Frequently asked questions

Temporary Exhibitions are shown in the Pei building located at Hinter dem Giesshaus 3.

The Zeughaus is closed. In the coming years, we will develop a new Permanent Exhibition.

The museum is open daily from 10 am to 6 pm. The museum is closed on December 24.

The Zeughaus is closed for necessary renovations and for the renewal of the Permanent Exhibition. The exhibition "German History from the Middle Ages to the Fall of the Berlin Wall" is not on display anymore. The temporary exhibitions in the Pei Building will continue to be open to the public. Starting from turning points in German history, the exhibition “Roads not Taken” presents a look back(wards) at decisive historical events of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Please contact the Visitor Service for any further questions or to book a tour. The Visitor Service are open Monday to Friday, 9 am to 4 pm.

Just dial +49 30 20304 -750 or -751, or drop us an email: fuehrung@dhm.de

Photography and filming are permitted for private purposes in the foyer of the Deutsches Historisches Museum. Flash photography and tripods are not permitted.

Unless stated otherwise, photography and filming are also allowed in the exhibitions.

By contrast, photography and filming for commercial purposes requires a permit and prior written consent from museum management or the Press Office.

Cloakrooms are available to a limited extent in the basement of the Pei Building. In the exhibitions please avoid carrying rucksacks, bags or objects larger than 30x20x10 cm if possible.

For lost items, please contact our Visitor Service, open Monday to Friday, 9 am to 4 pm.

Please dial +49 30 20304 -750 or -751, or drop us an email: fuehrung@dhm.de

Visitors should allow for at least 1 ½ hours to visit the museum. The average time required to view Temporary Exhibitions varies.

The overview exhibition on German history is closed. Depending on the thematic focus, there is also some offer for children and young people in the temporary exhibitions.

The Deutsches Historisches Museum is fully accessible, and provides stepless access to all exhibition floors and all lifts. Lifts are further equipped with tactile signage and announcements. Toilets suitable for guests with limited mobility can be found in the basement of the Pei building.

People with a reduction in earning capacity of 50% or more receive discounted admission. Admission is free for registered care partners accompanying severely disabled visitors. Our stewarding staff will be happy to assist you.

Wheelchairs, walking aids, foldable stools, and buggies for small children are also available at our info desks.

Service dogs are permitted in the exhibitions.

Yes, there are benches located throughout every exhibition. Folding stools can also be borrowed at no further cost.

No. There are no designated areas for eating or drinking in the exhibitions.

Admission to a temporary exhibition is € 7, the reduced rate is € 3.50. Admission is free for those 18 and under. Admission for all exhibtions is € 10, the reduced rate is € 5. Admission is free for those 18 and under.

A family ticket costs € 18 and includes the opportunity to take part in a guided tour for families for up to two adults and three children.

Reduced-price concessions also apply for: schoolchildren and people in vocational training over 18 years of age, members of the Federal Voluntary Service (Bundesfreiwilligendienst), students, the unemployed, holders of the Berlin Pass, severely disabled persons with at least a 50 % reduction in earning capacity and those of a similar status.

Admission is free for all pupils, students and people in vocational training visiting the museum with their school or seminar, even those over 18. (Please remember: All school groups must be booked in advance.)

With a group ticket, groups of 15 and over pay € 7 per person to visit the Temporary Exhibitions.

Online tickets can be purchased for the museum’s exhibitions. Visitors need to present their online ticket on their mobile phone or printed at the admission point.

Yes, the 3-day ticket is also valid for the DHM and can be purchased online or at the ticket desk. You can learn more about the ticket here.

No, the museum does not offer a yearly pass. Admission is free, however, for those with an annual membership to the Museumsverein – the museum’s patrons association. To learn more about becoming a member of the Museumsverein, follow this link.

No, the DHM does not belong to the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin.

The museum accepts cash, EC Karten (German debit cards), and credit cards (Visa, Mastercard). Online tickets can be purchased via credit card or Sofort direct transfer.

Gift vouchers are available for purchase at museum ticket desks. They can also be ordered – just dial +49 30 20304 -731, or drop us an email: verkauf@dhm.de.

Vouchers can be redeemed at the ticket desks on the day of your visit.

You can book a tour through our Visitor Service, available Monday to Friday, 9 am to 4 pm.

Just dial +49 30 20304 -750 or -751, or drop us an email: fuehrung@dhm.de

Parties of 15 people and more count as a group. Group tickets can only be purchased at the ticket desk.

Yes, groups are allowed to visit the museum without a guide. To do so, please register your visit with Visitor Service ahead of time: Just dial +49 30 20304 -750 or -751 (Monday to Friday 9 am to 4 pm) or drop us an email: fuehrung@dhm.de

Guided tours by external guides are currently not possible.

The Temporary Exhibitions feature texts and labelling in both German and English. Certain Temporary Exhibitions feature text in simplified language, braille, and German sign language.

Yes. Public tours are offered for all exhibitions, with dates and times listed on our events calendar. Tours cost € 3 plus admission.

German and English audio guides are also available for select Temporary Exhibitions.

Please register your class or seminar group with the Visitor Service ahead of time. Just dial +49 30 20304 -750 or -751 (Monday to Friday 9 am to 4 pm) or drop us an email: fuehrung@dhm.de

S-Bahn

Hackescher Markt or Friedrichstraße

U-Bahn

Museumsinsel, Französische Straße, Friedrichstraße, or Hausvogteiplatz

Bus

100, 300 Staatsoper or Museumsinsel

The museum recommends the garage at Bebelplatz. There are limited parking spaces available within the vicinity of the Palais am Festungsgraben.

Yes, the Buchhandlung Walther König operates the gift store in the Pei building that features a select assortment of products. Museum catalogues can either be purchased directly on site, or via the museum’s Online Shop.

The café is closed because of necessary renovations and for the renewal of the Permanent Exhibition in the Zeughaus.

The Zeughaus, a historic landmark building, is closed because it has to be renovated; at the same time a new concept for the Permanent Exhibition is being developed. For this purpose the entire exhibition area, the museum café, and the Zeughauskino in that building had to be moved out.

The buildings used by the Stiftung (Foundation) Deutsches Historisches Museum, among them the Zeughaus, are property of the Federal Republic of Germany. Proprietor of the property right is the Institute for Federal Real Estate (BlmA), to which the DHM pays rent for the use of the buildings. The BlmA is thus the contractor for the renovation measures. In December 2023, the BlmA commissioned the German Federal Office for Building and Regional Planning (BBR) to plan the renovation.

After being in use for 20 years, the technical facilities have to be completely modernised. This applies above all to the air-conditioning technology, which is indispensable for the operation of the museum, as well as to the entire safety-related system, the lighting, and the IT infrastructure. The renovation also includes technical adaptations to the operation of a modern museum and the new Permanent Exhibition. Since the renovation measures apply to the ceilings, walls and floors inside the Zeughaus as a protected historical monument, the building had to be cleared. For this purpose external storage spaces had to be found, prepared and rented. Due to the threatened breakdown of the air-conditioning, which is necessary to conserve the objects, the work already began in the middle of 2021. At this time the DHM transferred around 6,000 objects from the Permanent Exhibition to the newly rented storage spaces. The fact that the exponents were moved out just in time was confirmed when the anticipated damage to the water ducts for the air-conditioning actually occurred. Fortunately, all the objects had been cleared out by then.

Alongside the complete refurbishing of the technical facilities, the renovation is planned so as to improve the visitor experience, barrier freedom, and energy efficiency of the building. Among other things, a second entrance for visitors and additional toilets will be installed, visitor guidance improved, and a new area for children and families designed.

The German Federal Office for Building and Regional Planning (BBR) recommended to the Institute for Federal Real Estate (BlmA) as contractor and the Stiftung Deutsches Historisches Museum as utiliser to combine the measures for renovation and modernisation of the technical facilities in the Zeughaus into a single overall measure and, parallel to that, to plan the new Permanent Exhibition. Otherwise, it would have been necessary over a still longer period of time to undertake repeated intrusions into the structure (for example, repeated openings of the floors, ceiling or walls) for a step by step renovation of the various technical facilities as they deteriorated. This would have merely postponed the renovation and caused the building to be closed several times over an even longer period of time.

Combining the necessary renovation in a major building project – i.e., the coordinated planning and realisation of the necessary work – is more efficient and thus more economical to carry out. The decision-making process for this project took place over a long period of time and led in December 2023 to the commissioning of the BBR to prepare the building plans according to the guidelines of the Federal Construction and Finance Administration (RBBau), including the conceptual design, by the BlmA. The clearance of the Final Project Documentation in its complete form by the contractor is expected for the fourth quarter of 2026. According to RBBau guidelines, the commission to plan and carry out the complete building measures first comes into effect with the approval of the Final Project Documentation.

It is currently not possible for the Institute for Federal Real Estate (BlmA) and the German Federal Office for Building and Regional Planning (BBR) to make exact predictions about the completion of the renovation and reopening of the Zeughaus. The so-called Initial Project Documentation for the renovation was confirmed by the contractor in October 2024. The design planning is currently underway, which is to be presented in the form of the so-called Final Project Documentation at the end of 2025. It is only after verification and approval as well as after release of the necessary budgetary resources, presumably in autumn 2026, will the BBR be commissioned to carry out the renovation measures. Only then will the BBR be able to make reliable estimates of opening dates.

Parallel to the planning and subsequent renovation, the DHM is working extensively on designs for a new Permanent Exhibition. The museum can first install the exhibition when the construction and technical renovation is completed. Once started, it should take the DHM about one year to complete the installation of the new exhibition.

The DHM is using the urgently needed renovation of the Zeughaus to replace the former Permanent Exhibition “German History from the Middle Ages to the Fall of the Berlin Wall”, which was shown from 2006 to 2021 in the Zeughaus, with a newly designed Permanent Exhibition.

In the meantime, the DHM is offering a popular exhibition in the Pei Building that deals with turning points in the German history of the 19^th and 20^th centuries: “Roads not Taken. Or: Things could have turned out differently”. Further information below.

The new Permanent Exhibition will show German history with its international ramifications on two floors with a total surface area of around 9,000 square metres. The chronological presentation will be shown on the upper floor in streamlined form, but with new accents, in order to make room on the ground floor for new approaches to history and to address new visitor groups. Thus, a special area will invite children and young people on a journey into the past and a visit to the museum with the family. An area on the ground floor will also be devoted to the eventful history of the baroque Zeughaus (former armoury) and to address questions about collecting, preserving and researching objects.

The point of departure for the new Permanent Exhibition is the uniquely important collection of the Deutsches Historisches Museum, to which numerous important works have been added in the last fifteen years. The aim of the Permanent Exhibition is to present the openness and diversity of interpretation of past historical developments to the visitors and to invite them to reach their own conclusions.

Most of the objects are in the DHM’s own depots. A further part is being restored for the future Permanent Exhibition in the DHM workshops. Many objects can be seen in the current temporary exhibitions. As in every year, numerous objects are also on loan for exhibitions in Germany and abroad. The objects in the DHM collection are accessible in the online database as well as in the German Digital Library.

The DHM is continuing to show temporary exhibitions about various historical topics in the modern building, which is named after I. M. Pei, the architect who designed it. The different departments of the museum continue to prepare the concept and realisation of these new exhibitions and the various events and publications accompanying them. At the same time, the DHM team is working on plans for the presentation in the future Permanent Exhibition. The staff has discussed and further developed the concept for this inclusive and barrier-free exhibition in numerous workshops with experts from home and abroad and with our own board of advisers chosen specially for this purpose. Along these lines, the team is currently working on the historical background of the topics as well as the selection of the objects and their preparation in the restoration workshops. Parallel to this, the design office ATELIER BRÜCKNER is working on the design for the implementation and presentation of the Permanent Exhibition in the landmarked Zeughaus. This is a joint process combining curatorship and design which focuses on the staging of the objects and transferring historical themes into a three-dimensional special structure.

The DHM can partly fulfil the great interest in an overview of German history with the very popular exhibition “Roads not Taken. Or: Things could have turned out differently” and its accompanying programmes. Conceived by the historian Dan Diner, the exhibition looks at a number of turning points in the German history of the 19^th and 20^th centuries. It starts with the so-called Peaceful Revolution of the GDR in the year 1989 and ends in the year 1848, when Germany was attempting an initial democratic awakening. In reverse order it takes up such themes as Ostpolitik, the building of the Berlin Wall, the Cold War, the assumption of power by the National Socialists, as well as revolution and democratisation at a number of decisive tipping points and suggests that by no means did these events have to end as they finally did. In light of the long period of construction in the Zeughaus, the DHM decided to extend the exhibition’s running time until 11 January 2026. It is expected to be followed by another exhibition that will provide a partial survey of German history. The Zeughauskino will continue to devote itself to German history in the temporary screening room in the Pei Building.

Unexpected delays are the greatest challenge for the DHM. This means that the team of the DHM has to stay flexible all the time and adapt to new situations and changing schedules. The DHM is particularly sorry for our visitors, because we know that they miss the Permanent Exhibition very much.

The exhibition programme in the modern Pei Building will continue to present exhibitions about decisive events, developments, and persons in German history within its international context. Until January 2026, the exhibition “Roads not Taken. Or: Things could have turned out differently” looks at important turning points in the German history of the 19^th and 20^th centuries. This year the DHM will open two new exhibitions “On Displaying Violence. The First Exhibitions on the Nazi Occupation in Europe, 1945–1948” and “Nature and German History. Faith – Biology – Power”.

At the moment it is still not possible to give an exact date for the reopening. The DHM team also misses the café and in the meantime recommends nearby sources of good coffee and delicious snacks:

James Simon Galerie, Humboldt Forum, Palais Populaire, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin