The Old Fort, known in Swahili as Ngome Kongwe, is the oldest standing building in Stone Town, open daily from eight in the morning until six in the evening with free entry to the courtyard. Visitors can walk in unguided or include it on any Stone Town tour. Built by Omani Arabs between 1698 and 1701 on the Zanzibar seafront, the Old Fort now works as a cultural centre with craft shops, an amphitheatre and festival grounds.
People often walk past it. It sits low behind heavy walls, it charges nothing, and the House of Wonders next door is taller and better publicised. That combination means the single oldest structure in the UNESCO quarter gets about ten minutes from most visitors, which is roughly a third of what it deserves.
What an Old Fort Tour in Stone Town Involves
An Old Fort tour is short, self directed and free unless you have a guide with you. You pass through the main gate off the seafront into a roughly square courtyard enclosed by high coral stone walls topped with castellated battlements. Around the inside edge sit craft shops, a couple of workshops, a restaurant and a small open air amphitheatre.
Thirty to forty five minutes covers it properly. The towers at the corners hold an art gallery, and the walls themselves reward a slow lap, since the fabric of the building is layered in a way that is visible if you know to look for it.
Most guided Stone Town tours begin here, partly because it is easy to find and partly because the fort explains the sequence of who controlled this coast better than anything else in the quarter.
Entry to the courtyard is free and the front office runs from eight until six. Individual shops keep their own hours within that. For evening events and bar nights the gates stay open later, so check what is on before assuming the place shuts at six.
Portuguese Foundations Beneath Ngome Kongwe
The site was in use long before the fort existed. The Portuguese reached these islands in the early 1500s and held the coast for roughly two centuries. Between 1598 and 1612 they built a church on this plot, and when the Omanis took the site they built straight over it.
Fragments of that church survive inside the courtyard walls, worked into the later masonry. A guide will point them out; without one you can find them by walking the inner face slowly and looking for stonework that does not match its neighbours. It is a small detail and it is the most direct physical evidence of the Portuguese period anywhere in the old town.
The Omani Fort of 1698 and How It Was Built
The Busaidi Omanis took control of Zanzibar in 1698 after expelling the Portuguese, and construction of the fort followed immediately, running from 1698 to 1701. It is a large and deliberately intimidating structure, with thick walls of coral rag and lime mortar rising to battlements.
The fort was not built solely against the Portuguese. The Mazrui, a rival Omani faction who held Mombasa at the time, were the other threat, and the defences face the sea because that is where both were expected to arrive from. Coastal power on this stretch of the Indian Ocean was decided by who controlled the anchorages, and the fort was built to hold one.
The construction material is worth a moment. Coral rag quarried on the island, cut into blocks and bound with lime made from burnt coral, is what all of Stone Town is built from. It is porous, it weathers visibly, and it has stood here for over three hundred years, which says something about how well it suits the climate.
From Garrison to Prison Under Later Rule
By the 19th century the fort had stopped being a frontline defence and became a prison. Criminals were held here, punished here, and executions were carried out within the walls. That period lasted long enough to define the building’s reputation locally for generations.
Under the British the courtyard was put to a use that could hardly be further removed from any of that. The high walls made an ideal screen, and the space became a private tennis court for European ladies, shielded from public view. Three centuries of Indian Ocean power politics, ending in doubles matches.
A Portuguese church, an Omani garrison, a colonial prison, a tennis court, and now a stage. Few buildings anywhere have been repurposed quite so thoroughly.
The Amphitheatre and Live Music Tours at the Old Fort
Since 1994 the fort has run as a cultural centre, and the amphitheatre built into the courtyard is the heart of it. Live music and dance performances are staged regularly, drawing on taarab, the orchestral Swahili song tradition that developed in Zanzibar under Arab and Indian influence, and on ngoma drumming and dance.
Performances run in the evenings and are usually advertised on boards at the gate rather than online, which means the reliable way to find out what is on is to walk in and look. Some are free, some carry a modest charge, and some come bundled with a meal at the restaurant beside the stage.
The acoustics in a stone walled courtyard are better than you would expect. On a warm evening with the sea a few metres away it is one of the more pleasant things to do in the old town after dark, and it is genuinely local rather than staged for tour groups.
Craft Shops and Workshops Inside the Fort Tour
The shops lining the courtyard sell clothing, fabric, carvings, paintings and the usual run of souvenirs. Quality varies. Some are working workshops where you can watch the making, and those are the ones worth your time and money.
Prices are negotiable, as everywhere on the island. The pitch inside the fort is gentler than at the market or along the seafront, which makes it a reasonable place to buy if haggling is not something you enjoy. The art gallery occupying the far towers carries work by Zanzibari and mainland Tanzanian painters and is free to walk through.
Festivals at the Old Fort: Sauti za Busara and the Film Festival
Twice a year the fort stops being a quiet courtyard and becomes the busiest venue on the island.
Sauti za Busara runs in February and is East Africa’s best known music festival, filling the fort and the surrounding streets with performers from across the continent. Accommodation across Stone Town books out and rates in the quarter can double, so plan months ahead if you want to be here for it.
The Zanzibar International Film Festival takes place in July, screening films from across Africa and the Indian Ocean world in the open air amphitheatre. It falls in the middle of the dry season, which makes an outdoor screening under the walls a reliable proposition.
Beyond the two headliners, the fort hosts smaller festivals, fashion shows, film nights and weddings through the year. If your dates are flexible, checking the calendar before booking is worth doing.
Combining the Old Fort With a Stone Town Seafront Walking Tour
The fort sits directly beside the House of Wonders, which has been closed since a section of it collapsed in December 2020 and is currently viewable only from outside. The two are usually seen together, with the fort courtyard giving one of the better angles on the House of Wonders facade.
From the fort gate, a natural Stone Town walking tour continues north along Mizingani Road to the Palace Museum and the Old Dispensary, then turns inland for the Anglican Cathedral and the slave market holding chambers at Mkunazini, then loops back to Forodhani Gardens for the evening food market. That circuit runs two to three hours at a comfortable pace and takes in everything the World Heritage listing is built on.
Getting to Ngome Kongwe and When to Go
The Old Fort stands on the Stone Town seafront in Zanzibar City, on Unguja island, about fifteen to twenty minutes by road from Abeid Amani Karume International Airport and a short walk south from the ferry terminal where boats from Dar es Salaam arrive.
Late afternoon is the best time to arrive. The courtyard is shaded by then, the heat has dropped, the shops are all open, and you finish within a few steps of Forodhani Gardens just as the food stalls light their grills. Midday in the dry season is hot and the courtyard offers limited shelter. During the long rains of April and May an open courtyard is an obvious problem, though the shops and gallery stay dry.
Frequently Asked Questions About the Old Fort
Restoration and Layout
The fort was restored by the Aga Khan Trust for Culture in the 1990s, which is when the cultural centre in the courtyard began. The design is classic late seventeenth-century Omani military building: walls eight to ten metres high, four circular corner towers, and a courtyard of roughly thirty by forty metres now given over to an amphitheatre and craft stalls.
It is an easy site to visit with children, being open, walkable, free to enter, and small enough to see in half an hour.
How much does it cost to enter the Old Fort?
Nothing. Entry to the courtyard is free, which makes it one of the few sites in Stone Town with no admission charge. Individual events at the amphitheatre may carry a ticket price, and festival access during Sauti za Busara and the film festival is ticketed separately. Guided Stone Town walking tours including the fort typically run around $20 to $40 per person for a group departure.
What are the Old Fort opening hours?
The front office operates daily from 8am to 6pm. Shops and offices inside keep their own hours within that window and rarely stay open later. For evening performances and bar nights the gates open beyond six, so check the boards at the entrance for what is scheduled.
How old is the Old Fort in Zanzibar?
The current structure was built by Omani Arabs between 1698 and 1701, making it over three hundred years old and the oldest standing building in Stone Town. It sits on the site of a Portuguese church built between 1598 and 1612, remnants of which are still visible in the courtyard walls.
How long do you need at the Old Fort?
Thirty to forty five minutes covers the courtyard, the shops and the gallery at an unhurried pace. Allow longer if you are staying for a performance at the amphitheatre or eating at the restaurant beside it. As part of a wider seafront tour it usually gets twenty minutes, which is enough to see it but not enough to take it in.
Is the Old Fort worth visiting?
Yes, particularly given it costs nothing. It is the oldest building in the quarter, it carries visible physical evidence of the Portuguese, Omani and British periods in a single courtyard, and it functions as a real cultural venue rather than a preserved monument. It is also the most practical starting point for exploring the rest of Stone Town on foot.
When are the festivals at the Old Fort?
Sauti za Busara, the music festival, takes place in February. The Zanzibar International Film Festival runs in July. Both fill the fort and push accommodation prices in Stone Town sharply higher, so book well in advance if you are travelling for either.
The fort is easy to visit alone and much better with someone who can read the walls for you. Holidays To Zanzibar works with licensed Zanzibari guides who know which stonework belongs to which century and what is scheduled at the amphitheatre in any given week, and they will build the fort into a wider Stone Town walk rather than treating it as a box to tick.
For a guided day in the old quarter, or advice on timing your trip around the festivals, get in touch with Holidays To Zanzibar and a real person will get back to you.