Klaipėda is Lithuania's most distinctive city. As the country's only seaport, it faces the Baltic rather than inland. For centuries it was neither Lithuanian nor Polish but German: it was called Memel and was the northernmost city in East Prussia. That Germanic past shows in its old town of half-timbered houses (Fachwerk), in the layout of its streets and in a Central European feel you won't find in Vilnius or Kaunas. It's a practical port city with real character, and it tells a very particular Baltic story.
Beyond the city itself, Klaipėda is above all a gateway. From its shore, a short ferry ride takes you to Smiltynė, at the northern tip of the Curonian Spit (Kuršių nerija). The spit is a strip of sand almost a hundred kilometres long, shared with Russia, covered in giant dunes and pine forests, and listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Trips to Nida, Juodkrantė and the spit's beaches are nearly always organised from here, which makes Klaipėda the natural base for the whole Lithuanian coast.
This guide takes a practical look at Klaipėda: how to get there by train from Vilnius, what to see in the old town and the port, how to catch the ferry to the Curonian Spit and how to plan your days by the sea. Many people only pass through on their way to the dunes, but the city deserves at least a day of its own. That's enough to discover its Theatre Square, sculpture park and castle, and the unusual mix of cultures (Lithuanian, German, Prussian) that makes it unique in the country.
The Teutonic Order founded Klaipėda in 1252 under the name Memelburg. For almost seven centuries it was a German city and a prosperous Baltic port, the northernmost in Prussia and later in the German Empire. Only in 1923, after the First World War, did Lithuania annex the Memel region through an armed revolt, and it was renamed Klaipėda. In 1939 Nazi Germany took it back by force, and after the Second World War it became part of Soviet Lithuania as its main port. Since independence was restored in 1990, it has been the country's third-largest city, a key Baltic port and the gateway to the Curonian Spit. The full story is on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The Lithuanian Baltic and Lithuania Minor with its German roots: the port of Klaipėda (the former Memel), the dunes of the Curonian Spit that Thomas Mann loved, the beaches and amber of Palanga, and wooded Samogitia.
Read the history of The coast: Klaipėda, Nida and Palanga →If you book from here we earn a commission and you pay no more. Prices and availability come from Civitatis.
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Origins, formation and what the sources say.
Klaipėda's history begins with a crusader fortress. In 1252 the Teutonic Order, the Christian military order that dominated the southern Baltic, built a castle at the mouth of the Danė River, where the Curonian Lagoon meets the sea. They called it Memelburg, and the town of Memel grew up around it. It was a highly strategic spot: it controlled the entrance to the lagoon, the trade route inland and the border with the lands of the Baltic peoples not yet subdued, the Curonians and the Samogitians.
Over the following centuries Memel was a fortified frontier town. It was contested and attacked several times by the pagan Lithuanians, who stubbornly resisted the Order's advance. The town received municipal rights (traditionally said to be Lübeck law) and joined the Baltic trade network. Its frontier position, however, kept it a small military town for a long time rather than a great port.
The Teutonic Order declined, and in 1525 it became the secular Duchy of Prussia, so Memel became part of Prussia. It was now part of the German-speaking, Protestant world and the northernmost town of that state. These Prussian origins would shape its character for the next four centuries: Memel would be a German town on the Baltic, distinct and separate from the Lithuanian world that surrounded it inland.
As part of Prussia, Memel grew into a thriving port, the northernmost in the kingdom and, from 1871, in the unified German Empire. Life revolved around the sea and trade. Timber from the inland forests, Baltic amber, grain and other goods left through its port for the rest of Europe. Most of the town's population was German, with a large community of Prussian Lithuanians (the 'lietuvininkai') in the surrounding region, and it had a mercantile, Protestant character.
Memel saw some remarkable episodes. In the early 19th century, during the Napoleonic Wars, Napoleon occupied Berlin, and for a short time the town became the de facto capital of the Kingdom of Prussia. King Frederick William III and Queen Louise took refuge here in 1807-1808, and important reforms of the Prussian state were signed in Memel. For a few months it was the most important corner of Germany.
The town grew, with warehouses, shipyards and a Prussian-style street plan that you can still make out in the old town. It was also the birthplace of figures of German culture, such as the 17th-century poet Simon Dach, who is honoured today by the Ännchen von Tharau fountain. In short, for centuries Memel was a German town on the Baltic, apart from the history of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth unfolding inland.
The First World War changed Memel's fate. After Germany's defeat, the 1919 Treaty of Versailles separated the Memel Territory (the strip north of the Neman River) from the German Empire. It placed the territory under League of Nations administration, with French troops as the occupying force. Its future was up in the air: Germany had lost it, but it wasn't clear who it would belong to.
The newly founded Republic of Lithuania claimed the territory because of its rural Lithuanian population and its vital need for a seaport, and decided not to wait. In January 1923, in what became known as the Klaipėda Revolt, Lithuanian forces entered the territory, drove out the international administration and proclaimed union with Lithuania. The rising was presented as a local uprising by Prussian Lithuanians but was really organised and backed by the government in Kaunas. Faced with a fait accompli, the Great Powers eventually recognised the annexation. In 1924 the Memel Territory became an autonomous region of Lithuania, and the city was renamed Klaipėda.
It was a turning point: for the first time in its history the old German town of Memel became Lithuanian, and Lithuania gained its only access to the sea. Even so, the city kept a strong German character and a large German population. Relations between this German-speaking urban majority and the new Lithuanian authorities stayed tense throughout the interwar years, as nationalism took a growing hold on Europe.
Klaipėda's Lithuanian period was short. In a Europe dominated by Nazi Germany's expansion, Adolf Hitler set his sights on the mostly German Memel Territory. In March 1939, a few days after occupying Czechoslovakia and months before invading Poland, Germany issued an ultimatum to Lithuania demanding the return of the region. With no international support and facing the threat of invasion, the Lithuanian government had to give in. On 23 March 1939 Hitler arrived in Klaipėda on a warship and, according to tradition, gave a speech from the balcony of the city theatre. Memel was German once again.
It was one of the last Nazi annexations before the outbreak of the Second World War. For Lithuania it meant losing its only port, and it was a humiliating blow. During the war the city was part of the Reich, and its Lithuanian and Jewish residents suffered persecution and death. In 1944-1945, as the Red Army advanced, the region saw fierce fighting and a mass exodus of the German population. Much of old Memel was destroyed, and the city was almost entirely emptied of its former German inhabitants.
This double upheaval, the end of German Memel and the destruction of the war, abruptly closed nearly seven centuries of German history. The city that would rise from the ruins was a different one: Soviet, Lithuanian and resettled, with its German past now a silent layer beneath the new reality.
After the Second World War, Klaipėda became part of the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic, within the USSR. The city was almost empty after its German population fled or was expelled. It was resettled with Lithuanians from the rest of the country and with migrants from Russia and other Soviet republics. Its German past was silenced or reinterpreted, and many German traces disappeared, such as the large cemetery that became today's sculpture park.
Under Soviet rule, Klaipėda developed mainly as a port. It became the main seaport of Soviet Lithuania and a major fishing and industrial base, with shipyards, a deep-sea fishing fleet and large factories. The city grew with new housing estates of apartment blocks for workers, and its population multiplied. The port is ice-free almost all year round, which made it a strategic asset in the Soviet Baltic economy.
This port and industrial role defined modern Klaipėda. At the same time, the city's identity was complex: Lithuanian, but with its German past erased; Soviet, but facing the sea and the West. When independence came, it would have to rework all these layers (Prussian, interwar Lithuanian, Soviet) to build its present-day identity.
When Lithuania regained its independence in 1990, Klaipėda entered a new era. Freed from the constraints of the Soviet system, its port modernised and became one of the most important in the eastern Baltic. It drives the economy of the city and the country, with cargo terminals, international ferries to Germany and Sweden, and a growing cruise trade. Today Klaipėda is Lithuania's third-largest city and its main window on the sea.
The city has also been reconnecting with its past. Old German Memel, silenced for so long, is now embraced as part of its identity. The restored half-timbered houses, the Ännchen von Tharau fountain, the museums of Lithuania Minor history and of the castle, and the recognition of the Prussian Lithuanian heritage are all part of how Klaipėda tells its story today. The city presents itself as a unique crossroads of cultures on the coast: Lithuanian, German and Baltic.
For travellers, Klaipėda today is two things at once. It's a port city with its own character, with its old town, its river, its sculpture park and its Sea Festival. And it's the gateway to the Curonian Spit, the natural treasure of the Lithuanian coast, whose dunes and forests are a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Understanding its history, that of a city that was German for seven centuries and Lithuanian only in the last one, is the best way to see its old town with fresh eyes.
