Temple of the Six Banyan Trees Guangzhou: Hours, Tickets and How to Visit

This site’s 3-4 day Guangzhou itinerary already sends Day 1 to the Temple of the Six Banyan Trees, then never had a page for it. I went through 2026 visitor listings, Yuexiu district hours, and the standard history record so the stop has metro, hours, and a clear note on the pagoda.

The Chinese name is 六榕寺 (Liurong Si). English maps use Temple of the Six Banyan Trees or Liurong Temple. The address is 87 Liurong Road, Yuexiu District. Put the Chinese name in a map app. English spellings wander.

How to get to the Temple of the Six Banyan Trees

Take Metro Line 1 or Line 2 to Gongyuanqian (公园前). Walk northwest toward Liurong Road. Most 2026 guides put the walk at five to eight minutes. Line 6 to Haizhu Square is a longer walk, useful if you are already on that line.

Gongyuanqian is the same interchange people use for the palace-site half of the Nanyue King Museum. You can do the temple and that museum on one ticket-and-walk morning if you keep both visits short.

Buses still stop on Liurong Road. Route numbers change. The metro is the reliable instruction to give a first-time visitor.

Hours, tickets, and the Flower Pagoda

Yuexiu district visitor guidance published in January 2026, and TravelChinaGuide’s July 2026 update, both list opening hours as 8am to 4.30pm and list admission as free. Baidu’s encyclopedia entry matches that, and adds a line visitors actually need. The pagoda itself is listed as currently closed.

Some English blogs still quote 5 or 10 yuan at the gate. Treat those as leftover figures. Pay what the window asks that day. Do not plan the visit around climbing the tower.

The Flower Pagoda (花塔) is the red-and-white octagonal tower you see from the street. Records put its rebuild in 1097, in the Northern Song. Height listings cluster around 57 metres. It looks taller than the surrounding Yuexiu blocks, which is why photos from the courtyard work even when you cannot go up.

Arrive before 10am on weekdays if you want fewer tour groups. Lunar New Year and the Lantern Festival pack the courtyards because people queue for the first incense of the year. Festival days can change hours. The 8am to 4.30pm window is the ordinary weekday listing, not a promise for every holiday.

One hour is enough for the pagoda exterior, the main halls, and a slow loop of the steles. Two hours only pays off if you like reading inscriptions.

What you see inside

This is a working Buddhist temple. People burn incense, and halls stay in use. Dress with shoulders and knees covered. Keep voices down in the halls. Do not photograph worshippers up close without asking. Flash is a bad idea around gilt statues even when a sign is missing.

The Mahavira Hall holds three large Buddhas. Guides identify them as Sakyamuni in the centre, Amitabha on one side, and the Medicine Buddha on the other, standing for present, past, and future. That reading is the standard visitor explanation. You do not need it to stand in the hall.

There is also a bronze figure of Huineng, the Sixth Patriarch of Chan Buddhism. Guangxiao Temple, west of here on Guangxiao Road, is the larger Huineng site in the city. If you only have time for one temple, Six Banyan Trees wins on the pagoda. If you want the older, broader monastic compound, Guangxiao is the other stop. I have not given Guangxiao its own page yet, so I am not going to pretend this article covers both.

Thresholds are high. Step over them. Do not stand on them. That rule shows up in almost every Guangzhou temple note, including our Chen Clan Ancestral Hall page, and it still trips people who are looking at their phones.

How the temple got the name Six Banyan Trees

The first construction is dated to 537, in the Liang dynasty, under Emperor Wu. The monk associated with the founding is Tanyu. Early names include Baozhuangyan Temple. The compound burned and was rebuilt more than once. The Northern Song rebuild is the version later writers keep pointing to.

The present name comes from a visit by Su Shi (Su Dongpo). He wrote of six banyan trees on the grounds. The two characters 六榕 stuck. The original trees are long gone. The name is the leftover.

That is the whole origin story you need on site. Everything else is dynasty lists. They do not change how you walk the courtyard.

Walk it with nearby Guangzhou attractions

The temple sits in the old Yuexiu core, which is why it belongs on a first visit even if you are not collecting temples.

• North, a short walk toward Dongfeng Road, is Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall. Our 3-4 day itinerary already pairs the two on the same afternoon and evening.
• East and south, Beijing Road is the shopping street with the glass-covered ancient road. Sacred Heart Cathedral is a further walk from there, and has its own visiting page.
• Yuexiu Park and the Five Rams statue sit further north. Do not try to stack the temple, the park, and Chimelong in one day.

If you want Lingnan woodcarving after the brick-and-pagoda look here, cross west toward Chen Clan Ancestral Hall. That is a metro hop, not a stroll. The best 10 Lingnan attractions list already includes Liurong Temple as the compact spiritual stop.

A short plan that actually fits

Gongyuanqian Exit, walk to 87 Liurong Road, one hour in the temple, then either the Nanyue palace site or Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall, then Beijing Road when you want food and a flat walk. That is a full Yuexiu afternoon. It matches Day 1 of the itinerary without inventing a pagoda climb the listings no longer support.

The Guangzhou travel guide is the wider planning page. This article is only the temple.

Hours and fees follow 2026 visitor listings and can change on festival days. Confirm the gate board if you arrive on a public holiday.

Hours and free-admission listings are from Yuexiu district visitor guidance as reported in January 2026 and from TravelChinaGuide’s July 2026 update. The closed pagoda note is from Baidu Baike. Founding date, Su Shi’s naming, and the 1097 pagoda rebuild follow the English Wikipedia entry for the Temple of the Six Banyan Trees.