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Abidjan
Largest city and district of Ivory Coast

Abidjan

Abidjan is the seat of government, largest city and former capital of Ivory Coast.

Plan a trip to Abidjan→From Kumasi

As of the 2021 census, Abidjan's population was 6.3 million, which is 21.5 percent of the overall population of the country, making it the sixth most populous city proper in Africa, after Lagos, Cairo, Kinshasa, Dar es Salaam, and Johannesburg. A cultural crossroads of West Africa, Abidjan is characterised by a high level of industrialisation and urbanisation. It is the most populous French-speaking city in West Africa.

Get in

Getting to Abidjan

  1. 01
    Félix-Houphouët-Boigny International Airport
  2. 02
    Abidjan Railway Station
See

Worth seeing

Abidjan is sometimes referred to as the "Paris of West Africa". During the long and stable rule of the Ivory Coast's Godfather Félix Houphouët-Boigny the city of Abidjan has flourished. However, the political instability and the civil war of the past decade have taken their toll on the city.

  1. 01
    St. Paul's Cathedral (Cathédrale Saint-Paul
  2. 02
    National Library of Côte
  3. 03
    Banco National Park

    A 30 km² national park just north of Abidjan featuring many tropical rare woods (mahogany, avodirés, waffle wood and more).

  4. 04
    Museum of Civilizations in Côte
  5. 05
    Adama-Toungara Museum of Contemporary Cultures
Eat

Where to eat

There are many places to eat Ivorian food, most of them on the sidewalk or on a small road side terrace. Make sure that you ask about the price before you sit down, in order to avoid lengthy discussions about the price when they try to overcharge you after the meal. The staple foods in the Ivory Coast are rice, cassava, yam and bread. Bread is usually eaten at breakfast or as a supplement to the meal.

  1. 01
    Restaurant des Combattants
  2. 02
    Chez Georges Hollywood

    French and Italian dishes at French prices in a formal setting.

  3. 03
    Saarkan

    Avenue Chardy face à l'AIP, à la descente de Radio Nostalgie Plateau (on Plateau, near the highway on the eastern side of the peninsula.),.

How locals move

Getting around Abidjan the local way

  • Get inWhether you're in a private car, taxi, or gbaka (the shared minibuses) you will be stopped at various official (and unofficial) checkpoints where they will delay you at the very least and try to shake down a bribe at the worst.
  • Get aroundIf you just need to cross the lagoon and can make use of one of the ferry routes, by all means take it.
  • Get aroundYou can take a ferry from the It takes 15 minutes and costs only CFA 150 to get you to A commuter railway system is under construction, the first section is expected to open in 2025.
  • Go nextJacqueville - A small, relaxing beach town that sits about an hour from Abidjan with a short, 450-m ferry across the lagoon.

From Wikivoyage: Abidjan, CC BY-SA. Not yet checked by us. Last edited 2026-09.

Text adapted from Wikipedia and Wikivoyage, CC BY-SA 4.0. Photograph: Wikimedia Commons (see file page), Wikimedia Commons.