Lukács is the bath on Frankel Leó út in Felhévíz, a few minutes north of the Buda end of Margaret Bridge, and it is the one Budapest uses itself. Three medicinal pools sit indoors, an adventure pool and two swimming pools fill the courtyards, and four saunas come with the basic ticket. The water arrives from the Molnár János cave under the street.
Nobody sells it on its looks. The building is dated, spread over several levels, and hard to read on a first visit, which is why the practical half of this page is as long as the part about the water. What you get instead is a bath with regulars in it, cool outdoor water in summer, and one free entry on the Budapest Card.
Two things to settle before you go. Nobody under 14 is admitted, and nothing is hired, so the towel and the slippers come with you.
- Visit length
- 2 to 4 hours
- Entry
- Day ticket, locker included, cabin extra
- Book ahead
- Book online to skip the desk queue
- Opening hours
- Bath and pools: Mon 07:00 to 19:00, Tue 07:00 to 22:00, Wed to Sun 07:00 to 19:00Sauna World: Mon 14:00 to 19:00, Tue 14:00 to 22:00, Wed to Fri 14:00 to 19:00, Sat to Sun 07:00 to 19:00Drinking hall: Mon to Tue closed, Wed 11:00 to 18:00, Thu closed, Fri 11:00 to 18:00, Sat to Sun closed
- Best time
- Weekday morning
- Nearest stop
- Tram 17/19/41 Szent Lukács Gyógyfürdő2 min walk
- Accessibility
- Accessible changing facilities out of use
- Dress code
- Swimwear and slippers, cap in the swimming pools
- Age limit
- 14 and over
- Sauna World
- Extra ticket, swimsuit-free
- Budapest Card
- One free entry, with a locker
Lukács Thermal Bath tickets
Entry is by day ticket. Both of our partners sell the same admission, and so does the bath, online and at its own desk, and a locker comes with all of them.
Budapest: Lukács Thermal Bath Full-Day Spa Ticket
Best for: A whole day in the pools, booked ahead and still cancellable
- Valid 1 day
- Free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead
What’s included and more details
What’s included
- Full-day entrance ticket
- The use of a cubicle or locker, depending on availability
- Bring
- Swimwear, towel, flip-flops and a swimming cap
- On arrival
- Present your voucher at the entrance
- Not included
- The Sauna World, which takes a ticket of its own bought at the bath
- Not suitable for
- Children under 14, and pregnant women
- Also
- Reserve now and pay later
Lukács Spa: Thermal Bath Admission
Best for: Plain admission, for a plan that might still change late
- Cancellation possible until 23:59 the day before
What’s included and more details
What’s included
- Admission to Lukács Thermal Bath
- On arrival
- Show your smartphone voucher at the entrance, where staff give you instructions and access to the lockers and changing rooms
- Not included
- Spa treatments, massages, food and drinks
- Sauna World
- Not covered, and bought on the spot
- Also sold
- Bundled with a sightseeing cruise, or with St Stephen's Basilica
Getting in free with the Budapest Card
Budapest Card: Public Transport, 30+ Top Attractions & Tours
Best for: Getting into Lukács for nothing, once, which the card does for no other Budapest bath
- 24, 48, 72 or 96 hours from first use
- Free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead
What’s included and more details
What’s included
- One free entry here, on a locker ticket
- 20% off a locker ticket after that
- Unlimited public transport
- Free entry to more than 30 museums and attractions
- At Lukács
- One free entry per card, on a locker ticket, so a cabin still costs extra and Sauna World is a separate ticket either way
- Where it is given
- Shown at the cash desks in the entrance hall, never online, and it cannot be combined with another discount
- Why it matters here
- Of the city's thermal baths this is the only one the card lets you into free, which is worth knowing if you bought the card expecting Széchenyi
- Worth it only if
- You would have paid for several of the things on it. One free entry does not cover the card on its own
- A locker comes with every ticket. A cabin is the paid upgrade, and the Sauna World is a ticket of its own
- Nobody under 14 is admitted, swimming pools included
- The bath asks you to arrive one to two hours earlier than you planned at busy times, because a ticket in hand does not always mean walking straight in
Both partners’ terms, the bath’s own ticket types and what costs extra inside: Lukács Thermal Bath tickets guide.
Highlights
Get into the courtyard adventure pool
33 to 35°C, open all year, with bubble beds, neck showers and a circular current channel.
Bathe where Budapest bathes
the crowd is mostly regulars and skews older, which is the whole reason to come here instead of City Park.
Read the marble thank-you tablets
patients who were cured here fixed them to the courtyard wall, in Hungarian, Romanian and Arabic.
Plan your visit
Opening hours
The bath runs from 07:00 to 19:00 every day, and until 22:00 on Tuesday. The Sauna World opens at 14:00 on weekdays and all day at weekends, and the drinking hall serves on Wednesdays and Fridays only.
Bath and pools: Mon 07:00 to 19:00, Tue 07:00 to 22:00, Wed to Sun 07:00 to 19:00Sauna World: Mon 14:00 to 19:00, Tue 14:00 to 22:00, Wed to Fri 14:00 to 19:00, Sat to Sun 07:00 to 19:00Drinking hall: Mon to Tue closed, Wed 11:00 to 18:00, Thu closed, Fri 11:00 to 18:00, Sat to Sun closedThe full timetable by section, the cut-offs and when to come: opening hours guide.
Getting there
Trams 17, 19 and 41 stop at Szent Lukács Gyógyfürdő, right outside, about 2 minutes from the gate. Trams 4 and 6 and the H5 suburban railway stop at the Buda end of Margaret Bridge, about 5 minutes away.
Nearest stops
The entrance is set back from Frankel Leó út behind a gate and a courtyard, and it is easy to walk straight past. Every line, the walks and how to find the door: how to get there.
Before you go
- Bring a towel and slippers. Slippers are compulsory in the bath, and rental services are not available. Towels, bathrobes, swimsuits, caps and slippers are sold at the bath
- A swimming cap is needed in the two swimming pools, and nowhere else
- Shower with hot water and soap before and after the pools, and use the foot bath on the way in. Both are house rules, not suggestions
- Nobody under 14 is admitted, to any part of the bath
- Pay by card. The shops, bars and buffet inside take no cash, and the bath accepts SZÉP cards from OTP, MKB and K&H
- Massages are extra, from the age of 14, and the bath books them with a bath ticket
- Valuables go in the safe. The bath takes no responsibility for anything left in a locker or a cabin
Accessibility
- The accessible changing facilities are out of use for renovation works, which is the bath’s only published statement about access. Anyone who needs them should wait until it says they are back
- The building is old and on several levels, with stairs between the sections, so do not count on a step-free route through it
- The tram stop is at the door. Trams 17, 19 and 41 stop on Frankel Leó út, about 2 minutes from the gate
- Medical treatments are a separate service, booked in person at the patient desk on weekdays
Pools and saunas
Everything below comes with a day ticket, except the Sauna World, which takes a ticket of its own. The bath warns that pool temperatures can differ from the published ones when something technical is going on.
Start in the indoor medicinal pools
The covered thermal section holds three medicinal pools at 32, 36 and 40°C, all about 90 centimetres deep, so you sit rather than swim. This is the oldest-feeling part of the bath: stone pillars, tiled walls and a bronze figure in a niche above the water.
Work up rather than straight into the 40°C pool, and cool off in the Kneipp pool, a shallow 20°C channel you walk through for the shock on your feet. Two more pools sit in the same section, a medical fitness pool and an underwater traction pool, and neither is open to visitors, because both need a medical referral.
Give the courtyard adventure pool an hour
The adventure pool is the best-known pool at Lukács and the one most people spend their afternoon in. It runs at 33 to 35°C all year, winter included, and it is a metre or so deep, with bubble beds, neck showers and back massagers built into the sides.
The part that is easy to miss is the circular channel around the middle, where the current carries you round. It is the most fun in the building and people walk past it looking for the massage jets.
The pool dates from 1999, when the old mud pond was rebuilt, so this is the modern half of a very old bath.
Swim in the cooler courtyard pools
A level up, in a second courtyard, are two swimming pools at 22 and 26°C. They were rebuilt in the same 1999 works and they are properly cool water, which is what makes Lukács the sensible bath in a Budapest heatwave when everything thermal feels like too much.
A swimming cap is compulsory here, and staff hold the line on it. Caps are sold at the bath, not hired, and they are not always in stock, so bring your own if a swim is the point of your visit.
By the pool is a plaque to the artists and writers who used the bath, which is the closest Lukács comes to showing off.
Work through four saunas, then decide about the Sauna World
Four come with the basic ticket: a Finnish sauna at 80 to 90°C, a steam chamber at 40 to 50°C, a dry steam chamber at 60 to 90°C and a herbal sauna at 60 to 62°C. For most visits that is plenty.
The Sauna World is the separate one, on its own ticket, and the bath is blunt about the rule. It is a bathing-suit-free zone. A salt crystal sauna, an aroma steam room, an infrared sauna, a Finnish sauna, a naturist sauna and a tepidarium sit inside. Bring your own sheet or towel, because you are required to have something to sit on and nothing is hired here either.
Sauna programmes run on Tuesdays and at weekends, for a small extra charge.
Drink the water in the drinking hall, two days a week
The drinking hall opens on Wednesdays and Fridays only, from 11:00 to 18:00, and it is a proper piece of old spa culture: marble columns, tall windows and taps of medicinal water poured into a glass.
The bath describes the water as a calcium and magnesium hydrogen-carbonate medicinal water, also carrying sodium, sulphate, chloride and a significant amount of fluoride, and lists it for digestive, respiratory, urinary and bone conditions. It puts a single recommended dose at 300 to 350 millilitres and says to ask your doctor before starting a drinking cure. You can drink it there or take it away.
How a visit to Lukács works
Find the gate on Frankel Leó út
The bath is invisible from the street. Look for the iron gate and the courtyard of plane trees between the yellow wings, with the door under the sign at the back. The tram stop outside carries the bath’s name, which is the landmark to use.
Buy or swap your ticket at the desk
The cash desks are in the entrance hall, and they close an hour before the bath does. Budapest Card holders show the card here rather than online.
Take the proxy watch, then a locker or a cabin
Your ticket is a watch you wear. A locker comes as standard, so pick a free one and tap the watch on the door to claim it, one locker per watch. A cabin is the paid upgrade, and its number appears on the wall terminals.
Slippers on, shower, then the water
Slippers everywhere, a hot shower with soap before and after, and the foot bath on the way to the pools. The pool areas have to be cleared 20 minutes before closing.
Insider tips
Tuesday is the one late night
Lukács takes Tuesday in the operator’s rota of baths open until 22:00, and it is the only evening of the week you can come after dinner. Every other day the doors close at 19:00, and the cash desks an hour before that.
Bring the cap, not just the towel
The swimming pools are the only place a cap is compulsory, and they are also the reason many people come in summer. Caps are sold at the bath rather than hired, and visitors have turned up to find none in stock.
Leave the cash at the hotel
Inside the bath the shops, the bars and the Lukács Espresso Bar take bank cards and top-up cards only. The buffet does toasted sandwiches and hot dogs, so you do not need to go out for lunch.
Ask about the sauna programme
Aufguss sessions run on Tuesdays and at weekends, at a small extra charge, and the bath does not always hold them. The desk has the day’s times, and the bath answers by email if you want them before you travel.
Other thermal baths in Budapest
Rudas is the Ottoman bath at the Buda end of Elisabeth Bridge, with single-sex Turkish-bath days and night bathing at the weekend, and trams 19 and 41 run there from the stop outside Lukács. Széchenyi in City Park is the big one with the grand courtyard and the crowds.
Gellért is closed for rebuilding until 2028. If you are choosing between the rest, or travelling with children, start with our thermal baths round-up.
Nearby attractions
The bath sits in Felhévíz, between the river and the hillside, with Margaret Island over the bridge, two pieces of Ottoman Budapest and a flooded cave all within a few minutes’ walk.
Margaret Island
About 13 minutes on foot by the spur off Margaret Bridge, for the park, the gardens and the running track.
Veli Bej Bath
About 4 minutes north, an Ottoman bath of the mid-1570s inside the Hospitaller Brothers’ hospital, restored and much quieter than Lukács.
Tomb of Gül Baba
About 6 minutes’ walk, and a climb, up Gül Baba utca. The octagonal tomb of an Ottoman dervish, in a rose garden with a view over the river.
Molnár János Cave
About 3 minutes away on Frankel Leó út. The flooded cave the bath’s water comes from, dived by trained divers rather than visited.
History
The site has been used for healing since the 12th century, and almost nothing you walk through is that old. The short version:
- 12th century
Knights of the Order of Saint John settle at the springs to treat the sick, followed by the orders of Rhodes and Malta.
- Ottoman rule
The bath keeps working, but the energy of the springs goes mostly into gunpowder and grinding wheat.
- After 1686
Buda is retaken and the bath becomes the property of the Treasury.
- 1884
Fülöp Palotay buys the bath from the Treasury and rebuilds it, with a spa hotel and a hydrotherapy department.
- 1937
The drinking cure hall is built.
- 1979
Hungary’s first complex balneological day hospital opens here.
- 1999
The open-air pools are modernised, and the old mud pond becomes the adventure pool.
- 2023
An energy project adds 129 solar panels and replaces 170 square metres of windows.
The knights, the gunpowder mills and the marble tablets: history of Lukács Thermal Bath.