At the edge of the Black Forest, you can find Freiburg. The city is known for its university and cute old town, and it serves as a great base if you want to explore the Black Forest.
If you come in December, you will have the chance to visit the Freiburg Christmas market. More than 100 stands are waiting for you to discover food, drinks and handicrafts. Warm up with a mug of hot mulled wine or shop for Christmas presents on this beautiful market.
We have explored the Christmas market in Freiburg and can now give you all the information you need to plan your visit!
If you’re short on time, here is an overview of the most important information you need to know about the Freiburg Christmas market.
Opening hours:
- Opening days: 17 November – 23 December 2022
- 10 am – 8:30 pm (Monday – Saturday)
- 11:30 am – 7:30 pm (Sunday)
Best food and drinks you need to try:
- Glühwein from a vineyard
- Lange Rote
- Spätzle
Best hotels in Freiburg:
- Hotel Barbara (mid-range; super friendly owners and rates include breakfast)
- Colombi Hotel (a bit more comfort; a 5-star luxury hotel with pool and gym)
- Black Forest Hostel (budget; very close to the city centre)
Find the best train connections to Freiburg on Omio.
Freiburg Christmas Market
Brief history of the Freiburg Christmas Market
In Germany, Christmas markets started popping up in the late Middle Ages.
At first, people called them December markets. They were usually regional markets where locals could stock up on food and winter clothes. Over the years, these markets turned into events where you could buy sweets and locally made toys or other gifts.
Eventually, the December markets became the Christmas markets we know today.
In Freiburg, old photos from the 19th century show a Christmas market on the Münsterplatz in front of the minster. The Christmas market as it exists today, though, only dates back to 1973. That year, halfway through December, the city already announced that the market was so successful that it would take place every year.
Opening hours
Here are the opening hours of the Freiburg Christmas market for 2022:
Freiburg Christmas market dates: 17 November – 23 December 2022
Opening hours:
- Monday – Saturday: 10 am – 8:30 pm
- Sunday: 11:30 am – 7:30 pm
Where to find the Christmas Market in Freiburg
Since the old town of Freiburg is relatively compact, finding the Christmas market is easy. It spreads across multiple locations in the city centre, all of which are close to each other.
Here is where you need to go:
Rathausplatz
You can find the biggest collection of stalls in front of the town hall, on the Rathausplatz.
This square is excellent to visit if you’re hungry. Follow the line of market stalls going towards the centre to get chestnuts, churros, corn on a cob and some local delicacies. Spätzle, a type of local pasta, is a popular dish, or you could try some Dampfnudeln.
Some of the stalls here also sell handicrafts and gifts. Since this area is very busy, we recommend coming early in the morning if you’re looking to buy souvenirs and presents.
Franziskanerstraße
If you head to Franziskanerstraße from Rathausplatz, you’ll find a few stalls selling mulled wine along the way. Franziskaner street itself is great if you want to buy handicrafts or gifts.
Look out for the candle stall where children can make their own candles or buy a rolling pin with patterns for making beautiful cookies.
Kartoffelmarkt
On this square, called Potato Market, you can find a selection of stands selling food, drinks and various types of handicrafts and goods. When we came here, this area was less crowded than the Rathausplatz, so it’s a nice place to visit if you want to enjoy a quiet cup of mulled wine.
Unterlindenplatz
Following the Schiffstraße from Kartoffelmarkt, you’ll end up at Unterlindenplatz. This tiny square only has a few stalls, which means it’s far less busy than the central locations. Once again, this is the perfect location if you want to escape the crowds for a while.
Colombipark
On a hill in Colombipark, you can find multiple stalls mainly selling food and drinks. There’s a lot of space up here, so this is one of our top recommendations for enjoying a cup of mulled wine. Look out for the different foods, as you can try multiple local specialities at the stalls on this hill.
Rotteckring
The stalls on Rotteckring are also an excellent option for drinking mulled wine. Once again, there is more space than on the very crowded Rathausplatz. If you have children, they’ll enjoy the small carousel here.
Turmstraße
From Rotteckring, Turmstraße leads you back to Rathausplatz. The stalls here offer a great mixture of foods and drinks, handicrafts, and presents. Plus, there’s still enough space, so if you haven’t had a hot drink yet, this is a great place to stop.
What to eat and drink at the Christmas Market Freiburg
Glühwein
Glühwein is mulled wine. To make this delicious drink, you need to boil wine with sugar and spices. Glühwein is how Christmas tastes to me – just the right amount of sweet and sticky with lots of Christmas spices.
The area around Freiburg is famous for its wines, and you can even find a tiny vineyard in Colombipark, next to the Christmas market. Therefore, we highly recommend that you get your mulled wine from one of the stalls set up by local vineyards.
You might be paying a little bit more, but the Glühwein will be of excellent quality.
When you buy a drink at the Christmas market, you have to pay for the drink itself and the mug. We call it Pfand, and you’ll get some of the money back when you return the cup.
Lange Rote
The Lange Rote is a sausage local to Freiburg. So local, in fact, we had no idea it existed until we visited here.
It’s a reddish, skinless grilled sausage with a length of 35cm. The vendor will ask you “with or without”, meaning whether you want it with or without onions. Traditionally, the sausage is served in a bread roll, and you can add ketchup or mustard.
Spätzle
We already briefly mentioned Spätzle. They’re a type of local pasta. They’re often eaten as a side dish but also make for a great main dish. Käsespätzle is Spätzle with cheese, or you could go for Spätzle roasted in a pan with various ingredients.
Schäufele
While walking around, you might see a few stalls selling Schäufele. This dish is pork shoulder, cured and smoked and then boiled in broth for about two hours.
When eaten with potato salad, it is a classic Freiburg dish for Christmas eve. At the Christmas market, you can get it in a flatbread or with various side dishes.
What to buy at the Freiburg Christmas Market
Woodcarvings
The Freiburg Christmas market is the perfect place to buy handicrafts.
Some of the best German Christmas gifts are wooden Christmas decorations. You’ll find multiple stands selling them. If you want a small souvenir, go for the Christmas tree ornaments.
Otherwise, the so-called Räuchermännchen are very famous. They’re wooden figurines, traditionally holding a pipe. If you put in incense cones, they’ll “breathe out” smoke. You can also get many variations, like chefs holding bowls that smoke or little houses with smoke coming out of the chimney.
Pyramids are also popular wooden Christmas decorations. Make sure to go for high-quality ones that rotate easily. If you put candles in them, they’ll start spinning from the heat. The nicest ones can be pretty expensive, but the cheaper ones often don’t rotate well.
Candles
As we already mentioned above, one of the candle stalls offers a candle workshop. You can come here to make your own candles by dipping a string into different coloured hot wax. It’s a unique gift and souvenir and a lot of fun to make.
Christmas stars
You’ll see paper stars at Christmas markets all over Germany. The colourful stars are popular decorations in December, and they fold flat. That means they’re easy to carry if you decide to get one. Most stalls also sell light bulb holders that fit inside, so you can set it up the moment you arrive home.
Rolling pins
One of my favourite stands at the Freiburg Christmas market sells rolling pins. Not any ordinary rolling pins, though, but wooden ones with patterns. They’re brilliant for making a large batch of cookies in a short amount of time.
You can choose between different sizes and different designs.
How to get to the Freiburg Christmas Market
To get to the Freiburg Christmas market, you first need to reach Freiburg.
If you’re already in the area, it’s easy to reach Freiburg by train. High-speed trains regularly run north to Frankfurt and the Ruhr area and south to Basel and Zurich.
If you want to look up train schedules, check out Omio. From Frankfurt, for example, it only takes around two hours to get to Freiburg.
Therefore, if you’re coming from further away, we recommend flying to Frankfurt and continuing by train. Frankfurt has a large airport, so you can easily find connections.
Or maybe you want to rent a car and incorporate Freiburg into a Germany road trip?
Once you’ve made it to Freiburg, you can find the Christmas market in the city centre. Freiburg has an excellent public transport network, and you can walk to the market from any of the stations in the old town. You can also walk from the main station if you just arrived by high-speed train.
Christmas Markets near Freiburg
If you’re in Freiburg for a few days, you should visit some of the nearby Christmas markets. The Black Forest is known for its cute towns, and many of them set up stalls in the weeks before Christmas. We highly recommend the Christmas market in the Ravenna gorge. If you come here, you can visit a magical market in a valley underneath an aqueduct.
You could also take a train and visit some of the Christmas markets in nearby cities. Here are some ideas:
- Basel Christmas market
- Zurich Christmas market
- Strasbourg Christmas market
- Frankfurt Christmas market
The Freiburg Christmas market is a great market to visit if you’re coming to the Black Forest in winter. If you’ve ever been here, we’d love to hear from you. Leave us a comment about your favourite food or drink, or let us know if you have any tips we haven’t mentioned yet.
While you’re here, make sure to check out our other articles that will help you plan your trip:
- Top 7 Things to Know about German Christmas Markets
- Your Frankfurt Christmas market guide
- Top 23 Traditional German Christmas Market Food You Need to Try
- The 23 Best Christmas Markets in Europe
Until your next adventure!
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