CityDekho
Leh Palace

Leh Palace

heritage site · Leh & Ladakh

State
Leh & Ladakh
Type
Heritage Site

Leh Palace is a nine-storey former royal palace overlooking Leh, modelled on the Potala Palace in Lhasa, with upper floors that housed the royal family and lower floors used as stables and storerooms.

Leh Palace is known for

modelled on Potala PalaceNamgyal dynasty seat (c.1600)museum of royal artefactsDosmoche festival venue

A short history

Sengge Namgyal constructed the palace around 1600 AD. It was abandoned in the mid-1800s when Dogra forces took control of Ladakh and the royal family relocated to Stok Palace. Today it houses a museum with jewellery, ornaments, ceremonial dress, crowns, and Tibetan thangka paintings over 450 years old. The palace hosts the annual Dosmoche festival and stands near the Namgyal Stupa, Chandazik Gompa, and the 1430 Chamba Lhakhang. The Archaeological Survey of India is undertaking ongoing restoration. [Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leh_Palace]

Why Leh Palace matters

Modelled on Lhasa's Potala Palace, Leh Palace is one of Ladakh's most iconic heritage landmarks and a centrepiece of the Namgyal dynasty's architectural legacy.

When to go

May to September

How to reach

Located in Leh town, a short walk uphill from the main market.

Leh Palace guide & itineraries

Been to Leh Palace?

Write what you would tell a friend — where you stayed, what you would skip, the thing you wish somebody had mentioned before you went. We read every submission before it goes up.

Share your story

More heritage & forts

More places you'll love

Karnataka

Daria Daulat Bagh (Srirangapatna)

Daria Daulat Bagh is the elegant summer palace of Tipu Sultan, the Tiger of Mysore, set in a garden on the river-island of Srirangapatna near Mysuru.

Tripura

Neermahal

Neermahal is a striking water palace rising from the middle of Rudrasagar Lake near Melaghar in Tripura, built by the Manikya king in the 1930s as a royal…

Assam

Sivasagar

Sivasagar, once the capital of the mighty Ahom kingdom that ruled Assam for six centuries, is a town rich in monuments around its great tank.

Tripura

Unakoti

Unakoti, in the forested hills of northern Tripura, is an ancient Shaiva pilgrimage and archaeological site famous for its colossal rock-cut carvings and…

Delhi

Safdarjung's Tomb (Delhi)

Safdarjung's Tomb is a garden-tomb built around 1754 for Safdarjung, the powerful Nawab of Awadh and a prime minister of the Mughal empire.

Delhi

Lotus Temple (Delhi)

The Lotus Temple is a Baha'i House of Worship and one of Delhi's most photographed modern landmarks, shaped like a half-open lotus with 27 marble-clad petals…

Andaman & Nicobar Islands

Cellular Jail (Port Blair)

The Cellular Jail in Port Blair, known as Kala Pani, is a colonial-era prison built by the British between 1896 and 1906 to hold Indian freedom fighters in…

Rajasthan

Kumbhalgarh Fort

Kumbhalgarh, a UNESCO-listed Mewar fort in the Aravalli Hills, is famed for its immense perimeter wall, which stretches roughly 36 km and is often called the…

Maharashtra

Bibi Ka Maqbara (Aurangabad)

Bibi Ka Maqbara in Aurangabad (Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar) is a grand Mughal mausoleum built in the 1660s to 1670s for Dilras Banu Begum, the wife of Emperor…

Maharashtra

Daulatabad Fort

Daulatabad Fort (historically Devagiri) stands atop a steep 200-metre conical hill roughly 15-16 km northwest of Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar (Aurangabad)…

Karnataka

Gol Gumbaz (Vijayapura)

Gol Gumbaz in Vijayapura (Bijapur) is the mausoleum of Sultan Mohammed Adil Shah, completed in 1656.

Delhi

India Gate (Delhi)

India Gate is a 42-metre war memorial arch on the ceremonial Kartavya Path, designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens and completed in 1931.

Trending in Leh & Ladakh

Leh

Leh

Leh sits at 3,500 metres and the single most important thing about it is that you cannot skip the first two days. Fly in and you arrive from sea level in ninety minutes. Spend the first forty-eight hours doing almost nothing — walk slowly, drink far more water than feels reasonable, no alcohol, no trekking. People who ignore this lose a week to altitude sickness or end up on a flight out. Coming overland from Manali or Srinagar acclimatises you properly, and if you have the days it is the better arrival. Once you are adjusted: Thiksey monastery at dawn for the morning prayers, which visitors are welcome at and which almost nobody attends. Hemis is grander but further. The Indus valley villages between Leh and Nimmu are where you see how people actually live at this altitude. Pangong and Nubra both need inner-line permits, arranged in Leh in a morning, and both are long hard drives. Pangong as a day trip is a mistake — twelve hours in a car for an hour at a lake. The road season is roughly June to September. Outside it the passes close and Leh is reachable only by air.

Hemis Monastery

Hemis Monastery

Hemis belongs to the Drukpa (Dragon) lineage of the Kagyu sect, and it is set back in a mountain canyon on the western bank of the Indus, roughly 45 kilometres south of Leh. It is the largest and wealthiest monastery in Ladakh, and the most influential. The buildings are traditional Tibetan monastic architecture on a large scale: whitewashed stone walls, timber windows painted in fine detail, and wide flagstone courtyards. Below is a museum holding centuries of gold-plated statues, sacred thangkas and old weapons.

Diskit Monastery

Diskit Monastery

Diskit is the oldest and largest monastery of the Nubra valley, founded in the 14th century and stacked on a rocky spur above the Shyok river. Its prayer halls hold fierce guardian deities and centuries-old murals, but the landmark is newer: the 32-metre Jampa (Maitreya) Buddha on the hill facing Pakistan, consecrated by the Dalai Lama in 2010, gazing out over the cold-desert dunes of Hunder.

Where next?

More like Leh Palace

Heritage

Everything in Leh & LadakhBrowse all destinations