Of all the incredible things travel allows us to experience, from hidden beaches, to outlandish meals, to intestinal discomfort, ancient ruins have to be my all time favorite. Whether it’s a long-abandoned city, a forgotten religious relic, or something mystifying enough to elude a modern parallel, a good ruin dazzlingly fuses the worldly and familiar with the cosmic and unknowable, and it does so using nothing but rudimentary building materials, zero labor laws, and an ever-astounding bounty of invention. To stand in front of civilization’s great ruins is to know the world on a more visceral level, to tread its history with your own orthotic inserts, to inhale its apical heights and catastrophic lows in a single breath.
In fact, no element instantly elevates an otherwise by-the-books trip into “Mega” status like an ancient ruin. Perhaps this is a result of the compound travel phenomenon, when the thousands of miles you’ve traversed to get somewhere become multiplied by the transportive exponent of time. Or maybe it’s the shattered looking glass effect, the dreadfully hypnotic speculative snapshot of what our current world could be reduced to in the coming centuries. Or weeks. Whatever the explaination, the results are the delicate precious gems of the travel world. When people talk about standing the test of time, these are the places that broke the grading curve. They are the sites that amazed upon their inception and only grew more mesmerizing with each consecutive century. They are the things you need to see before you die, or more pressingly, before they do.
While it is borderline impossible to visit all of the world’s notable archaisms, we have slain enough of these majestic travel beasts to put together an obsessively curated list of the ones that refuse to leave our subconscious, that insist on imprinting our worldview, and that demand immortalization in our picture frames. This is our power ranking of the world’s greatest ancient ruins. May the most dilapidated win.
9. Ait Ben Haddou
We kick off the countdown with a bit of a curve ball. Ait Ben Haddou is probably the least recognizable name on this list. Which makes some sense considering its relative inaccessibility compared to Morocco’s bounty of airport-adjacent Medinas. But name recognition aside, you probably still know Ait Ben Haddou. There are very few filmed historic epics in the past 50 years that haven’t used the site’s sandcastle configuration of clay buildings as an easy visual cue for bygone exoticism. And even without recognizing the Maximus or Khalesi scenes in question, Ait Ben Haddou more than earns its ruin stripes with its disintegrating aisles of clay, deftly nestled tea houses, and breathtaking vistas of empty sands capped with white mountaintops.
If Ait Ben Haddou is lacking in terms of showy centerpieces, it more than makes up for it in slice-of-life charm. It’s hard to navigate these dusty trenches without picturing yourself living in them hundreds of years ago. You can’t help but envision yourself opening the front curtain in the morning to see the parchment boy has already dropped off the day’s decrees. You’d leave your quadradic encampment to grab a tea at your favorite rooftop. You’d fill up on water in the trickling river. You’d congregate with other Ben Haddouins on village’s crowning hilltop to get the latest town gossip. Turns out the school district is a little rocky, but the cost of living is still sand-cheap. Rumor has it Linda stole Tammy’s tajine recipe, and people say Alan has been acting like a coastal elitist ever since he visited Essaouira. Classic Alan.
Above all, that’s what distinguishes Ait Ben Haddou: it’s so damn inviting. It’s not an extravagant mausoleum. It’s not a crumbling military artifact. It doesn’t exist to serve a higher power. It’s an antique neighborhood. An archaic subdivision. A primordial cul-de-sac. A place to walk the dog, who is statistically very likely to be rabid, and wave to the neighbors, who are statistically very likely to be artisanal carpet manufacturers. A great ruin is all about capturing a distinct moment in time. And moments this relaxed and quotidian might just be the most difficult ones to preserve for so long.
8. Roman Forum
The Foro Romano (which for our purposes includes the Colosseum) is easily the most accessible ruin on this list, unearthing itself right in the middle of one of Europe’s biggest, busiest, and yummiest metropoli. And while ease of access does install somewhat of an allure cap on this ancient-city-center-within-a-modern-city-center, at least relative to its more remote counterparts, it also speaks to the significance and longevity of what the Forum represents.
This is the place where modern civilization was invented, and a lot of the design choices, including where to build important cities, haven’t really changed in the millennia since. It’s evident on every marble-clad inch of this monument to rational governance and political subterfuge. A healthy dose of White House vibes here, a dash of Arc di Triomph inspiration there, a casual blueprint for every sports arena in existence you know where. That these rows of column-supported, dome-decorated buildings reside in the uncanny valley of familiarity is only greater evidence of their enduring impact.
Not that recognition can’t be butterfly-inducing. The Colosseum practically fires grandeur out of an antediluvian t-shirt cannon, toeing the line between communal entertainment and imperial intimidation more successfully than any retractable roof imitator since. And while these concentric circles of death sport probably grace the fighting lion’s share of glossy postcard surfaces, the Forum itself is where things really start to get interesting. To explore the Forum is to wander the same symmetric stone lanes where scholars and senators once philosophized and conspired in equal measure. It’s a fascinating array of palatial parliaments, stately centers of justice, and perhaps the world’s most OG wealthy suburb on Palatine Hill.
The site easily holds the title of most opulent ruin on this list, and perhaps the world, sporting a lavishness familiar enough to make even today’s visitors cringe with class jealousy. Much like current concert goers will recognize the adrenaline kick elicited from surveying the Colosseum’s stadium seating, and modern agoraphobes will balk at early urban design’s embrace of public congregation. But that’s just how this degree of influence works. If the Forum is lacking in novelty, it’s because we’re still living in it. And as viewers of any remake are well aware, the original is always the most interesting. Thumbs up.
7. Tikal
Toward the tail end of our day in Tikal, we sauntered along a dirt path deep in the rainforest. To our left, a towering stone pyramid pierced the canopy, an eerie monument to a time long forgotten, all but erased from the earth by the earth itself. To our right, a baby coati (small raccoon-like jungle creatures with pointy faces and giant red tails) lay on the forest floor struggling to breathe. It sat next to the tree it had fallen from, whimpering in pain and distress, when down from a neighboring tree scurried an adult coati, searching desperately for the infant in need. The baby cried out as the full-grown coati sniffed around, hoping its superior sense of smell could locate the source of the anguish before it was too late.
Finally, the adult found the trembling youth, whose yelps dissipated the moment this comforting presence arrived. The adult approached, nuzzled gently with its prolonged snout, and then opened its mouth and started tearing into the baby’s face with its teeth, shredding underdeveloped cheek and forehead flesh with starved savagery. Our guide, who had spent 40 years of his life in Tikal’s ferocious habitat, gasped in shock as he stood powerless in front of this Darwinian infanticide, decades of untamed immersion failing to prepare him for the raw cruelty of nature.
To love Tikal is to love the jungle. Of all the ruins our Megatravels have given us, these are perhaps the most intrinsically linked to their environment. Most of the temples and pyramids are still half-buried in centuries of crumbling dirt, spindling roots, and burrowing life. When the architecture does break free, it does so triumphantly. The Great Plaza in particular is an all-out dogfight between ancient showstoppers, a dueling arena for extravagant petrified wedding cakes where solar alignment is the judging criteria.
But its gravitas would be hampered were it not for the immediate density of the surrounding chaparral. And if you manage to forget where you are, the howler monkeys and cannibalistic coatis will remind you. The city may have been man made. But it’s theirs now.
6. Great Wall Of China
There is a certain tier of ruin that has to compete, not only with other odes to antiquity in its weight class, but with its own name recognition as well. These are the ruins that constantly have to combat the possibility of Letdown. And it isn’t exactly a fair fight. How can something like China’s Great Wall, a bare-bones, unadorned, several-meter-tall fortification, possibly compete with its own status as the first thing you learn about international history as a 4-year-old? The odds are heavily stacked in Letdown’s favor. But we all love a good upset. Which is what makes it so satisfying to walk along this infinite range of rolling ramparts, to scale a steep incline and see your sense of accomplishment evaporate in the blink of an ever-unfurling carpet of stone, to ponder the fact that you could keep walking on this thing for a literal year and a half, and then to wonder how the hell the underdog pulled it off.
Many ruins impress with their sense of scale, with how tall they stand, with how ornate they are, with how long ago they were constructed. But no one approaches scale from the same angle as the Great Wall. It’s the only ruin in the world where physically visiting it STILL doesn’t give you the whole picture. Other ruins have to be seen to be believed. The Great Wall has to be seen to realize how far you are from fully grasping its enormity. The wall is forever. It’s not that any one section of it is that visually mind-blowing. It’s that the damn thing just keeps going. For longer than is really comprehendible. It’s like watching a comedian commit to a bit that only starts to get belly laughs after the audience comes to terms with the fact that it’s still happening. It’s the Sideshow Bob rake step of ruins, as inscrutable as it is undeniable.
One element that often gets overlooked in Great Wall discussions is how gorgeous its natural surroundings are. Just a short drive from the planar-smog-cloud-masquerading-as a-city that is Beijing, the Wall may as well reside in a different geological dimension. Jagged irregular crags rise and descend with an almost tidal rhythm, alternating seasonally between lush, verdant emerald, and arid, chilly slate. And much of the Wall’s visual appeal comes from the fact that it doesn’t attempt to dominate this bewildering topography. It lets the land do the heavy defensive lifting, settling comfortably into the role of transcontinental hall monitor. Keeping a stern eye on things as it snakes silently over mountains, across nations, and into eternity.
And this air of wisdom-infused detachment is the Wall’s secret weapon in the venerable cage match against Letdown. Because such debates are small, finite, and fleeting. People will eventually stop searching for the hottest take, finish finding the trivial comparisons, and cease creating the arbitrary ranking lists. And when all that is said and done, the Wall will still be there, serving its purpose with graceful indifference. Winning without trying, forever.
5. Pyramids Of Giza
Ruins are usually complex. They’re sprawling, they’re elaborate, and they’re convoluted, harkening back to times when proper design and functionality were frequent afterthoughts to grandiose ambition. But then there’s the Pyramids of Giza, easily some of the most iconic manmade structures in history, which for all their majesty, ultimately amount to an enormous geometric flex. The strategic vision for the Pyramids is simple: Take the most basic shape imaginable and exaggerate it to ludicrous extremes. You can imagine the Pharaoh checking on his Director of Construction/Slave Labor Coordinator, surveying his polygonal progress, and demanding with an imposing inflection: “Bigger” “Taller” “More”. It’s as if his goal was to ruin the shape for everyone else, to make any other three-sided pretender appear cheap and derivative in comparison, to wordlessly and definitively declare “I came, Isosceles, I conquered.” Put another way: “Do you like triangles? How you like them triangles?”
As excessive and hubristic as it most certainly was, this maniacal focus and determination paid off. The Pyramids collectively remain a staggering demonstration of purpose and might, an array of massive wedge-like totems to both the souls of the departed and the egos of the living. And it really can’t be overstated just how huge they are. The individual building blocks alone are enough to intimidate, and when playing in grand, tapering unison, they are nothing short of emasculating. The Great Pyramid in particular is so gargantuan, that the neighboring lumps of limestone appear less like individual structures and more like celestial bodies caught in its gravitational pull, an earthbound orbit of the arcane, a swirling solar system in the sand.
Visiting the Pyramids elicits that elusive spinal sensation that can only come from witnessing your expectations getting thoroughly lapped by reality. And as astonishing as they are up close, the site is really at its most effective when you take a step back from it. When you realize that this cluster of yellow corners creates different, yet equally elegant, tableaus from every angle, when you can appreciate the stark suddenness with which they emerge from the desert, when it sinks in that, despite their projection of power, they actually appear quite lonely in perspective.
Of course, as is the case with all exercises in simplicity, there’s more here than meets the eye. There’s a whole series of subterranean crypts and passages available to spelunk for those with adequate quad strength and an immunity to phobias both claustro and tapho. And there is of course the Sphynx, which for all its schoolbook bonafides, is more of a refreshing garnish than main ingredient. A whimsical decorative wrinkle to an otherwise minimalist presentation. But really what you’ll remember years later are those indelible angles surfacing from the sand. Towering timeless testaments to tyranny and triangles. Keeping things simple isn’t always easy, but if your attempt sticks around for several thousand years, you’re probably in good shape.
4. Bagan
Bagan is all about the big picture. Other ruins on this list certainly have flashier main attractions, sexier set pieces, and more stylish souvenir stands. But Bagan’s strength lies not in any one notable, big-name temple, but in the aggregate spectacle of its infinite, anonymous pagodas. Hundreds upon hundreds of tanned brick witch hats penetrate the parched brush in what ultimately adds up to a Magic Eye poster come to life. Bagan isn’t a site, it’s a scene, a mood piece, where your appreciation revolves less around locating a single crown jewel and more around uncovering the perfect vantage point from which to observe an entire king’s ransom. And the freedom of that search is one of the most rewarding travel experiences on earth.
Inherent to most ruins is a recommended route of observation, a direction on a trail, a circuit of temples, a celebrity-narrated audio tour. In Bagan, the script consists of nothing more than renting an electric bicycle and setting out into an endless field of wonder, surprise, and sunburn. The trails that do exist make no sense. Dead ends are abundant. Wrong turns are rewarded. It’s an all-day exercise in selecting a distant point of interest, trying to physically connect the dots, and ending up somewhere else that’s even more fascinating. You’ll happen across pagodas patroned by practicing monks. You’ll swerve to steer clear of sunbathing snakes. You’ll pass massive multi-story freaks of construction just as often as you’ll find yourself swarmed by squadrons of smaller spires that appear to multiply before your eyes.
And when taking on the terrain grows tiresome, you take to the sky. Every morning at sunrise, a legion of levitating balloons glides spectrally over the assortment of steepled shrines. And whether you’re observing from a pre-dawn pagoda perch or clinging to the edge of an airborne wicker basket, the inflatable armada adds one more otherworldly element to a landscape that hardly needs it.
It’s also worth mentioning, primarily to asuage my insatiable thirst for crepuscular light, that were this list to rank ruins in terms of best sunset experience, Bagan would be number one hands down. As the sky begins to burn orange, last-gasp solar rays start to dance over the distant mountains, across the wooded fields, and around the tips of the pagodas, accentuating their outlines in a silhouette as apocalyptic as it is captivating.
And, like everything else in Bagan, there’s no one way to appreciate this serendipitous confluence of nature, history, and light. In fact, the best sunset experience of my visit was when we identified a virtually unvisited pagoda as a potential sundowner candidate during a daytime excursion deep within the park, only to relocate it hours later, relying on nothing but remedial directional memory and several lucky turns. We got there, parked our e-bikes outside, used our phone flashlights to navigate the cobwebbed interior to the third floor, and emerged to one of the most impressive panoramas I’ve ever seen, entirely unique from the view you’d get on any different ledge, at any different angle, at any different time of day. And we had it to ourselves until the sky blackened. And then we had to find our way out in the dark.
Irreplicable experiences like happen all the time here. Bagan is entirely what you make of it. There is no signature moment, no one part that approaches the cumulative total of the sum, no two visitors who will share the same experience. There’s just a playground of relics and artifacts for you to choose you own adventure in. And all choices are correct.
3. Angkor Wat
Drawing comparisons between Bagan and Angkor Wat feels almost cliché at this point. It’s a fabricated competition that wouldn’t exist if these very different ruins didn’t arbitrarily share the same subcontinent. But here’s an analogy that will hopefully demonstrate juxtaposition over forced resemblance: If Bagan is a free jazz record, Angkor Watt is a classic rock opus. More methodical, structured, and tangible, and all the more memorable because of it.
The various tracks on the Angkor record are distinct and varied yet they remain thematically connected. It is a concept album about a fallen empire that just happens to nail every heart-pounding chorus and ear-worming riff. It begins with the power-chord-laden opener of Bayan Temple, bursting out of the gates with thundering purpose and literal stone-faced confidence. Bayan is the album’s mission statement, announcing a definitive arrival while hinting at some of the intrigue to come.
Then there’s the towering technical elegance of Baphuon, tossing multi-level harmonies and complex time signatures into a staggering, monolithic whole. This is where the artist shows off his most impressive tricks, soloing into eternity, unleashing pinch harmonics that tear through the Khmer wilderness. There’s the mid-record experimental track, Ta Phrom, a beguiling blend of genres that toes the line of crumbling under its own ambition only to strike a perfect balance between strange and familiar, jungle and civilization, overgrowth and stone.
And of course, there’s the requisite 11-minute epic: Angkor Wat itself. A tune so timeless even those who don’t know the band will recognize it instantly. The eponymous temple of the Angkor kingdom seems like it was built with icon status in mind. It has that massive moat surrounding the grounds, like ominous minor chords signaling that this track is important and requires undivided attention. It has those unmistakable coniferous towers, the signature hook that is at once known throughout the entire world yet remains entirely unique to this one small place. It has the reflecting pool in front of the temple, a symbolic lyric of immortality that would be too on-the-nose if it weren’t so damn beautiful.
The whole thing closes with the contemplative ballad of Phnom Bakeng, a sunkissed-cum-twilit ode to a day well-traveled, a world forever mysterious, and a sky that goes on forever. And sure, the tracklist analogy might seem reductive to a place this enormous and spellbinding, but if Angkor teaches us anything, it’s that a trusty framework can be useful when it’s executed to perfection. When every note is pristine. When it’s an album for the ages. This is ground control to Angkor Thom. You’ve really made the grade.
2. Machu Picchu
The word that feels most appropriate in describing the absolute pinnacle of the Incan empire is “mystique”. Everything about the site, from the arduous arrival journey, to the carefully controlled admissions numbers, to the pre-dawn entrance procedure, to the sheets of fog and mist that insist on dramatically flowing across the scene, adds up to a prevailing sense that you’re visiting a place that maybe isn’t even meant to be seen. Machu Picchu still feels like a secret. An arcana. Something we have access to, but don’t fully comprehend yet. And mystique of this magnitude commands your respect the moment you step foot in front of it.
Of course, all the mystique in the world wouldn’t mean anything if the site didn’t have the goods to back it up. And in a world of constant evaluation, incessant hype, and even more evaluation of said hype, Machu Picchu utterly delivers. No one who makes it there, no one who looks down from the initial terraces across the labyrinthine citadel below, impossibly nestled under the haunting shadow of Wanya Picchu peak and in-between dizzying freefalls on either side, no one who witnesses that is capable of carrying on without taking several moments to process what they are seeing. It’s the kind of place where even the actual inhabitants must have recognized how special it was. You don’t pick this spot to build a city without a sense of purpose. Or at least an appreciation for a damn fine view.
For as recognizable as Machu Picchu is, you’d be forgiven for being unacquainted with the overwhelming intricacy of the place. Because, as is the case with the next entry on this list, the trademark snapshot you came to witness firsthand, jaw dropping as it may be, is only the beginning. 
This is a capital “C” lost City, with neighborhoods, town squares, religious structures, and probably a gentrified brewery district. And that iconic backdrop mountain, the one who’s mere outline you could identify instinctively? You can climb the damn thing. It’s an insane multi-hour scramble over eroding sacred staircases, sedimentary summits, and not a single safety railing in sight. It’s undeniably exhilarating, and once again, there’s a good chance it shouldn’t be allowed.
And what actually is allowed, much like the peak’s state of cloud cover, is ever-changing. The rules for visiting have tightened even since we were there a few years ago, and the structures themselves are at constant risk of reverting to rubble. Because what often goes hand in hand with mystique is the ephemeral, and while Machu Picchu gives the impression of being here since time immemorial, there’s nothing to say it won’t one day vanish from the earth as abruptly as it appeared. Nobody truly knows for sure. It’s a mystery.
1. Petra
All of the ruins on this list bring something different to the table, be it a novel aesthetic, an obscure location, or a uniquely problematic history. But for all their individual claims to fame, common themes do emerge. Pyramids of some shape or size are favorites, cramped corridors are abundant, free-standing temples are all but required. 
And yet, there’s nothing in the world that looks quite like Petra, even amongst its contemporaries. It’s as if, faced with the unrelenting hardships of life in an immense yet constrictive, protective yet dehydrated, sidewinder of a canyon, its architects threw out the ruin rule book, and forged something completely new and beyond comparison. The result is the most remarkable surviving vestige of the ancient world anywhere in our modern one. A lost city so peculiar and enthralling, you might even overlook how flamboyantly performative it is.
Yes, Petra is a showman. It relishes in grand entrances, surprise endings, and dramatic tension. Not that it needs to be. The rigid beauty and grandiose splendor of the site are enough on their own to place this edified settlement high in the ranks of A-list historic remnants. But Petra goes above and beyond its impressive tactile features and laces its network of ravines with suspense, conflict, and satisfying climaxes. It begins with the anticipatory build-up of the thoroughly disorienting and astoundingly narrow entrance gorge: the Siq; a meandering yet dazzling intro credit sequence that would go on for a minute too long if it didn’t end with a smash cut to the most famous opening shot of all time. Which is of course the Treasury, Petra’s star attraction.
The Treasury stands in splendid, stony contrast with Angkor’s aforementioned Ta Phrom. Where the latter is a testament to nature’s undefeated record against the feeble efforts of humanity to leave its manicured mark, the Treasury documents one of the few glorious moments of continued coexistence, where through an immeasurable feat of ingenuity, dedication, and sheer will, people like us were able to carve out a refuge amongst the unforgiving walls of the world. And to make it look gorgeous for good measure. Much of the awe elicited from the site comes from the ever-evident fact that it simply shouldn’t be there. Like an elite actor somehow whittling a remarkable performance out of an otherwise petrified film, the Treasury derives its strength from standing transcendently alone.
It’s a sight so singular and awe-inspiring that it almost threatens to hog the spotlight. But the show goes on. There’s the precarious climb to the Monastery, a classic bit of sleight of hand where steep drops and strenuous effort are used to distract from the gradual approach and unexpected reveal of a hulkingly ornate façade sculpted lovingly and decisively into the side of a mountaintop. There are the tea-house intermissions, Bedouin blanket forts perched on the edge of panoramic cliffs that reward hours of emotionally draining journey with a quiet moment to reflect and consider what the whole damn thing even means. There is the mournful coda of visiting the treasury at night, flickering in candlelight, insisting, promising, perhaps even warning that after you leave and the stage lights go out, it will remain.
It all adds up to an experience that surpasses any stone dwelling or restored temple. It’s a sense of time and place so palpable and unique that it’s not surprising how easy it is to get swept up in the theater of it all. Suspension of disbelief is completely unnecessary. Petra is real life magic. Enjoy the show.
