When to go to the Serengeti?
→ The detailed month-by-month page, with real weather records
Best time: January to February (calving) and June to October (river crossings)
At a glance
Why go to the Serengeti?
The Serengeti covers 14,763 km² without a single fence or tarmac road. Created in 1951 and listed as a World Heritage Site in 1981, it forms, together with Kenya's Masai Mara and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, a single 30,000 km² ecosystem that the herds cross freely. This scale changes the nature of a visit: you do not tick off animals, you drive for hours across an open plain where nothing blocks the horizon and where the action can kick off at any moment.
The Great Migration is what drives it. Around 1.3 million wildebeest, accompanied by 200,000 zebras and hundreds of thousands of gazelles, follow the growth of the grass in an annual loop: births in the south in February, a move north through the west in spring, crossings of the Grumeti and then the Mara in summer, and a return with the first rains. The timetable cannot be ordered and shifts by several weeks from one year to the next, but the logic stays the same and lets you choose your area according to the month you travel.
The predators follow in numbers. The park is home to Africa's largest lion population, estimated at around three thousand animals, an unusual density of leopards in the Seronera Valley and cheetahs seen out in the open on the southern plains. Add elephants back after decades of poaching, hippos packed into the pools and more than five hundred bird species. Rare are the days when you return to camp without having seen a big cat.
Map of the Serengeti: what is where?
The map shows the 6 places covered in this guide, to picture the distances and plan your route.
- Seronera
- Moru Kopjes
- Ndutu Plains
- Mara River crossings
- Grumeti corridor
- Naabi Hill Gate
How much does a trip to the Serengeti cost?
The Serengeti is expensive, and most of the cost is settled before you leave: entry fees of around $70 per person per day, concession fees, a vehicle with driver-guide and full-board accommodation. Almost everything is booked as a package, with little spending on site apart from tips and drinks.
| Style | Per day | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| Backpacker | €220-300/day | Group tour in a shared 4x4, public campsites or simple tents, three nights in the park, picnics |
| Comfort | €350-500/day | A good lodge or camp, private vehicle with guide, two areas combined, one internal flight |
| Premium | €800+/day | Upmarket mobile camp or private concession, light-aircraft flights, a hot-air balloon ride and guided walking safaris |
Park fees are paid by card at the gate or, more often, by your agency in advance. On site, bring US dollars in small notes printed after 2009 for tips, around $20-30 a day for the guide and $10 for the camp staff. Shillings are only useful in Arusha, and there are no cash machines in the park.
Is the Serengeti safe?
The Serengeti is a safe park, provided you follow the rules, which protect you from the animals rather than from people. You do not get out of the vehicle outside designated areas, you do not stand on the roof, and you keep arms and heads inside when a big cat approaches. The camps are unfenced: after nightfall, a ranger always escorts you between your tent and the dining tent, and the zip must be closed all the way. Hippos and buffalo cause more accidents than lions, especially at waterholes. As for health, malaria is present all year, with preventive treatment recommended and long clothing in the evening; yellow fever vaccination is only required if you arrive from a country at risk. The tracks are bumpy and the days long, so bring something to support a fragile back.
What to see and do in the Serengeti
- The Great Migration
- The Mara River crossings
- The Moru Kopjes
- The Seronera Valley
- The Ndutu Plains
- The Grumeti corridor
- A hot-air balloon flight
- The Retina Hippo Pool
The Seronera Valley
The geographical and logistical centre of the park, around a river that flows all year and so holds wildlife even outside the migration. Leopards settle in the sausage trees and acacias along the water, lions occupy territories known to the guides, and cheetahs hunt on the southern grasslands. It is also the busiest sector, with an airstrip, several lodges and clusters of vehicles around the big cats. The first hours after the tracks open, around 6.15am, remain much quieter.
The Moru Kopjes
Granite outcrops rise from the plain like islands, remnants of a bedrock more than 500 million years old exposed by erosion. They serve as lookout posts for lions, shelter for hyraxes and water stores after rain thanks to their natural rock pools. The Moru group adds an overhang covered in Maasai rock paintings and a gong rock that rings when struck. This is also the area where a small population of black rhinos survives, watched over constantly by rangers.
The Ndutu Plains
In the south, a short-grass steppe grows on ash from the Ngorongoro too thin to support trees, giving a perfectly open horizon. Between late January and March, the herd gives birth here, up to eight thousand calves a day at the height of the season, under the eyes of hyenas and cheetahs. Two shallow lakes, Ndutu and Masek, attract flamingos and birds of prey. The area belongs to the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, where off-road driving is still allowed, which really brings you close to hunting scenes.
The Mara River crossings
In the north, the Mara separates the Serengeti from Kenya's Masai Mara and confronts the herds with high, slippery banks. From July to October, the columns build up, hesitate, then plunge into the water all at once, where Nile crocodiles more than four metres long lie in wait. The spectacle cannot be ordered: it may happen twice in the same day or not at all for three days. Camps in the Kogatende sector let you wait on the spot rather than drive four hours from the centre of the park.
The Grumeti corridor
A strip of land running west to the edge of Lake Victoria, with a river lined by gallery forest and giant fig trees. The Grumeti crocodiles are among the largest in East Africa and spend the dry season crammed into the last pools. The herd arrives in May and June, in the middle of the rut, with males chasing each other and bellowing day and night. The riverine forest shelters black-and-white colobus monkeys, absent from the rest of the park, and the sector remains little visited.
Naabi Hill Gate
The south-eastern entrance to the park, on the road from Ngorongoro, marked by a lone hill in the middle of the plain. Formalities here often take an hour: the guides fill in the registers while travellers climb the short path to the top, ten minutes, for a panorama over dozens of kilometres of grass. A water point and picnic tables attract weaver birds and agama lizards. It is the first encounter with the scale of the Serengeti, and often the first herd of wildebeest spotted from the track.
How many days, and which itinerary?
Three nights in the park is the minimum for one area, and four to five nights let you combine two with a light-aircraft transfer. Allow eight to ten days for a complete northern Tanzania circuit with the Ngorongoro and Lake Manyara.
🗺️ Day-by-day itinerary · 📓 Free printable Serengeti guide (PDF) · 🌍 All of Tanzania
The Serengeti in 3 nights
The most common format as an add-on to the Ngorongoro: a light-aircraft flight from Arusha to the Seronera airstrip, three nights in a camp in the centre, two game drives a day at dawn and in the late afternoon. On the third day, push on to the Moru Kopjes or the Retina Hippo Pool depending on the season. Return by plane or by road via Naabi Hill Gate and the Ngorongoro Crater. Short, but enough to see the big cats and a slice of the migration.
Northern Tanzania in 8 days
Arusha, then Lake Manyara for the elephants and baboons, two nights on the rim of the Ngorongoro Crater with a full descent into the caldera, and four nights in the Serengeti split between two areas depending on the month. The journey is made by 4x4 with a driver-guide, about six hours of dirt track between the crater and Seronera. The classic format, and the one that gives you the widest range of habitats for a single plane ticket.
Migration and beaches in 14 days
Four nights following the herd, in the north from July to October or at Ndutu from January to March, two nights on the rim of the Ngorongoro Crater, then a direct flight to Zanzibar for a week of recovery in Nungwi, Paje or Stone Town. Domestic flights between the park airstrips and the island must be booked well ahead, with a baggage allowance limited to 15 kilos in a soft bag. This is the most requested format for Tanzania, and the one that best justifies the price of the ticket from Europe: two very different trips for a single long-haul flight.
Getting there and getting around
Light aircraft from Arusha or Kilimanjaro serve around ten airstrips in the park, including Seronera, Kogatende and Grumeti, in 1 hour to 1 hour 30 minutes for €200-350 one way. The baggage allowance is limited to 15 kilos per person, in a soft bag with no rigid frame.
By road, allow about eight hours from Arusha to Seronera, four of them on dirt tracks after the Ngorongoro Crater. The route passes through Naabi Hill Gate and crosses the southern plains, which makes it a full safari day in its own right.
Inside the park, everything is done by 4x4 with a driver-guide, the pop-up roof raised and binoculars on board. Off-road driving is banned in the national park but allowed in the Ndutu area, and the tracks close from nightfall to sunrise.
Transfers between areas take time: four hours between Seronera and the Grumeti, six to seven hours between Seronera and the Mara. A twenty-minute internal flight costs €150-250 and saves a whole day on the tracks.
Where to stay in the Serengeti?
Mobile camps follow the herd and move three or four times a year. Spacious tents, hot bucket showers, no permanent electricity, €250-450 per person per night full board, with game drives included depending on the package.
The permanent lodges of Seronera offer solid-walled rooms, a pool and a restaurant, at €170-350 a night. They reassure families and operate all year, but their fixed location sometimes puts them far from the herd depending on the season.
The park's public campsites take self-drive and self-catering tours for around $35 per person per night, with basic washrooms and no fence at all. The cheapest way to sleep inside the park.
The luxury camps in the private concessions, on the western and northern edges, exceed €600 per person per night and allow activities forbidden in the park, including guided walks and night drives.
Our places to stay, stop by stop, at three budgets →
What to eat in the Serengeti?
In the camps, meals are included and follow a set rhythm: coffee and biscuits before the morning drive, a full breakfast on your return, a buffet at lunchtime, and dinner served at the table. The cooks easily handle dietary requirements given at booking.
The midday picnic, often taken under an acacia or at a designated site, comes down to a basket of cold chicken, samosas, fruit and juice. Pack everything away before moving on: the black kites at picnic sites snatch food right out of your hands.
The Tanzanian dishes served in the camps revolve around ugali, a maize porridge, fragrant pilau rice and stews of beans or goat. The vegetables come from the farms of Karatu, on the road to the crater.
Tap water is not drinkable: camps provide bottles or fill your water bottles from their filter. Allow three litres per person per day, as dehydration in a 4x4 makes itself felt mainly in the late afternoon.
Entry requirements
A visa is needed by EU, UK, US, Canadian and Australian passports. Apply for the e-visa online before you go; single-entry visas are also issued on arrival at the main entry points. US citizens must take the multiple-entry visa. Zanzibar adds its own compulsory travel insurance, bought online from the Zanzibar Insurance Corporation: no other policy is accepted.
Rules change: check your own government's travel advice before you go.
Frequently asked questions about the Serengeti
When can you see the Great Migration?
It all depends on the area. Births are concentrated at Ndutu from late January to March, the herd moves up through the Grumeti corridor in May and June, then crosses the Mara in the north from July to October. Dates vary by several weeks depending on the rains, so it is better to choose the sector according to the month you travel rather than the other way round.
How much does park entry cost?
About $70 per non-resident adult per 24-hour period, plus 18% tax, on top of which come vehicle and camping fees. Over a three-night stay, that comes to nearly €300 per person, almost always included in the agency's package rather than paid on site.
How many nights should I allow?
Three nights at least in a single area, to make the transfers worthwhile and increase your chances with the big cats. Four to five nights let you combine two sectors, for example the centre and the north, with a light-aircraft flight between the two. With fewer than three nights, the day on the road eats up too large a share of the stay.
Can you go with children?
Yes, most lodges accept children from six or eight years old depending on the property, and some private camps set the limit at twelve. Days in the 4x4 are long and dusty, so it is best to book a private vehicle so you can head back when the youngest tire, and to choose a lodge with a pool for the middle of the day.
Serengeti or Masai Mara?
It is the same ecosystem, cut in two by a border. The Serengeti is fifteen times larger, less crowded and can be visited all year round, with the births in the south in February. The more compact Masai Mara concentrates the river crossings in a small area between August and October. The Serengeti offers more variety, the Mara more density over a short period.
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