Prague is a great city for a tourist. Beautiful scenery of the old city, local cuisine, and tasty beer. What else do you need for a short week of cultural tourism or even a weekday? But a month passes, the scenery gets repetitive, local cuisine turns into everyday food and you just might gain some weight from all the tasty lager. What to do now? Well, I advise you to hit all the Prague museums? And instead of going to TripAdvisor or Google, I suggest you give this article a read. No honestly, the answer just might surprise you. 

The must-see list

The richest, the most popular, the most famous museums of Prague. They would be the first pick for anyone interested and for a good reason. 

National Museum 

The National Museum is probably the most well-known museum in Prague. And not only because of its outer beauty and proximity to Václavské náměstí, a popular place for various political activism. National Museum, both the old building you may see in the picture above, as well as the new one to the left of it, houses a variety of permanent and time-limited exhibitions and is built in a way that you can visit every few months and always explore something new. And the price of a ticket is laughably low for everything you may experience inside, just don’t forget your ISIC card. Regarding permanent exhibits, you may be interested in one of the 4 major collections: Geology, which includes bizarre unrefined rocks of nearly alien structure, actual alien rocks, in the form of meteorites, and various fossils from tiny leaves to parts of dinosaurs. Another half a floor is dedicated to biology, and figures of animals starting with microbes and ascending by the complexity of the animal kingdom. Another floor is split between the history of Czech lands, from the Roman period to the 19th century, and finally, a collection dedicated to Czech composers. Overall, all 4 permanent exhibits in the old building are worth a look. They not only show items but also often explain the context for them. The building has an excellent English translation for nearly all signs and pieces of information and is quite accessible to kids through games and touchable exhibits. I can’t say anything about temporary exhibitions, it all depends on when are you reading this article, but if you’re planning your visit before the 29th of February 2024, I suggest you take a look at “Nejstarší šperky a ozdoby těla”. It’s a collection of the oldest jewellery, coming to Prague from Brno, including the infamous Venus of Dolní Věstonice, one of the oldest ceramic statues in the world. Visiting National Museum and Prague for the first time since 2007. The new building of the museum should also be mentioned. And it’s rather disappointing. It looks, and smells, like an office room from the early 90s, in high contrast to the gold, marble, and granite of the old building, filled with statues, busts and wall paintings. The only notable exhibition is the “Czech History of the 20th Century” and it is rather good. What should be mentioned about the new building, however, is the underground tunnel between the two buildings, housing a very immersive art project that, at the very least right now, shows a panorama of the evolution of Václavské Square since the dawn of time.

National Gallery Prague 

National Gallery Prague would be your first pick for Czech historical art. Truthfully, I haven’t visited all 8 locations of the National Gallery, but the ones I’ve seen for myself are filled with classical art, modern art, and even works from the Middle Ages. Overall, I would suggest visiting it if you’re interested in paintings and sculptures, but it is rather lacking in historical context or other values such as the beauty of the architecture. At the very least in the sections I’ve visited. 

National Technical Museum

Technical Museum doesn’t have glorious interiors like the National Museum, and it does not emit any energy of professionalism and high society like the Gallery. Instead, it wins a spot in the list of greatest museums of Prague by simply being giant and simply overfilled with rarities and exclusive materials. If you plan to see it in one day, I suggest you change your plan. I’ve been there 3 times and probably missed something. But what is it even about? Well, mechanisms and tech in general. Inside it, you may find planes, jets, helicopters, trains, mining equipment, smelters, clocks, computers, cameras, motorcycles and a giant golden coin costing 5 million dollars. Singular. Overall, the same things you may find in any other museum. If we have to compare, the Vienna Museum of Science and Technology is bigger and immerses visitors better. So why do I suggest you visit the National Technical Museum so much? Its exclusivity would be the answer. Every car, every bike, every camera and every plane come here with a history. Instead of showing “an old Czech car”, the museum presents you with the 4th oldest motor vehicle in the world. Instead of immersing you into that era with a simple German car, they will provide you with the car of a nazi official, with a full explanation behind its survival modifications. And finally, even the train in there is no simple train, but the presidential train of the first Czechoslovak president. 

Tourist traps, or are they?

Unfortunately, many Prague museums are rather lacking in quality. Illusion museum, Beer museum, communism museum, sex machine museum, steel figures museum, and many others. But what makes them such a subpar experience? I cannot judge if you’ve enjoyed your experience with any of the museums, but there is a common pattern that allows you, dear reader, to identify a bad museum experience before paying the entrance fee. Usually, such museums are overpriced, 500 crowns and above, clearly small, housing a 30-minute experience at best, and most importantly, designed for English speakers more than for native Czechs. What you’ll get in such places is a subpar, shallow experience with a questionable level of factual correctness. However, not all the museums in the list above fit this definition. One of them is clearly a level above all the others.

Museum of Communism

I don’t try to argue that it is as good as any from the “must-see list”, furthermore, the Czech History exhibition in the National Museum often covers the same grounds, but the Museum of Communism excels at telling a story. It feels like walking into a history book, but the pictures inside are replaced with physical exhibits. They are not necessarily accurate or authentic, but they fulfil the task of referencing and providing context for the text of this history book. Overall, it’s up to personal taste.

Hidden Gems

And finally, I want to give you some niche museums to make this guide somewhat unique. They aren’t mind-blowing. They aren’t modern, nor they are glorious. They may even have any English signs in them. But they are unique and worth both your time and your money.

Czech Police Museum

The Czech Police Museum is clearly made for Czech kids. It often teaches its audience basic knowledge of how to call an emergency service, how to cross the road, or how to behave in case of a forest fire, for example. But it also provides plenty of interesting things for an adult. Vintage uniforms and police memorabilia, weapons and historical context for various special operations, and even a moderate car collection, including a civilian-made armoured car that was confiscated by the police back in the 2000s. As was already said, it is nothing huge, but it is unique enough to earn your time, especially if you are interested in the topic. 

Museum of Public Transport

The Museum of Public Transport would be the last location on this list. It doesn’t beat the National Technical Museum in its collection, but it is a perfect place to immerse yourself in the streets of Czechoslovak-era Prague and its antique machinery. The nearly non-existent price and general niche of the museum provide you with a feel of exclusivity and discovery of something forgotten, while an obvious focus on children’s education doesn’t harm the experience in the slightest. 

Overall, Prague is a city of museums. And sometimes, it feels like you won’t be able to see it all even in a thousand years. I haven’t seen all of them yet as well. Not even half. And there are still trips that I plan to take even next week after this article is released. My knowledge is ultimately subjective, and not full, so I do ask you all to share your museum experience in the article replies or on our socials, and I wish you a pleasant trip.