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Forchheim
Town in Bavaria, Germany

Forchheim

Forchheim is a town in Upper Franconia in northern Bavaria, and also the seat of the administrative district of Forchheim.

Plan a trip to Forchheim→From Erfurt

Forchheim is a former royal city, and is sometimes called the Gateway to the Franconian Switzerland, referring to the region of outstanding natural beauty to the north east of the town. Nowadays Forchheim is most famous for its ten day long beer and music festival (Annafest) which takes place in late July in an idyllic wooded hillside, home to 24 beer gardens, on the outskirts of the town. Forchheim's population, as of December 2013, was 30,705, and its land area is 44.95 square kilometres. Its position is 49° 44' N, 11° 04' E and its elevation is 265 metres above sea level.

Get in

Getting to Forchheim

Forchheim has regular S-Bahn service from Nuremberg and Erlangen as well as Bamberg and is part of the VGN network. The

  1. 01
    Forchheim train station is east

    The next airport is in Nuremberg (NUE IATA) and is connected to the main station via the subway (~12 minutes) which is part of the VGN network as is the S-Bahn from there to Forchheim.

See

Worth seeing

  1. 01
    Kaiserpfalz
  2. 02
    Town Hall
  3. 03
    Kellerberg
  4. 04
    Burgruine Streitburg
  5. 05
    Burgruine Neideck

    Next to Streitburg on a neighboring hill, this castle ("Neid" means envy) is said to have fallen victim to the same quarrel as Streitburg although, again, the actual history was different.

  6. 06
    Pfalzmuseum
Do

Things to do

Annafest is probably the most noteworthy event in town and regionally second only to the Bergkrichweih in Erlangen. It is usually held around late July, early August and draws crowds from throughout the region.

Eat

Where to eat

Zollhaus, Hauptstraße 4, info@zollhaus-forchheim.de. Mains €10-15.

How locals move

Getting around Forchheim the local way

  • Get aroundIf you stay longer a car or bike might be a good idea, especially for day trips that can't be done by train.
  • Go nextForchheim is the perfect entry point for (though not located inside of) Franconian Switzerland If you enjoy old towns Bamberg makes for a fascinating, and easy, day trip, as there is a direct train connection

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

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