Abu Dhabi is ninety minutes down the road from Dubai and it is a different city: quieter, greener, built around a corniche rather than a skyline. Most visitors give it one day. Done in the right order, one day is enough to see the things people come for without spending the whole of it in a vehicle. For the Dubai half of the trip, see the full list of things to do in Dubai.

The shape of the day

A sensible Abu Dhabi day runs about ten hours door to door. Leave Dubai between 07:30 and 08:30, take the E11 south along the coast, and you are at the first stop before the heat and the coach parties arrive. Come back in the evening and you have had a full day without an overnight stay.

The order matters more than the list. Grand Mosque first, while the light is good and the marble is cool. Emirates Palace and the Corniche in the middle, when you want to be indoors or near water. Heritage Village and the viewpoints late, when the sun is behind you.

Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque

This is the reason most people make the trip, and it earns it. Eighty two domes, a courtyard floor laid with a flower mosaic that runs for seventy metres, and a prayer hall carpet that was made in one piece. Entry is free. Allow ninety minutes.

The dress code is enforced and it catches people out: everyone covers shoulders and ankles, women cover their hair, and nothing close fitting is allowed through. An abaya is lent free at the entrance to anyone who needs one. We have written the whole thing out in what to wear at Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque, which is worth five minutes before you travel.

Emirates Palace

A working hotel rather than a museum, which means you can walk into the lobby, look at the dome, and have a coffee under it. The gold leaf and the chandeliers are genuinely worth seeing, and the grounds give you the photograph of the building from the front that everybody takes. It is a photo stop on most itineraries rather than a long visit.

The Corniche

Eight kilometres of seafront with the skyline on one side and the Gulf on the other. In winter this is where Abu Dhabi spends its evenings. The beach is clean, the water is calm, and the walk is flat the whole way. Even as a thirty minute stop it changes how the city reads: it is the part that does not look like Dubai at all.

Etihad Towers and Qasr Al Watan

The five towers at the end of the Corniche are the ones from the Fast and Furious film, and the observation deck on the 74th floor looks back over the whole city and the palace district. Qasr Al Watan, the presidential palace, opens its state rooms and its library to visitors and is the newest thing on most itineraries. Both carry their own entry tickets.

Heritage Village

A reconstruction of a pre oil coastal settlement, across the water from the Corniche with the skyline behind it. Small, free, and the best place in the city to understand what Abu Dhabi was seventy years ago. It is also the easiest photograph of the skyline you will get.

The ones that need their own day

Two attractions are regularly added to a one day itinerary and then rushed. Be honest with yourself about them.

  • Louvre Abu Dhabi deserves two hours minimum. On a day that already has the mosque in it, you are looking at a very long day.
  • Ferrari World and Yas Island are a full day in themselves. Yas is thirty minutes from the city centre in the opposite direction from the mosque. If you want an Abu Dhabi stop that is two hours rather than a day, the National Aquarium at Al Qana is on the Corniche side, from AED 80. Our Ferrari World day pass exists because it is a day, not an hour.

On our city tour both are photo stops rather than entries, and we say so on the tour page rather than letting people find out on the day.

Driving yourself

It is a straightforward motorway drive, and the roads inside Abu Dhabi are wide and well signed. Three things catch visitors out. Parking in the city centre is paid and the machines want a local payment method. Speed cameras on the E11 are frequent and the fines arrive with the rental company. And the mosque car park fills by mid morning in season, after which you are directed to an overflow with a shuttle.

Taking a tour instead

Our Abu Dhabi city tour from Dubai runs the order above as a full day from AED 100 per person on a shared basis. Pickup is from your Dubai hotel between 07:30 and 08:30 and you are back the same evening. Lunch, bottled water, WiFi on board and the abaya at the mosque are included, the vehicle is air conditioned, and the guide speaks English and Russian. A private vehicle can be arranged if you would rather not share.

Taxes and fees are in the price shown. You book online, choose your date, and get a booking reference straight away; our team then confirms the pickup time with you. Free cancellation up to 24 hours before departure.

What to take

  • Clothing that meets the mosque dress code, or plan to borrow an abaya.
  • Sunglasses. The courtyard marble is white and very bright.
  • Shoes that come off easily, for the prayer hall.
  • A light layer. Interiors in the UAE are air conditioned hard.
  • A payment card. Almost nothing needs cash.

Worth knowing

Friday mornings the mosque is closed to visitors. Ramadan changes opening hours across the city and many attractions shift to evening timings. Between June and September the middle of the day outdoors is genuinely difficult, and a day built around the mosque, a hotel lobby and a museum will be a better day than one built around a corniche walk.