Best Things To Do in Savannah
Savannah, Georgia sits at the mouth of the Savannah River with a downtown grid that has barely changed in design since the colonial era. The city's founding plan — a repeating pattern of wards, each anchored by a public square — gives it a walkability that few American cities can match. That layout, layered over centuries of architecture, ceremony, and commerce, is a large part of what draws visitors here. Whether you have a single afternoon or a full long weekend, Savannah rewards careful exploration on foot. For broader context before or after reading this page, the Savannah Travel Guide: Things to Do, Landmarks, Food, and Itineraries covers the full picture.
Walk the Historic Squares
The most Savannah-specific thing you can do costs nothing: walk the squares. Twenty-two historic squares remain intact in the downtown district, each a small park surrounded by streets, live oaks, iron benches, and buildings that date anywhere from the early 1800s to the early 1900s. No two squares are quite alike in character. Some are formal and quiet; others anchor active commercial streets. Chippewa Square, Johnson Square, and Madison Square are among the most commonly visited, each with its own historical associations and surrounding architecture worth pausing to look at.
The squares are free and publicly accessible at all hours. Plan for at least two to three hours if you want to move through the core historic district at a pace that lets you actually notice things. Comfortable shoes matter — the brick and cobblestone surfaces are uneven in places.
For a curated first-time route, the Savannah 1-Day Itinerary offers a structured walk that strings the highlights together logically.
The Riverfront and Factors Walk
River Street runs along the southern bank of the Savannah River and is one of the city's most recognizable stretches. The old cotton warehouses that line the bluff have been converted into shops, restaurants, and bars. The cobblestone ramps connecting River Street to the upper level — Factors Walk — give you a sense of how the original commercial system was layered into the landscape.
The riverfront is free to walk and worth doing at multiple times of day. Morning is quieter and better for photographs; evenings draw larger crowds. Large container ships still move through the Savannah River channel with some regularity, which adds an unexpected industrial scale to the view.
Forsyth Park
Forsyth Park anchors the southern end of the historic district and is the largest green space in the downtown area at roughly 30 acres. The cast-iron fountain at the park's north end is one of the most photographed spots in Savannah. The park draws locals for daily walks and weekend gatherings, and it functions as a genuine neighborhood park rather than a purely tourist destination.
The grounds are free and open daily. A farmers market runs on weekend mornings when the season is active — check local listings before you go rather than assuming it will be operating on a given day.
Museums and Cultural Institutions
Savannah has a denser concentration of museums relative to its size (about 147,500 residents as of the 2024 ACS estimate) than many comparable cities. The Telfair Museums system encompasses three distinct sites: Telfair Academy, the Jepson Center for the Arts, and the Owens-Thomas House & Slave Quarters. Each covers different ground — fine and decorative arts at the Academy, contemporary work at the Jepson Center, and a carefully interpreted house museum at the Owens-Thomas property that addresses the full history of the site, including the lives of enslaved people who lived and worked there.
The SCAD Museum of Art, operated by the Savannah College of Art and Design, is another option worth considering, particularly if contemporary and modern work is your focus. The Ships of the Sea Maritime Museum, housed in the William Scarbrough House, is a more specialized stop with an impressive collection of ship models and maritime artifacts.
Admission policies and hours vary by site and can change seasonally, so checking each institution's official website before visiting is the reliable approach. For a broader look at landmarks connected to these institutions, see Top Landmarks in Savannah.
Historic Sites and Cemeteries
Colonial Park Cemetery is a public historic cemetery in the heart of the district, free to enter and one of the older burial grounds in Georgia. It's a reflective, low-key stop that gives real texture to the city's age.
Bonaventure Cemetery, on Savannah's eastern edge, is a Victorian-era cemetery that became widely known after its appearance in popular culture in the 1990s. It's an active cemetery, so visitors are expected to be respectful of that, but it remains open to the public. The mature live oaks and the mix of elaborate funerary sculpture make it genuinely distinctive.
Mercer Williams House, on Monterey Square, is another site that gained broader attention through the same cultural moment as Bonaventure. It operates as a house museum; check the official site for current tour availability and policies.
Wormsloe Historic Site, managed by the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, sits southeast of downtown. Its entrance avenue — a long dirt road canopied by live oaks draped with Spanish moss — is one of the most striking natural approaches to any historic property in the Southeast. The site interprets early colonial settlement and is a reasonable half-day excursion from downtown.
National Park Service Sites in the Area
The National Park Service maintains six units in or near the Savannah area. Fort Pulaski National Monument, located on Cockspur Island east of the city, is the most prominent. It's a well-preserved masonry fortification with significant Civil War history and a good interpretive program. The drive from downtown Savannah takes roughly 30 minutes. Check the NPS website for current hours, entrance fee status, and any seasonal closures before making the trip.
Neighborhoods Worth Wandering
Beyond the core historic district, a few other areas are worth exploring on foot.
The Victorian District, immediately south of Forsyth Park, has a dense inventory of late-19th-century residential architecture. It's quieter than the tourist core and gives a clearer sense of what the city looks like as a place people actually live.
Starland District, further south still, has a neighborhood character shaped by local businesses, studios, and SCAD-affiliated activity. It skews younger and less formal than the historic squares area.
Thomas Square and the streets surrounding it offer a similar mix of local commercial energy and architectural character.
Free vs. Ticketed: A Quick Reference
Generally free: the 22 historic squares, River Street and Factors Walk, Forsyth Park, Colonial Park Cemetery, Bonaventure Cemetery (open grounds), neighborhood walks.
Generally ticketed or with admission: Telfair Museums sites, SCAD Museum of Art, Ships of the Sea Maritime Museum, Mercer Williams House, Wormsloe Historic Site, Fort Pulaski National Monument. Verify current pricing directly with each venue, as fees change.
Eating in Savannah
Savannah has roughly 488 mapped restaurants and cafes across the city, with strong representation in the historic district and along the riverfront. The range covers Southern cooking, seafood, casual lunch spots, and more formal dinner options. For an organized overview, the Where to Eat in Savannah page covers the dining landscape by neighborhood and style.
Planning Your Visit
The Best Time to Visit Savannah page covers seasonal considerations in detail. In short: spring and fall bring the most comfortable temperatures for walking; summer is hot and humid; winter is mild by national standards but can be rainy. The city sees significant tourist traffic year-round, so popular sites can be crowded regardless of season.
Savannah's compact historic district is easiest to navigate on foot, and most of the sites described here are within a reasonable walk of each other. For a structured multi-day plan, the Savannah 3-Day Itinerary sequences the major attractions with logistics in mind. Common questions about the city are addressed in the Savannah FAQ.
As with any city, ordinary awareness of your surroundings is sensible. The historic district is a genuinely walkable area, but it's an active urban environment — keep track of your belongings and be aware of traffic, particularly on busier streets near the riverfront.