Zagreb is a two-day city and there is no point pretending otherwise. The centre is small, flat and walkable, the museums are excellent but not enormous, and by the end of a second afternoon you will have seen it.
That is not a criticism. It means you can see the whole of a European capital properly in two days, which is not true of many, and it leaves a third day for the mountain or the lakes.
The one thing to know before you start: coffee is not a drink here, it is an appointment. Build sitting down into the plan or you will spend two days walking past the best thing in the city.
Day one: the two hills
Morning. Start at Ban Jelačić Square and go straight up the steps at the north-east corner to Dolac. Be there before nine. Buy cheese, buy fruit, look at the red parasols, eat a burek standing up.
Then the cathedral on Kaptol, two minutes away — expect scaffolding, and check whether the interior is open.
Late morning. Cross to the other hill. Down into Tkalčićeva, up Radićeva, and through the Stone Gate — read the votive plaques, they are the best thing in the Upper Town.
Come out at St Mark’s, photograph the roof, and be at Lotrščak Tower a few minutes before noon for the cannon.
Lunch. On or near Opatovina, behind Dolac, rather than on Tkalčićeva. Same food, less money.
Afternoon. The Museum of Broken Relationships — an hour, and it will stay with you — then the Croatian Museum of Naive Art thirty seconds away.
Late afternoon. Down the funicular — 64 seconds, and take it anyway — and back through the Grič Tunnel if it is hot.
Evening. Dinner in the lower town, then a drink on Radićeva or Martićeva.
Day two: the lower town
Morning. Walk the Green Horseshoe: down Zrinjevac, Strossmayer Square, King Tomislav Square and the Art Pavilion, across through the Botanical Garden, and back up the western arm past the Croatian National Theatre and the Well of Life.
That is about three kilometres and ninety minutes at a stroll.
Midday. Break it at the Archaeological Museum on Zrinjevac for the Liber Linteus — the longest surviving text in the Etruscan language, on linen wrapped round an Egyptian mummy. Forty minutes if that is all you want.
Afternoon, option A — across the river. Tram 6 or 14 to the Museum of Contemporary Art, use the slide, and walk out into Novi Zagreb to see the blocks and Bundek.
Afternoon, option B — the cemetery. Bus 106 from beside the cathedral to Mirogoj, ninety minutes among Bollé’s ivy-covered arcades.
Both are excellent and there is not time for both.
Evening. Dinner, and the theatre if something is on — tickets cost less than a decent bottle of wine.
If your second day is a Saturday
Change everything. Špica happens between ten and one on Bogovićeva and Cvjetni trg, the entire city dresses up and sits outside, and it is the single most characteristic thing in Zagreb.
Do the Green Horseshoe on Friday and give Saturday morning to sitting still.
A third day
Medvednica — a 1,035-metre mountain at the end of the tram line, with a cable car, a medieval fortress and mountain huts serving beans and beer. Half a day, and almost no visitor does it.
Plitvice — spectacular, and a full day with two and a half hours of bus each way. Book a timed ticket before you go.
Samobor, Varaždin or Trakošćan — all much closer, all half-days. See day trips from Zagreb.
What to skip
Organised walking tours of the Upper Town. It is 500 metres across and signposted.
The Museum of Illusions. It is fine. It is also a franchise with branches in thirty countries and you did not come to Croatia for it.
Restaurants with photographs on the menu, anywhere on Tkalčićeva.
Practical shape
Stay in the lower town — everything above is within twenty minutes on foot. Buy a transport ticket only if you are going to Mirogoj, Maksimir or across the river; otherwise you will walk everywhere.
Croatia has used the euro since January 2023. Anything quoting kuna is out of date.
If you only have one day
It happens — Zagreb is a common stopover between the coast and central Europe, and a lot of people get an afternoon.
Do this, in order, and it takes about six hours:
Dolac if it is before noon, the cathedral from outside, up Radićeva through the Stone Gate, St Mark’s, the noon cannon if the timing works, the Museum of Broken Relationships, down the funicular, and a long sit on Zrinjevac with a coffee.
That is the city, honestly covered, in an afternoon.
Pacing, and the thing most itineraries get wrong
Zagreb rewards sitting down more than it rewards walking, and visitors consistently under-plan for that.
The museums are small. The Upper Town is 500 metres across. There is no vast palace to queue for, no cathedral interior that takes two hours, no queue-skipping decision to agonise over. If you march, you will finish day one by two in the afternoon and conclude there is nothing here.
Build in two long coffees a day, outside, on a terrace, with one drink and no hurry. That is not filler — it is what the city is for, and it is the difference between having seen Zagreb and having been in it.
What it costs to do all of this
Very little. Dolac, the Stone Gate, the cannon, the Green Horseshoe, Mirogoj, the Upper Town and the gas lamps are all free.
The museums that charge are inexpensive, and a theatre ticket costs less than dinner. The full arithmetic is in how much Zagreb costs.