Clifftop walkways with sheer drops. Underground crypts lined with human skulls. Roller coasters that will leave you hoarse from screaming. It might not sound like the makings of a relaxing holiday, but we’ve ranked 30 of the world’s most terrifying attractions – guaranteed to thrill adrenaline junkies and horror fans alike. You have been warned.
Read on to discover our ranking of the world's most terrifying attractions...
The Skywalk is a vertigo-inducing viewing platform made almost entirely of glass, suspended directly above the 820-foot (250m) sheer rock face of the Hunerkogel mountain region. This unique vantage point offers some of the most beautiful views in the Alps – on a clear day, travellers can see as far as Slovenia and Czechia. While it may look fragile, The Skywalk is anything but: the steel-reinforced structure is built to endure winds of up to 130 miles per hour (210km/h) and support up to 26 feet (8m) of heavy snowfall.
Behind the beautiful exterior of the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose, California, lies a seriously spooky history that has led many to declare it America’s most haunted property. Built by eccentric ‘cursed widow’ Sarah Winchester between 1884 and 1922, this 160-room mansion features 2,000 doors, 10,000 windows, a ‘seance room’ and countless instances of paranormal activity and chilling ghost sightings. You can tour the mansion all year round, but it’s best explored by flashlight, after-hours.
Claustrophobes, look away now. Got a fear of insects? Stay away too. The Gomantong Caves are a popular stop on the Malaysian Borneo tourist trail, but they’re also home to hundreds of thousands of wildlife, including bats, cockroaches, spiders, scorpions and giant centipedes, all of whom litter the floors and damp, mossy walls. The takeaway? Covered shoes and a hat are essential, as is a mask – the smell, mostly bat and bird excrement, is pungent.
Hidden deep underneath the City of Love lies one of the world’s most macabre attractions: an ossuary, or resting place for human remains. This labyrinth of tunnels contains the bones of over six million bodies, moved there in 1786 due to overcrowding in the city’s graveyards and cemeteries. Incredibly, the catacombs are roughly the depth of a five-storey building, and while they stretch for over 150 miles (240km), visitors can only explore around a mile of them. What makes the catacombs so unique is their design: the bones and skulls are artfully arranged into beautiful structures, and the tunnels also contain sculptures and other artworks.
Red Force, Europe’s fastest and highest roller coaster, accelerates from 0 to 110 miles per hour (177km/h) in a staggering five seconds. Part of the Ferrari Land theme park, which opened in 2017, the ride was designed to give Formula One fans a taste of what it’s like to be Lewis Hamilton et al, as they experience a hair-raising G force of 1.35. Costing an estimated £80m ($101.9m) Red Force is unsurprisingly high-tech, using magnetic launch technology in its acceleration.
Port Arthur, on the Australian island state of Tasmania, has an incredibly dark and storied history. The site of Australia’s largest penal colony in the 18th and 19th centuries, with up to 14,000 convicts passing through or living there, it has a tragic recent history too, with the country’s biggest mass shooting taking place at Port Arthur in 1996. Nowadays it’s a popular historic attraction, including the eerie ‘Isle of the Dead’, where more than 1,000 convicts and their families lie buried.
It doesn’t get much creepier than an abandoned mine – particularly one that’s completely underwater. Located 96 miles (156km) east of Dusseldorf, Germany, is the Felicitas Slate Mine, opened in 1886 but shut down and purposely flooded in 1997. Since then it’s been abandoned, but is popular with divers in search of an eerie experience – with old machinery, discarded cables and even a small chapel still visible under the water in the darkness. Understandably, exploring the area is reserved for divers with a cave or mine certification, but tours run year round.
In the quiet village of Sagada in the Cordillera Mountains of northern Luzon, visitors encounter a haunting yet fascinating sight: hundreds of hand-carved coffins suspended from cliffs. This ancient burial tradition, practiced for over 2,000 years by the Igorot people, reflects their belief that placing the deceased high up brings them closer to ancestral spirits and the afterlife. Some of the coffins are more than a century old, and while rare today, this unique tradition remains a powerful testament to the region’s cultural heritage.
Commonly known as ‘The Death Road’, the North Yungas Road has frequently been called the world’s most dangerous drive. Stretching 40 miles (64km) through rural Bolivia – linking the capital city of La Paz to the Amazon Rainforest – it’s infamous for its sheer, vertical 11,000-foot drop (3,500m) that claimed the lives of hundreds of motorists and passengers in the 1990s. Now mostly used by cyclists, parts of the Yungas Road are a miniscule 10 foot (3m) wide, while the entire route is dotted with memorials and crosses dedicated to the dead.
Sitting atop Iron Mountain at Glenwood Caverns Adventure Park in Colorado, Defiance stands an impressive 7,132 feet (2,173m) above sea level, making it the highest and steepest looping roller coaster in the United States. It features a thrilling 102.3-degree freefall and a 75-foot (22m) vertical lift hill, before plunging riders at high speed into a ravine with epic views of the Colorado River. Opened in 2021, the ride lasts just 56 seconds, but you’ll be screaming for every single one of them.
Snow and ski enthusiasts alike will be dazzled by the Titlis Cliff Walk, one of Europe’s highest suspension bridges. With snowy vistas visible from every angle, the bridge hangs between two rock faces, and intrepid visitors walk the 328-foot (100m) length of it with a 1,640-foot (500m) chasm unfolding beneath their feet. Once they reach the end, they can step onto the Ice Flyer glacier chair lift for a more serene end to the experience.
The Arouca Bridge, the world’s longest pedestrian suspension bridge, may be sturdy and very new – having only opened in 2021 – but it’s still anxiety-inducing to cross. Suspended 574 feet (175m) above the Paiva River in Portugal’s Arouca UNESCO Global Geopark, the bridge stretches an astounding 1,693 feet (516m), connecting the stunning Aguieiras Waterfall and Paiva Gorge. Inspired by ancient Tibetan footbridges, its metal grid floor and railings offer a breathtaking (and nerve-wracking) 360-degree view of the dramatic scenery below.
Deep in Turkmenistan’s Karakum Desert is a massive, burning gas crater of unknown origin: the aptly named ‘Gateway to Hell’. Geologists disagree as to how the hole was formed – while some believe it was a freak natural phenomenon, others say it was accidentally created by the Soviet Union in the 1960s while they drilled for oil. Either way, it’s still burning more than half a century later – and is one of the country’s most popular tourist destinations, with people flocking from all over the world to marvel at the seemingly eternal flames.
Volcanoes are among the most terrifying things on Earth to witness – let alone climb inside. But that’s exactly what Iceland’s ‘Inside the Volcano’ experience offers intrepid tourists. Named as ‘one of 20 places in the world you must see’ by CNN, the dormant Þríhnúkagígur volcano is the only accessible lava chamber on Earth. Participants begin by hiking two miles (3km) to the summit, before descending 400 feet (120m) into the volcano via an open cable lift, operated by mountaineers.
Equal parts creepy and fascinating, the abandoned Al-Ula Old Town is an ancient time capsule. Frozen in time since the 1980s, when the last few residents left for a nearby town, Al-Ula’s winding pathways and once-bustling squares were a key route on the spice and silk roads, welcoming traders from all over the Middle East and Europe. However, travellers wanting to visit Al-Ula for its ghost-town-vibes should do so soon: it’s currently undergoing careful redevelopment, and may not be abandoned for much longer.
On the Indonesian island of Java lies the world’s largest acidic lake, nestled within the crater of the Kawah Ijen Volcano. Measuring over half a mile wide (1km) and 656 feet (200m) deep, the lake's stunning turquoise colour is caused by high sulfuric acid levels. Recognised as part of a UNESCO World Biosphere Reserve in 2016, Kawah Ijen remains an active volcano, with notable eruptions as recently as 2002. Visitors can trek along the crater’s rim, taking in both its beauty and its geological power.
Hidden in an unassuming monastery in Palermo, Sicily lie more than 1,000 mummified corpses – beautifully dressed in their best clothes. This is the Capuchin Catacombs where, unlike its Parisian counterpart, many of the bodies have been embalmed, some as recently as 1920. The largest collection of mummified remains in Europe, the Catacombs have fascinated and terrified tourists for decades. Originally, only Capuchin monks could be interned there, but it soon became a prestigious final resting place and was opened to the public.
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Whether you find this entry creepy or cute will depend on how you feel about scarecrows. Hidden deep in the valleys of Tokushima Prefecture on the Japanese island of Shikoku is a real-life ‘Valley of the Dolls’, where hundreds of handmade, life-size scarecrows outnumber humans 10-to-one. Why, you ask? With a permanent population of just 27, most of them elderly, crafts hobbyist Tsukimi Ayano decided to create scarecrow tributes to all of the past residents who have left the remote village. It now attracts more than 3,000 visitors every year.
There’s several volcanic attractions featured on this list – but none quite like Cerro Negro. It’s become synonymous with ‘volcano boarding’, where hardcore adrenaline junkies take on the 2,388-foot (728m) descent strapped to a sandboard. They experience an almost completely vertical drop, and if that wasn’t terrifying enough, the black-sand Cerro Negro volcano remains active, having erupted 23 times since its formation in 1850, with the last eruption occurring as recently as 1999.
Built way back in 1829, Eastern State Penitentiary was once ‘home’ to notorious criminals like Al Capone. It’s also thought to be one of USA’s most haunted buildings, with past inmates and present visitors reporting footsteps, ghosts and shadows. Before finally shutting its doors in 1971, it was an overcrowded hellhole where inmates were locked in their cells for 23 hours a day – now, it’s a popular destination where true crime and horror fans flock for spooky experiences and Halloween festivities, including nighttime tours.
South of Mexico City is Xochimilco, home to the chinampas, ancient floating gardens filled with brightly coloured flowers that are also a UNESCO World Heritage Site. But one of the Xochimilco islands is more nightmare fuel than beauty spot. Translating literally to ‘island of the dolls’, it’s home to more than four thousand of them – many dishevelled and broken. Legend has it that after a young girl drowned in one of the chinampas in the 1950s, a local hermit, Julian Santana Barrera, began hanging dolls to ward off evil spirits – before drowning in the canal himself, leading many to consider the now uninhabited island haunted in the extreme.
At its narrowest point, the path on Mount Huashan in China is just 11.8 inches (30cm) wide – the same as a standard ruler – earning it a reputation as ‘the world’s most dangerous hike’. While rumours of 100+ deaths annually are likely unfounded, safety harnesses are now mandatory on the most treacherous sections. Giving a whole new meaning to the phrase ‘walking the plank’, part of the mountain’s 700-year-old path is little more than rickety wooden slats, affixed to the cliffside by metal bolts. And with two-way traffic and a height of more than seven thousand feet (2,100m), it’s no surprise that this six-hour trek leaves even experienced hikers hanging on for dear life.
The third crypt on this list, and the creepiest, the Capuchin Crypt in Brno is the final resting place for more than two hundred 15th-and-16th-century friars and a handful of ordinary folk. Fascinating and horrifying visitors for more than 140 years, the dead are not preserved behind glass but lay prone, side-by-side, and tourists must navigate claustrophobic corridors to reach the crypt. Most chillingly, some of the mummies are said to have been accidentally buried alive.
Once known as ‘the world’s most dangerous walkway’, Malaga’s Caminito del Rey has shaken off its fearsome reputation in recent years, thanks to a £2.3 million ($2.9m) renovation completed in 2015. Constructed in 1905, it’s attached to the terrifyingly steep walls of the El Chorro gorge, and was originally used by construction workers as they transported materials to the Guadalhorce dam. Throughout the 20th century, it fell into disrepair, closing to the public in 2000 after five deaths in just two years. And while the Caminito Del Rey’s paths may no longer be narrow and rickety (and all walkers must now wear hard hats), those with a fear of heights would be wise to steer clear.
Guanajuato is one of Mexico’s most beautiful cities and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Less picturesque is one of its biggest tourist attractions, the Museo de las Momias, home to more than 100 mummified bodies, dating from the 18th and 19th centuries, standing shoulder to shoulder behind glass cases. Incredibly, these mummies are a vital source of income for the region – bringing in the second biggest revenue after property tax.
Everything is a little crazier in Las Vegas, and its roller coasters are no exception. Perched precariously at the very top of The STRAT Hotel & Casino, X-Scream dangles its terrified riders headfirst over the edge – staring down at a 866-foot (263m) sheer drop – before dragging them back time and again for more. Definitely the most petrifying (and unique) way to experience the world-famous Las Vegas Strip.
Famous for going viral on TikTok, the Buddha’s Hand sculpture is located in Qingyuan City, Guangdong Province – and has long captivated tourists in search of the ultimate selfie. At 66 feet long (20m) and 53 feet high (16m), those brave enough to climb the sculpture’s narrow steps are rewarded with a breathtaking view. There’s no harnesses or rails, but the Buddha’s Hand does, thankfully, have a safety net underneath in case of trips or falls.
Often called ‘the most famous swing in the world’, Queenstown’s Nevis Swing is nothing like you’ve experienced at your local playground. Suspended 525 feet (160m) above the stunning Nevis River Valley, it boasts a massive 984-foot (300m) arc. Daredevils can choose to swing forwards, backwards or even – gulp – upside down, before being winched back onto the platform.
Giving a whole new meaning to ‘living life on the edge’, our number one pick for the scariest tourist attraction in the world goes to Toronto’s EdgeWalk. Those brave enough to take it on can experience the city from a height of 116 storeys – protected by nothing but a harness. The world’s highest, full-circle, hands-free walking experience, thrill seekers spend 30 minutes strolling the Tower’s five-foot-wide (1.5m) ledge, and can lean forward (or back, if so inclined) as they soak up breathtaking views of Lake Ontario.