What remains of the Berlin Wall today?

Very little of the original Berlin Wall remains. Of the 155km of Wall that once encircled West Berlin, only about 3km of original segments survive in various locations around the city.

The largest surviving section is the East Side Gallery, a 1.3km stretch along Mühlenstraße that was painted by artists from around the world in 1990. It is now the world’s longest open-air gallery and a protected heritage monument.

The most historically significant section is at the Berlin Wall Memorial on Bernauer Straße, where a 60-metre segment has been preserved in its original state, complete with the death strip, watchtower foundations, and border installations.

Other surviving fragments include:

• A section along Niederkirchnerstraße at the Topographie des Terrors
• The watchtower on Erna-Berger-Straße near Potsdamer Platz
• Short segments in the grounds of the Parlament der Bäume
• Scattered sections in parks and along the Spree river

The rest was demolished with remarkable speed. Most of the Wall was ground up and used as road-building aggregate. Sections were sold off, some to collectors and museums around the world, others as commercial souvenirs. The famous “Wall chips” sold to tourists at Checkpoint Charlie are, in many cases, not from the Wall at all.

A double line of cobblestones set into the ground now marks where the Wall once stood throughout central Berlin. The 160km Berliner Mauerweg (Berlin Wall Trail) follows the entire former route and can be walked or cycled.