t know this beforehand and had to go all the way back to our hotel to get our passport… Oops!
From the southern entrance of the park to the monastery itself, it’s a couple of kilometers. A shuttle bus runs between the entrance and the monastery. When buying your ticket, you’ll be asked if you also want a bus ticket. Almost everyone we saw purchased it, and since parts of the park were under construction during our visit, we highly recommend saving your energy for exploring the monastery itself. The only people we saw that choose to walk from the entrance to the actual monastery were to western tourists. We felt sorry for them when we passed through the construction site of a park on the bus taking us to the monastery.
🎟️ Ticket prices (August 2025):
- Entrance: 55 yuan
- Shuttle bus (round trip): 20 yuan
- Total: 75 yuan per person
Inside the temple buildings, photography is not allowed. Visitors are also asked to remove hats and sunglasses when visiting the monastery.
We spent about 2 hours at Songzanling Monastery during our visit. A great experience in Shangri-la!
I read on another blog post that walking the stairs up to the monastery was really hard because of the thin air. If you have acclimatised before coming to Shangri-La you have nothing to worry about. Sure, we had a little bit of a heart rate spike walking up the stairs, but if you’re in somewhat of a shape, you’ll be totally fine. Don’t let the thin air stop you from visiting Songzanlin monastery 🙂
Visiting Songzanling Monastery was one of the highlights of our time in Shangri-La. The mix of Tibetan culture, stunning architecture, and peaceful surroundings made it a truly memorable experience. If you’re planning a trip to Shangri-La, make sure to set aside a couple of hours to explore this incredible place.
Have you visited? Let us know what you think in the comments!
