Basilica Cistern (Private Guide & No Waiting) Ticket Not Included

We have a wonderful experience. Nuri was very knowledgeable and friendly. Highly recommend this tour.

A wonderful private tour of the Cistern. The guide was very knowledgeable and had a lot of information - especially all the technical details of how the water was filtered etc.

The guide was awesome and very informative thank you Nuri for the opportunity to share this experience. Really appreciate the detailed explanation and the care of all the details during the visit.

Nuri gave my husband and I an absolutely amazing tour of the Basilica Cistern! It was truly one of the most incredible experiences of our trip. The Basilica Cistern is breathtaking and filled with so much history, and having Nuri as our guide made the experience even more special. Nuri was incredibly knowledgeable and shared so much fascinating information about the history, architecture, and stories behind what we were seeing. He made everything interesting, easy to understand, and brought the history to life for us. We are so grateful we had Nuri as our guide and would highly recommend him to anyone visiting Istanbul. If you have the opportunity to take a tour with Nuri, do it—you won’t regret it! It was an unforgettable experience!

Having Nüri with us as our guide was extremely helpful and made our experience even more enjoyable. He is incredibly knowledgeable, and you can genuinely see the passion he has for what he does. He was very accommodating, patient, and happy to answer all of our questions. He also went above and beyond to make sure we got that perfect picture! We truly appreciated his expertise and the personal touch he brought to our experience.

Nuri was very friendly and very informative. He even had a fun fact about Albania! Thank you Nuri :)

Great experience and great communication from before meeting until the end. Interesting stories and nice time!

Nuri was a great guide to this amazing location. We learnt a lot about the cistern’s history and importance and enjoyed the experience much more than if we had gone alone. Highly Recommend.

I cannot say enough about how excellent Nuri was! He is very knowledgeable about the cistern (and Istanbul), very kind, and insists that you not feel rushed. He took several photos of me (traveling solo), pointed out countless cool things I would have missed, and made me so happy that I took this tour. There wasn’t a long line to get in, but even with no line at all, I recommend everyone book a time with Nuri. Thank you so much, Nuri!

Seeing the Basilica Cistern without a tour guide would be good but having a knowledgeable guide like Nuri made this visit exceptional. We bought our tickets, met up at the agreed meeting place and skipped the queue to enter. Nuri was quite exceptional....great knowledge, good historical background, his torch was used to highlight key features for us and his photos enhanced his explanations.There were 4 of us and this was a perfect group size. He took as much time as we needed and even took our photos. He also was very flexible in changing our tour date and time as I had double booked by mistake. Highly recommend Nuri for this tour.

Nuri was very knowledgable excellent day.

An excellent tour guide. Knowledgeable, up to date, and well prepared. No waiting in line you can go straight to the program! Don't hesitate to ask for recommendations on local attractions and restaurants he gives excellent suggestions.

Was a pleasured tour, good person and professional tour explanation

Mr Noori is a very knowledgeable guide and very patiently explained everything about the basilica in Istanbul. I highly recommend his services

I found Nuri, a tour guide who is extremely knowledgeable about the Sultanahmet area, on the internet—and it turned out to be one of the best decisions I’ve made. He is very friendly and polite, and he was incredibly helpful in getting us inside without having to wait in line. Thanks to him, our trip was much more enjoyable and efficient. I would definitely recommend him to everyone. Thank you, Nuri !

Nuri was super helpful and delivered an amazing tour for me and my wife. He knows a lot about the history of the place and it was entertaining to listen to him.

Nuri is extraordinary guide. He knows very much, explains clearly and make the tour exciting experience. Thank you Nuri!

It was a great experience with Nuri! He showed the wonderful would of the cicerone. The pictures he jad and history was great.

We had an excellent tour guide during our visit. He introduced us not only to the history of the Basilica Cistern, but also to the history of Istanbul as a whole. Thank you for sharing your knowledge with us in such an interesting way. Greetings from Croatia!

I had a wonderful experience visiting the Basilica Cistern, thanks to our amazing tour guide. Their knowledge, passion, and friendly attitude made the entire tour truly memorable. They explained the history of the cistern in a clear and engaging way, sharing fascinating details that brought the place to life. The guide was patient, attentive, and always ready to answer any questions. Their enthusiasm made the atmosphere relaxed and enjoyable, and I felt like I was exploring the site with someone who genuinely loves what they do. I would happily recommend this tour to anyone visiting Istanbul. It was informative, enjoyable, and beautifully delivered an unforgettable experience!

Very nice, friendly and knowledgeable Tour guide. Took time to explain everything and gave us also some additional advices for the city.

Thanks to Nuri Erbay, it was a wonderful tour of such a special location. Full of information and answers to all our additional questions. Thank you Nuri for a wonderful tour 😊

Nuri was soo perfect! He told us everything about Cistern, tour was interesting and amazing. I recommend Nuri as a tours guide!

Amazing tour gide really kind talkative, he provided is everything, pictures, jokes and an amazing atmosphere! Don’t hesitate and choose this wonderful man for your tour!

Awesome experience with Nuri. Would’ve missed so much if we didn’t have him guiding us. He also knows all the best spots for photos.

It was great, it was beautiful and very interesting. Nury Erbay is the best tour guide ever. Nice memory from Istanbul!!

Excellent guide! So nice, full of information, excellent English, has good tips for photos, patient, seems really friendly and calm. Definitely recommended! I hope he will remember his first tour with Croatian girls 🙂

Nuri was a truly excellent guide on our tour of the incredible Basilica Cistern recently demonstrating his knowledge and expertise with flair. Thank you for an unforgettable adventure under Istanbul as we discovered all the history and came away with amazing photos. Gina and Mic

Nuri was amazing! Normaly I don't like to go sightseeing such a place like historical architecture, but this time thanks to Nuri was amazing! His energy, felxibility and sens of humor made me and my son happy💚💙 We love this place. Nuri knows a lot of curiosities about this place, he has in his mobile Phone many pictures and sketch from ancient Times and thanks to that he allows his customers to travel back in time💫💚 we are very lucky that we had Nuri as our guide because thanks to him we have a lot of amazing puctures bacause he took puctures of us🙏💚 I highly reccomend Nuri as a guide👍💚💙

Nuri is the best tour guide you could ask for! He is knowledgeable, patient, very friendly and personable. He takes time to answer all of your questions and the passion that he has for his job comes across easily and smoothly! He is nice, kind and professional! Without him this place would have been watching some pillars and with him explaining every corner and the history behind it in a cohesive narrative is a story interwoven to the heart of ancient wisdoms, ambition and hope! I totally recommend him!

What a great, informative guided tour by Nuri. We all enjoyed it very much. He is very knowledgable on the Basilica Cistern and answered all my children's questions. Thank you Nuri!

Nuri is a great guide - knowledgeable, excellent English (and Japanese). He sped us to the front of the entry queue and helped us buy tickets, then gave a fantastic tour of the Cistern. We would definitely recommend him!

Travelers, book this tour, you will never regret! The tour guider is so nice and knowledgeable, and very patient.

Very good guide- gave us a lot of historical information - clear spoken english - very friendly and competent - we would book him again!👍

Nuri was an excellent guide for our Basilica Cistern tour. He was patient and very knowledgeable about Turkish and Ottoman history.

Excellent cistern guided visit in English. Would thoroughly recommend! 3 of us shown around for about 45 minutes. Excellent!

Nuri is a fantastic tour guide. He's very knowledgeable and thorough. We really enjoyed our private tour of the cistern. We were in a little bit of a hurry after a long day, and Nuri accommodated us perfectly without feeling like we were rushing at all. He is so friendly and personable, and we will definitely contact him for further tours next time we're in Istanbul. I can't recommend him highly enough!

We first approached the Basilica Cistern on a weekday around 10 or 10:30AM...to find the entry line stretching 2 blocks around the corner. As you join the end of the line, as at many of the major attractions in Istanbul, registered tour guides are offering their services. Part of the offer the tour guides say is that a guided tour skips the entrance line -- while my family stayed in the normal line, I walked down to the entrance and confirmed guided tours have a separate, gated entrance that only had 1 group waiting to buy tickets. I walked back to my family at the end of the normal line, found the tour guide that had first offered to take our family of 4 as a tour group for 40 euros. This is where we met Nuri, and wow did I wind up being glad we did. First off, Nuri spoke great English so it was clear what was happening when talking with him about his services. Nuri pulled us out of the line and went straight to the gated entrance, skipping about 1+ hours of waiting to buy tickets. First he took me in individually to buy tickets for our family (we didn't have to buy a ticket for him) then while I waited inside he walked back out to escort the rest of my family in to meet me at the gate. Nuri gave a great about 1.5 tour of the Cistern that gave information on the history, the architecture, and the function of the Cistern over time. He had a variety of pictures and diagrams of the Cistern from various time periods that he referred to on his phone to illustrate different aspects. Nuri also was a master at knowing the spots for great photos AND herding people and tour groups out of the way to set-up photos at these spots. Overall it was a great experience and one of our favorite sites that our family saw in Istanbul -- having Nuri as a tour guide to facilitate the experience AND provide all the information just made it all the better. 10 out of 10 would recommend. In fact after finishing the tour we were asking whether he does similar tours for single sites like Hagia Sophia because we had such a good experience with Nuri at the Cistern.

I would not hesitate to recommend this tour to anyone looking to go around the cisterns of Istanbul. He is very knowledgeable and knows a lot about the areas as well as other parts of the country. I believe he is certified for English Turkish and Japanese that would not hesitate to use him again.

Nuri was such a respectful and knowledgeable tour guide in our cistern tour. I would recommend him to any friend or family member who was inquiring for a tour guide.

I have to say that Nuri is one of the best tour guides we’ve ever had. Having been to over 30 countries, he was so knowledgeable and he speaks excellent English. He absolutely goes above and beyond to make sure you are happy. Thanks Nuri from the 6 of us! I consider you a friend.

Excellent tour of the Cistern with Nuri. Very friendly and knowledgeable about the history of the cistern. Great about pointing out all the best spots for memorable photos. We really enjoyed him as our guide. I would highly recommend him!

Couldn’t fault the visit. Nuri was fascinating, knowledgeable and had excellent English. The Basilica Cistern is well worth a visit and you could not get a better guide than Nuri.

Amazing guide! Very friendly and knowledgeable. Big recommendation. He fixed a fast track so we did not have to wait in line. Affordable too

Nuri is very knowledgeable and gave us a wonderful tour of Basilica cisterna, the history, the architecture and art works in there. With his lead- we skipped the lines and had a relaxed visit. We had many opportunities to take some nice pictures. This is our first trip to Istanbul, and Nuri gave us a lot of details of Turkish history and gave us tips of places to visit. Nuri 非常博学，带我们参观了地下水宫，并详细介绍了那里的历史、建筑和艺术品，这是一次很棒的旅行。在他的带领下，我们跳过了排队，享受了一次轻松的参观。我们有很多机会拍到一些很棒的照片。 这是我们第一次来伊斯坦布尔，Nuri 向我们详细介绍了土耳其历史，还为我们提供了许多值得参观的地方的建议。

Awesome tour really fun tour guide super educational I would go again I love Istanbul so much the tour guide was really nice

Nuri was truly an expert guiding us through the Basilica cistern and sharing not only his knowledge about the place, but also other key sites in Istanbul. He demonstrated a lot of care listening and answering all the questions including from my under 10 kids who were very excited and curious listening all he had to say. He kept us all engaged and allowed us to go at our own pace, even helping with photo spots as I’m a photographer enthusiast. We really had a good time and leant things that we would have missed and would have changed the significance and memories of that amazing place. Highly recommended and I wish Nuri the best in his Spanish so next time we do a tour with him, we can choose btw Turkish, Japanese, English or Spanish 🙂

Nuri has been the best guide you can imagine! Attentive, so well prepared about the Cisterna Basilica , his explanations and company has made our trip the best one in the city! Super recommended, thanks again !

Nuri made my Istanbul experience exceptional! He is very knowledgeable and has a true passion for sharing the history of his country with others. I was fortunate to spend the day with him and he took me to so many places I would have never known about. He’s very insightful and makes sure you get to see/experience as much of the city as possible. I will recommend him to all of my traveling friends. Thank you, Nuri! I hope to return to Istanbul one day! :)