Hotels near Lisbon Oceanarium, Lisbon

The Oceanarium is amazing, we spent over 3 hours there without getting bored for a minute. But the restaurant is ridiculously expensive, you can go in the nearby shopping center for great choice of food including local food, for quarter of this price.

Not a fan usually of encaptured animals but this has so much room for the species it is really interesting and although the cafeteria needs way more staff, the people caring for the fish and mammals are obviously caring and knowledgeable about their 'inmates'. Watch out for groups of families and children as they can be incredibly noisy, but maybe that is just me!

It is a must see for families with young kids. Our favorite animals were the otters chilling on their backs. The oceanarium itself is amazing with a lot of diverse animals and climates. Outdoors, there is a nice park. the kids enjoyed running around and wanted to go on the cable cars but we ran out of time.

From the outside it looks small and strange: a cube with weird protrusions on the corners. From the inside: an amazing large 2-story square tank with several creative animal exhibits around it. This is not the type of aquarium that tries to hit all the "favorites" and same old bland types of exhibits. They actually choose some nice unique experiences with a logical flow guiding you on the journey. I loved seeing the sea otter play, the puffins dive underwater, and the terns flying around the outside exhibits. The large tank features different types of manta rays, guitar fish, lots of sharks of course, big schools of fish, and two huge sunfish. There are many thoughtfully designed nooks to sit and experience being "under water." There is a natural flow walking through the aquarium. The gift shop is almost all items specifically formatted for the aquarium, most of them from eco-materials. You won't find bins with thousands of lame plastic toys here. Great experience and fair price. Someone really sat down and re-imagined the aquarium experience. Buy tickets online to skip the lines. As an unexpected surprise, they had a temporary freshwater aquascaping exhibit.

This is well worth the trip. Possibly try and go early and buy ticket ahead if your visiting on the weekend or summer. The aquarium is well laid out. I loved that the tanks although separate appeared as though all the fish and otters were in the same tank. You must see it

If you haven’t been to a good aquarium before, do visit. I have the 2 Oceans Aquarium on my doorstep in Cape Town which is superior imo. However, the superb Takashi Amano temporary exhibition was excellent and made my visit worthwhile. Beautiful planted waterscapes and compelling music.