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October 2, 2026 · FarSerene Editorial Desk

Top 5 Places to Visit in Uruguay in 2026

Brick lighthouse with a red-and-white lantern and low white buildings on a rocky point at Cabo Polonio, seen through a wire fence and tall dry grasses under a blue skyFarSerene
Brick lighthouse with a red-and-white lantern and low white buildings on a rocky point at Cabo Polonio, seen through a wire fence and tall dry grasses under a blue sky
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The top places to visit in Uruguay are Montevideo, Colonia del Sacramento, Punta del Este, Cabo Polonio, and the Fray Bentos industrial landscape. Uruguay received 3,604,488 visitors in 2025, 8% more than in 2024, according to Ministry of Tourism figures reported by Infobae, and the same data puts Montevideo, Punta del Este and Colonia at the top of the list of places they went.

  1. Montevideo — Two things justify at least a couple of days in the capital. The first is lunch at the Mercado del Puerto in Ciudad Vieja, the old town founded as a walled Spanish city in 1724, where grill restaurants serve asado. The second is the Rambla, more than 22 km of waterfront avenue on the Río de la Plata that people use for jogging, cycling, fishing and drinking mate; walk or ride any stretch of it.
  2. Colonia del Sacramento — If you take one trip out of Montevideo, make it this one. In a region where Spanish towns were laid out on a grid, this Portuguese settlement (1680) has a street plan that follows the lie of the land, a feature UNESCO highlights in its description of the historic quarter, on the World Heritage List since 1995.
  3. Punta del Este — Ranked behind only Montevideo for visitors in the 2025 ministry data, Uruguay’s beach resort sits on a peninsula on the Atlantic side of Maldonado. Worth the short trip out of town is Casapueblo at Punta Ballena, 13 km away: the late artist Carlos Páez Vilaró’s former home and workshop, which now houses a museum and a hotel.
  4. Cabo Polonio — Go for the sea lions: the islets off this Rocha cape host the largest population in Uruguay. Getting there is half the experience. With no road in, the last stretch from the highway, around 7 km, means a hike over dunes or a ride in a 4×4.
  5. Fray Bentos — The odd one out on this list, and the stop for travellers curious about how food production was industrialised: a former meat-processing complex on the Uruguay River, inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2015. Its export trade to Europe goes back to 1865.

Planning note

Uruguay’s three most-visited destinations all sit on the southern shore, with Colonia in the west, Montevideo in the middle and Punta del Este to the east, so one coastal route covers them. Cabo Polonio extends that line north-east into Rocha. Fray Bentos is the outlier, out west on the Uruguay River, and needs its own detour. Book the coast early if you are going in January: the government counted 572,699 visitors that month in 2025, which it called a January record and 32% more than January 2019. For sequencing several stops, see our multi-city itinerary guide.

Sources

Explore more of FarSerene’s destination guides, including the Top 10 Countries to Visit in 2026 roundup, for more 2026 trip inspiration.

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