The Asian Places on TIME’s World’s Greatest Places 2026
Twenty-one of the hundred places chosen by TIME for 2026 are in Asia. They include a Bangkok art museum, a wine lodge on the upper Mekong, a Thai sleeper train and Japan's most sacred shrine.
TIME magazine’s annual list of the World’s Greatest Places names one hundred destinations to visit and places to stay. The 2026 edition includes 21 in Asia. The selection is made from nominations by the magazine’s correspondents and favours places that are new or newly relevant, so it works less as a ranking than as a snapshot of where attention is moving.
Thailand leads
Thailand has the largest share. Dib Bangkok, the contemporary art museum that opened in a converted warehouse in December 2025, is the best known of the entries. It is joined by two projects outside the capital: Khao Yai Art Forest, a programme of large outdoor works in the hills north-east of Bangkok, and DaiDib DaiDee in Pua, in the northern province of Nan.
Among places to stay, the Mandarin Oriental Bangkok is listed in the year of its 150th anniversary, and so is the Blue Jasmine, a sleeper train that runs a slow itinerary between Bangkok and Chiang Mai. Taken together the Thai entries describe a country whose appeal is shifting from beaches towards art and the interior.
China, Hong Kong and Japan
Mainland China’s entry is Songtsam Lodge Cizhong, the wine lodge in a Tibetan Catholic village on the upper Mekong, which reopened in 2025. Hong Kong is represented by Kai Tak Sports Park, the stadium complex on the site of the old airport that opened in 2025 and has given the city a venue for the largest concerts and matches.
Japan has two entries. Ise Jingu, the most sacred Shinto shrine, is listed as it approaches its next rebuilding: every twenty years its sanctuaries are constructed anew beside the old ones, and the next transfer is due in 2033, with the preparatory ceremonies already under way. Maana Living, in Kyoto, is a shop and guesthouse project devoted to craft and domestic life in restored townhouses. For the shrine’s region, see our report on Amanemu.
Singapore and Indonesia
Singapore’s entries are the House of Tan Yeok Nee, a 19th-century Teochew mansion near Orchard Road restored as an arts and lifestyle venue, and Rainforest Wild Asia, the newest of the wildlife parks at Mandai. In Indonesia, TIME chose House of Tugu Old Town, a hotel in a group of colonial buildings in the old quarter of Jakarta, and a new expedition vessel, Si Datu Bua, which sails Cenderawasih Bay in Papua, where whale sharks gather.
The Himalaya, India and the Maldives
Bhutan’s entry is a small lodge at Laya, a highland village at 3,800 metres reached on foot. Nepal has a mountain-biking trail centre. India has the Oberoi Rajgarh Palace, a restored palace near Khajuraho, and a cultural space in New Delhi. The Maldives are represented by Six Senses Laamu, reopened after a rebuilding.
What the list suggests
Few of the Asian entries are large city hotels, and several are far from any airport. Art spaces in converted buildings, lodges in villages, trains and small boats account for most of the list. This matches what has been visible in hotel openings across the region for some years, and it is the kind of travel covered in our guides to distinctive stays beyond China’s big cities and to Japan’s cruise trains.