The Most Beautiful UNESCO-Listed Sacred Places in Turkey
6 places · updated 5 October 2026
In short: By our ranking, the most beautiful UNESCO-listed sacred places in Turkey are Hagia Sophia, Sultan Ahmed Mosque and Chora Church (Kariye). The list covers 6 UNESCO-listed sacred places. Last updated 5 October 2026.
Turkey's sacred architecture spans two empires that both ruled from Istanbul. Byzantium left the domed church as its great legacy, and the Ottomans took up the challenge of that dome, producing mosques of an elegance and engineering daring that culminated in the work of the architect Sinan. Further east, Anatolian dynasties of the 13th century developed a stone-carving tradition of their own, so the country's sacred places range from gold mosaic to cascades of carved stone.
Hagia Sophia, completed in 537, crowned Justinian's cathedral with a dome that seemed to float above a ring of windows; after 1453 it became a mosque and set the model for Ottoman builders. Next to it, the Sultan Ahmed Mosque, known as the Blue Mosque for its İznik tiles, rises with six minarets. The Chora Church preserves Byzantine mosaics and frescoes from the early 14th century, including a celebrated Anastasis. Sinan's Süleymaniye Mosque dominates Istanbul's skyline from its hill, while his Selimiye Mosque in Edirne, which he called his masterpiece, raises a single great dome over an open, light-filled interior. In central Anatolia, the Great Mosque and Hospital of Divriği, built in 1228–29, is famous for portals carved in deep, almost organic relief.
In this list
| # | Place | Type | UNESCO |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hagia Sophia | Mosque | ✓ |
| 2 | Sultan Ahmed Mosque | Mosque | ✓ |
| 3 | Chora Church (Kariye) | Church building | ✓ |
| 4 | Selimiye Mosque | Mosque | ✓ |
| 5 | Süleymaniye Mosque | Mosque | ✓ |
| 6 | Divriği Great Mosque and Hospital | Mosque | ✓ |
01 Hagia Sophia
Ayasofya
Turkey · 1.1 km from Istanbul41.008° N 28.980° E
- UNESCO World Heritage
Image by edibejko from Pixabay The building that stands today was put up in barely five years. In January 532 the Nika riots burned down the previous church on the site, and within weeks Emperor Justinian I had started a far more ambitious replacement, designed by two scholars rather than master masons: Anthemius of Tralles, a mathematician, and Isidore of Miletus, a geometer. It was dedicated in 537.
Did you know? Envoys of the Kievan Rus' prince reported that inside they could not tell whether they were in heaven or on earth, a verdict tied to Rus' conversion to Orthodoxy.
02 Sultan Ahmed Mosque
Turkey · 1.4 km from Istanbul41.005° N 28.977° E
- UNESCO World Heritage
Image by OWPictures from Pixabay Sultan Ahmed I commissioned this at just 19 years old, and it was built between 1609 and 1616 — a low point in Ottoman fortunes, coming right after an unfavorable peace ended a long war with Persia. An imperial mosque of this scale was, among other things, a calculated show of confidence: proof the empire hadn't actually faltered. Ahmed died the year after it was finished, at 27.
Did you know? The tile orders swallowed the entire İznik industry, and in 1613 the sultan banned making or selling tiles for anyone else until his were finished.
03 Chora Church (Kariye)
Kariye Camii
Turkey · 3.3 km from Istanbul41.031° N 28.939° E
- UNESCO World Heritage
Tadam · CC0 From the street in Edirnekapı the Chora looks modest: a cluster of brick domes and banded walls tucked just inside the land walls of Istanbul.
Did you know? During the final Ottoman siege of 1453, the Hodegetria icon, revered as the protector of Constantinople, was carried to the Chora to help the defenders.
04 Selimiye Mosque
Turkey · 1.2 km from Edirne41.678° N 26.559° E
- UNESCO World Heritage
Image by Mozder from Pixabay The Selimiye Mosque in Edirne is the building its architect considered his masterpiece. Mimar Sinan, the chief architect of the Ottoman Empire, built it for Sultan Selim II between 1568 and 1575, and it is widely regarded as the summit of Ottoman — and much of Islamic — architecture.
Did you know? Sinan was about 80 when he built the Selimiye, which he called his masterwork after the Şehzade, his apprentice work, and the Süleymaniye, his journeyman work.
05 Süleymaniye Mosque
Turkey · 0.9 km from Istanbul41.016° N 28.964° E
- UNESCO World Heritage
Image by fotos1992 from Pixabay The Süleymaniye crowns Istanbul's Third Hill, and from the water its silhouette — a great central dome shouldered by cascading half-domes and four slender minarets — is one of the defining outlines of the old city's skyline. It was built for Suleiman the Magnificent by his chief architect Mimar Sinan; the inscription over the entrance gives 1550 for the foundation and 1557 for the inauguration.
Did you know? Sinan is said to have channelled the smoke of the mosque's oil lamps into a chamber above the entrance, where the soot was gathered and turned into calligraphers' ink.
06 Divriği Great Mosque and Hospital
Turkey39.371° N 38.122° E
- UNESCO World Heritage
R Prazeres · CC BY-SA 4.0 Divriği is a small town in the uplands of Sivas Province, and above its roofs, just below the citadel, stands one of the most astonishing pieces of stone carving in the Islamic world. The mosque and the hospital attached to it were raised together in 1228–1229 under the Mengujekids, a minor Anatolian dynasty whose Divriği branch ruled this valley.
Did you know? Each aisle of the prayer hall is roofed with a different star-patterned stone vault, so the ceilings never repeat from one bay to the next.
How this list is ranked
Places are chosen for how they look, not for how famous they are: each one has its own description and a photograph credited to its author. The order is a single world ranking that weighs the beauty of the place in curated photography together with how widely it is documented — the number of language editions of its encyclopedia article and how often that article is read in a year. The list is rebuilt as places are added, so the order and the counts on this page are always current.
Questions people ask
- What are the most beautiful UNESCO-listed sacred places in Turkey?
- On our list, Hagia Sophia ranks first, followed by Sultan Ahmed Mosque and Chora Church (Kariye).
- Why is the Sultan Ahmed Mosque called the Blue Mosque?
- Its interior is lined with thousands of hand-painted İznik tiles in which blue predominates, and the name comes from that colour scheme.
- Who was Mimar Sinan?
- Sinan was the chief architect of the Ottoman Empire in the 16th century, responsible for hundreds of buildings including the Süleymaniye Mosque in Istanbul and the Selimiye Mosque in Edirne, which he regarded as his finest work.
- What is special about the Divriği Great Mosque and Hospital?
- Built in the 13th century by the Mengujekid dynasty, it joins a mosque and a hospital in one building and is known for exceptionally rich, three-dimensional stone carving on its portals.
- How many UNESCO-listed sacred places are on this list in Turkey?
- The list covers 6 UNESCO-listed sacred places.