Geographic · Scandinavia & the Nordics
The Most Beautiful Places in Scandinavia & the Nordics
13 places · every one real, mapped, and worth the trip
The Nordic north is a land of extremes of light and water: fjords cut deep into mountains, waterfalls thunder off basalt cliffs, glaciers calve into lagoons, and in winter the aurora burns over it all. This is our editors' pick of the most beautiful places across Norway, Iceland, Sweden, and the Faroe Islands.
It isn't a strict ranking. Each is a real, mapped place with an honest note on how to reach it and the season that shows it best — the long midnight-sun days of summer, or the dark aurora nights of winter.
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Lofoten Islands Peaks from the sea
Nordland, Arctic Norway
Sharp granite peaks rising straight from turquoise Arctic water above red fishing villages and white-sand beaches in northern Norway.
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Geirangerfjord The postcard fjord
Sunnmøre, Western Norway
A UNESCO-listed Norwegian fjord of sheer green walls hung with the Seven Sisters waterfall.
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The Sognefjord
Sogn, Vestland, Western Norway
Norway's longest and deepest fjord, reaching over 200 kilometres inland to the foot of the Jotunheimen peaks.
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Jökulsárlón Glacier Lagoon Glacier lagoon
Vatnajökull National Park, Southeast Iceland
Iceland's lagoon of drifting blue icebergs calved from a glacier tongue, spilling to a black-sand 'diamond beach'.
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Preikestolen
Rogaland, southwestern Norway
Norway's flat Pulpit Rock, a stone platform hanging 604 metres straight above the Lysefjord.
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Trolltunga
Vestland, western Norway
A thin tongue of rock jutting over a lake far below in the Hardanger highlands — one of Norway's great hikes.
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Seljalandsfoss
Seljaland, South Iceland
An Icelandic waterfall you can walk behind, a curtain of water off a former sea cliff.
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Kirkjufell
Grundarfjörður, Snæfellsnes Peninsula, West Iceland
Iceland's photogenic 'church mountain', a lone peak beside twin falls on the Snæfellsnes peninsula.
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Reynisfjara
Near Vík í Mýrdal, South Iceland
Iceland's black-sand beach of basalt columns, sea stacks, and powerful Atlantic surf near Vík.
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Svalbard The high Arctic
Svalbard archipelago, Arctic Ocean
A polar archipelago of glaciers, tundra, and polar bears far north of the Norwegian mainland.
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Faroe Islands
North Atlantic (between Iceland and Norway)
Green, cliff-walled islands rising from the North Atlantic, laced with waterfalls and grass-roofed villages.
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Abisko Aurora country
Swedish Lapland, above the Arctic Circle, Sweden
A Swedish Lapland park under a rain-shadow sky famed as one of the best places on Earth to see the northern lights.
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The High Coast
Gulf of Bothnia, northeastern Sweden
Sweden's UNESCO-listed coast of forested hills and islands still rising from the sea after the Ice Age.
Timing is everything in the north: summer (roughly June–August) brings the midnight sun, full waterfalls, and open mountain roads, while winter (roughly September–March) brings the aurora and frozen landscapes. Each guide notes the season and how to reach it.
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