Palermo
Overview
Palermo does not ask to be liked. It dares you to keep up.
This is the wildest of Italy's great cities, a place of crumbling Baroque palaces and gilded Norman churches, of street markets that shout like Arab souks, of grandeur and decay sitting on the same block and somehow making sense together. Seven hundred years of Arabs, Normans, Spaniards, and Sicilians are layered into the stone, and you taste all of it in the food, the best street food in Italy, eaten standing up at a market stall. The city is loud, chaotic, sun-blasted, and gorgeous, and it runs on its own logic, by relationships and patience, not by rules or schedules.
Go deeper
A note on these scores: Palermo carries a reputation, but the city most newcomers actually live in is calmer than the headlines suggest. We score Palermo as daily life is really experienced in its central and residential neighborhoods, not by its roughest corners. Safety especially depends on where you are, and the neighborhood guide shows the real range.
At a Glance
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