Steam, salt pools and Aufguss: the best saunas in Berlin

The best saunas in Berlin span three very different experiences: Vabali, a sprawling Balinese-style sauna village near the Hauptbahnhof; Liquidrom, where you float in a 36°C saltwater dome to underwater music; and the Badeschiff, a pool moored in the river Spree that turns into a sauna over winter. A day ticket runs roughly €22–35 depending on venue and hours. German saunas are textile-free by tradition, but the saltwater pools and the Badeschiff are swimwear, so there’s an easy entry point whatever your comfort level — and it’s all far better with someone to share the heat and the cold plunge with.

The short version:

The grand one: Vabali Spa (Seydlitzstraße 6, by the Hauptbahnhof) — a Balinese village with 13 saunas and landscaped pools, open 9am to midnight, about €22.50 for two hours.
The atmospheric one: Liquidrom (Kreuzberg) — a 36°C saltwater pool under a concrete dome with underwater music and light, plus three saunas; from €24.50 for two hours, with DJs on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.
The only-in-Berlin one: the Badeschiff at Arena (Alt-Treptow) — a barge pool floating in the Spree in summer, enclosed and saunafied in winter, with the TV Tower on the skyline.
The ritual to time your visit around is the Aufguss — a guided sauna-master infusion with choreographed towel work. And the day is simply better shared: on MITRA you send a sauna or spa-day request to someone nearby, and they accept if they’re in.

Friends in robes relaxing by a warm pool in a Balinese-style Berlin sauna garden

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Want a spa day but not on your own? Find a sauna buddy on MITRA — free to download. Get MITRA on Google Play or grab it for iPhone.

Where to sauna in Berlin: the three to know
Vabali: a Balinese sauna village
Liquidrom: a saltwater dome with a DJ
Badeschiff: a sauna floating on the Spree
What Aufguss is, and why people plan around it
Textile-free, mixed and quiet: Berlin sauna etiquette
Is the sauna actually good for you?
Better with someone: why a sauna day wants a partner
Finding a sauna buddy on MITRA
Your first Berlin sauna visit: a simple plan
Frequently asked questions

Where to sauna in Berlin: the three to know

Berlin’s sauna scene divides neatly into three experiences, and knowing which mood you’re in is the whole decision. There’s the destination spa — Vabali — where you lose a half-day among lodges, pools and a dozen saunas and forget you’re in a capital city. There’s the atmospheric soak — Liquidrom — built around a warm saltwater pool under a dome, more nightlife-adjacent than nature retreat. And there’s the only-in-Berlin novelty — the Badeschiff — a pool in the actual river that becomes a winter sauna with a skyline view. Each is a genuinely different day out.

The practical differences matter as much as the vibe. Vabali is the biggest and the most “all day”; Liquidrom is the most central and the most sociable, especially on a DJ night; the Badeschiff is the most seasonal and the most photogenic. All three reward going with someone — a sauna day is long, slow and punctuated by cold plunges that are far more fun to dare together, the same way a lake swim is better with a second person on the jetty.

Vabali: a Balinese sauna village

Vabali Spa is Berlin’s grandest sauna complex, an ensemble of Balinese-style wooden pavilions and walkways that hides, improbably, right behind the Hauptbahnhof at Seydlitzstraße 6. Across two floors and a landscaped garden it packs in thirteen saunas and steam rooms, a heated outdoor swimming pool and several warm-water pools, plus hammam and massage rooms. It’s open every day from 9am to midnight, and a day ticket is around €22.50 for two hours or €30.50 for four, with a small weekend surcharge — generous, given how easily you can spend five hours drifting between the hot rooms and the loungers.

The point of Vabali is scale and calm: it’s big enough that even on a busy Saturday you can find a quiet corner, and the garden setting means you’re padding between saunas under real sky and trees rather than down a corridor. Bring a towel and a bathrobe (or hire them), expect the saunas to be textile-free, and plan to stay longer than you think. It’s the closest Berlin gets to a full spa-resort day without leaving the city — and, like a long day’s hike in the Grunewald, it’s the shared downtime between the effort that you remember.

People floating in a turquoise saltwater pool under a concrete dome with coloured light

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Liquidrom: a saltwater dome with a DJ

Liquidrom is the most distinctive soak in the city: the centrepiece is a 36°C saltwater pool inside a domed concrete hall, where you float on your back to ambient music piped underwater while coloured light plays across the ceiling. It sits at Möckernstraße 10 in Kreuzberg, a short walk from Gleisdreieck and the Tempodrom, and rounds out the experience with three saunas — a Finnish sauna, a Himalayan salt sauna and a Kelo herbal sauna — plus a steam bath and an outdoor area. Entry starts around €24.50 for two hours and €34.50 for four, with a small supplement for the textile-free saunas; an “Urban Ticket” with a towel bundles in at about €30.

What makes Liquidrom sociable is the programming. On Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday evenings DJs play gentle downbeat and lounge sets, turning the float pool into something between a spa and a very mellow club — a genuinely Berlin crossover. Crucially for a first outing with someone new, the saltwater pool is a swimwear zone, so you can enjoy the headline experience fully clothed-in-a-swimsuit and save the textile-free saunas for when you’re ready. It’s relaxed, central and easy to suggest.

Liquidrom on a DJ night is made for two. See who’s up for a soak near you and send a spa-day request. MITRA on Google Play · MITRA for iPhone.

Badeschiff: a sauna floating on the Spree

The Badeschiff is the most Berlin idea on this list: a swimming pool that floats in the river. Moored at Arena in Alt-Treptow (Eichenstraße 4), it’s a converted 30-metre barge sunk with fresh water, about two metres deep and lifeguarded, where you swim with the TV Tower, the Molecule Man sculpture and the Oberbaumbrücke filling the skyline. The summer bathing season runs from 1 May to early September, when the deck becomes one of the city’s favourite sun-and-sand hangouts. It’s a swimwear spot, which makes it the easiest of the three to suggest for a first meet-up.

Then winter flips it completely. The Winter-Badeschiff wraps the pool in a translucent membrane and installs saunas on the site, so you can sweat, swim in heated water and step out to a frosty river view all in the same afternoon — a sauna with a skyline, basically. It’s seasonal and weather-dependent, so check what’s open before you go, but the contrast of hot sauna and cold Spree air is exactly the kind of small adventure that’s more fun with a partner egging you on, the same way a winter cycling outing is better in company.

What Aufguss is, and why people plan around it

If you’ve never experienced an Aufguss, it’s worth timing your visit around one. An Aufguss is a guided sauna ritual led by a trained sauna master, who ladles water and essential oils onto the hot stones and then uses a towel in choreographed sweeps to circulate waves of intensely scented heat around the room. A session typically runs fifteen to twenty-five minutes, often set to music, and it’s as much performance as wellness — a formalised tradition that grew up in German-speaking Europe and is now the centrepiece of sauna culture across the continent.

The etiquette is simple: arrive a few minutes before it starts, because once the doors close latecomers usually aren’t admitted; sit down, stay for the whole round if you can, and don’t wave your own towel during the master’s performance. Venues post Aufguss times by the saunas, and the popular slots fill up, so a busy weekend Aufguss is a small event in itself. It’s also a brilliant shared experience for a first sauna outing with someone, precisely because nobody has to make conversation — you just sit, breathe and compare notes afterwards.

Textile-free, mixed and quiet: Berlin sauna etiquette

The single thing that surprises newcomers most is that German saunas are textile-free — you go in nude, not in a swimsuit, and the saunas are usually mixed-gender. This is completely normal and entirely non-sexual; it’s simply the hygiene norm, and everyone is far too relaxed to be paying attention. You always sit or lie on your own towel (feet on the towel too, never bare wood), shower before entering, and keep voices low to a near-whisper inside the hot rooms. Bring a robe for the walk between saunas and the pools.

If textile-free feels like a leap, ease in. Liquidrom’s saltwater dome and the Badeschiff pool are swimwear zones, so you can have a full visit there in a swimsuit; many venues also run occasional women-only or swimsuit hours, which are worth checking if that suits you better. Phones are off-limits in the wet and sauna areas, both for the no-screens calm and for everyone’s privacy. None of this is hard once you’ve done it once — which is the best argument for going the first time with someone who’s relaxed about it, or at least with a friend you’ve arranged to meet there.

First time and slightly nervous? Go with someone, not solo. Find a sauna buddy near you on MITRA. Download for Android · download for iOS.

Is the sauna actually good for you?

There is real evidence that regular sauna use is good for the heart, though it’s worth being precise about what the research shows. A widely cited Finnish study followed 2,315 middle-aged men for around twenty years and found that more frequent sauna bathing was associated with lower rates of cardiovascular and all-cause mortality, with the men who used a sauna four to seven times a week faring best (Laukkanen et al., JAMA Internal Medicine, 2015). It’s an observational association rather than proof of cause, and the study was on Finnish-style dry saunas — but it’s the strongest signal we have, and the broad direction is encouraging.

Beyond the headline numbers, the appeal is more immediate: heat eases tense muscles, the hot-then-cold cycle leaves you pleasantly wrung out, and an enforced hour with no phone is its own kind of reset. If you have a heart condition, are pregnant, or have any medical concern, check with a doctor first, go easy on the temperature and time, and never combine the sauna with alcohol. Hydrate well, listen to your body, and treat the cold plunge as optional rather than a dare — though it is, admittedly, much more tempting with someone counting you in.

Better with someone: why a sauna day wants a partner

A sauna day is long and slow by design, and that’s exactly why it’s better shared. You’re not playing a fast game that demands constant focus; you’re drifting between hot rooms, pools and loungers over several hours, with long easy stretches in between. That rhythm — sweat, plunge, rest, repeat — is made for two: someone to brave the cold pool with, to flag when the next Aufguss starts, to claim the loungers while you fetch the teas, and to dissect the whole experience over a drink afterwards. Alone, it’s a nice reset; together, it’s a proper outing.

It’s also one of the lower-pressure ways to spend real time with someone you don’t know well yet, because the setting does the work. There’s no need to keep a conversation going — long silences are the entire point — so it suits people who find a coffee-and-talk meet-up more daunting than a shared activity. That’s the same logic that makes a gym session with a buddy easier than small talk: you’re side by side doing a thing, and the ease grows out of that.

Finding a sauna buddy on MITRA

MITRA is the simplest way to turn “I’d love a spa day” into an actual plan with another person. You browse people nearby who are up for activities, send one of them a sauna or spa-day request — “thinking of a few hours at Vabali this Sunday, fancy it?” — and they accept if it appeals. Nothing is automatic and nobody is assigned to you: you choose who to ask, they choose whether to say yes, so a sauna day only ever happens between two people who both opted in. You agree the venue and a time, then meet there.

Because you set the terms in the request, you can be upfront about the bit that matters: whether you’re after the swimwear pools at Liquidrom or the full textile-free works at Vabali, a quiet weekday or a DJ night. That removes the awkwardness before it starts. It’s the same way Berliners use MITRA to line up a kayaking trip or any other one-to-one outing: pick the activity, find someone nearby, agree a time, meet in real life.

Your next spa day is one message away. Send a sauna request on MITRA and make the plan real. Get it on Google Play · get it on the App Store.

Your first Berlin sauna visit: a simple plan

For a first visit, keep it easy: pick one venue, go mid-afternoon on a weekday if you can, and give yourself at least three hours so you’re never rushing. Liquidrom is the gentlest start because the headline saltwater pool is swimwear and it’s centrally placed; Vabali is the best if you want a full half-day of variety; the Badeschiff is the one to save for a hot summer afternoon or a crisp winter day when its novelty peaks. Pack a large towel, a bathrobe, flip-flops and a water bottle, and leave your phone in the locker.

Then build the loop: warm up with a shower, do a first gentle sauna round of eight to twelve minutes, cool down properly with a cold shower or plunge, rest for as long as you sweated, drink water, and repeat two or three times — slotting in an Aufguss if one’s scheduled. That’s the whole art of it. Arrange to meet your sauna buddy at the entrance, sort out towels together, and you’ll both relax into it within the first round. By the time you’re on the loungers comparing which sauna was hottest, the plan has done its job.

Frequently asked questions

What are the best saunas in Berlin?

The three standouts are Vabali Spa, a large Balinese-style sauna village behind the Hauptbahnhof with 13 saunas and landscaped pools; Liquidrom in Kreuzberg, built around a 36°C saltwater pool under a dome with underwater music; and the Badeschiff at Arena in Treptow, a pool floating in the Spree that becomes a sauna in winter. Vabali suits a full half-day, Liquidrom a central atmospheric soak, and the Badeschiff a seasonal novelty with a skyline view.

How much does it cost to go to a sauna in Berlin?

A day ticket is roughly €22–35 depending on the venue and how long you stay. Vabali charges about €22.50 for two hours and €30.50 for four, with a small weekend surcharge. Liquidrom starts around €24.50 for two hours and €34.50 for four, plus a small supplement for the textile-free saunas. Towels and robes can usually be hired for a few euros if you don’t bring your own.

Do you have to be naked in German saunas?

In the saunas themselves, yes — German sauna culture is textile-free, and the hot rooms are usually mixed-gender. It’s a long-standing hygiene norm and entirely non-sexual; you always sit or lie on your own towel. If that feels like too much at first, the saltwater pool at Liquidrom and the Badeschiff pool are swimwear zones, and some venues run occasional swimsuit or women-only hours, so you can ease in gradually.

What is an Aufguss?

An Aufguss is a guided sauna ritual led by a trained sauna master, who pours water and essential oils onto the hot stones and then waves a towel in choreographed sweeps to circulate waves of scented heat around the room. A session usually lasts 15–25 minutes, often set to music, and is as much a performance as a wellness practice. It’s a German-speaking-Europe tradition and the highlight many people time their visit around.

Which Berlin sauna is best for beginners?

Liquidrom is the gentlest introduction, because its headline experience — floating in the warm saltwater dome — is done in a swimsuit, and it’s centrally located in Kreuzberg. You can enjoy a full visit without ever entering a textile-free sauna, then try the saunas when you feel ready. Going mid-afternoon on a weekday, and ideally with a friend, also makes a first visit far more relaxed.

Is the Badeschiff open in winter?

Yes, but in a transformed state. In summer (roughly 1 May to early September) the Badeschiff is an open-air pool floating in the Spree. In the colder months the Winter-Badeschiff encloses the pool under a membrane and installs saunas on the site, so you can sweat, swim in heated water and take in the icy river view at once. It’s seasonal and weather-dependent, so check what’s currently open before heading over.

Is going to the sauna actually good for your health?

There’s encouraging evidence, with caveats. A well-known Finnish study followed 2,315 middle-aged men for around twenty years and found more frequent sauna use was associated with lower cardiovascular and all-cause mortality (Laukkanen et al., JAMA Internal Medicine, 2015). It’s an observational association, not proof of cause, and was based on dry Finnish saunas. Sauna also relaxes muscles and forces a phone-free reset. If you’re pregnant, have a heart condition or any concern, check with a doctor and avoid alcohol.

How do I find someone to go to the sauna with in Berlin?

A sauna day is long and social, so it’s worth not going alone. On MITRA you browse people nearby who want to do activities and send a sauna or spa-day request — naming the venue, the date and whether you prefer the swimwear pools or the full textile-free experience. They accept if it suits them; nobody is auto-matched. You agree a time and meet at the entrance. It’s a low-pressure way to share the experience, because the setting does the talking.

What should I bring to a Berlin sauna?

A large towel to sit on (essential — bare skin never touches the wood), a bathrobe for moving between saunas and pools, flip-flops, and a water bottle to stay hydrated. Swimwear is useful for the pool zones at Liquidrom and the Badeschiff. Leave your phone in the locker, as screens aren’t allowed in the wet and sauna areas. Towels and robes can be rented at most venues if you travel light.

How long should you stay in a sauna?

Build it in rounds rather than one long sit. A typical round is eight to twelve minutes in the heat, followed by a proper cool-down — a cold shower or plunge — and then a rest for at least as long as you sweated, with water in between. Two or three rounds over a couple of hours is plenty for most people. Listen to your body, leave if you feel light-headed, and treat the cold plunge as optional. Going with someone makes it easier to pace sensibly.

Want to keep reading?

The heat is the same whether you go alone or not — but the cold plunge, the Aufguss and the long, easy hours in between are all better with someone. That part, the city can’t hand you. The app can.

Book the day, bring a partner — send a sauna request on MITRA, free on both stores. Get MITRA on Google Play or download it for iPhone.

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Sources

vabali spa Berlin (official) — vabali.de/en/berlin and visitBerlin — Seydlitzstraße 6, 10557 Berlin; Balinese-style complex with 13 saunas, heated and warm-water pools, hammam; open daily 9:00–24:00; day ticket about €22.50 (2 h) / €30.50 (4 h) with a small weekend surcharge.
Liquidrom (official) — liquidrom-berlin.de and prices — Möckernstraße 10, Kreuzberg; 36°C saltwater pool under a dome with underwater music and light; Finnish, Himalayan salt and Kelo herbal saunas; entry from €24.50 (2 h) / €34.50 (4 h), small textile-free supplement; DJ evenings Tue/Thu/Sat.
Badeschiff at Arena (official) — arena.berlin/venue/badeschiff and Berlin.de — Eichenstraße 4, Alt-Treptow; a ~30 m barge pool floating in the Spree (~2.05 m deep, lifeguarded), summer season 1 May–early September; the Winter-Badeschiff encloses and heats the site with saunas in the colder months.
Laukkanen, T., Khan, H., Zaccardi, F., Laukkanen, J. A. (2015) — Association Between Sauna Bathing and Fatal Cardiovascular and All-Cause Mortality Events, JAMA Internal Medicine — prospective cohort of 2,315 Finnish men aged 42–60; more frequent sauna use associated with lower cardiovascular and all-cause mortality (observational).
visitBerlin (official Berlin tourism) — Sauna and spa in Berlin — overview of Berlin’s sauna and bathing venues, textile-free convention, and Aufguss sessions.