Serengeti National Park

What the Serengeti is like

The Serengeti is enormous and mostly open. The name comes from a Maasai word for endless plains, and once you’ve stood on one of its granite outcrops, the kopjes, and watched the horizon flatten in every direction, the name makes sense. It’s also a genuine wilderness. Unlike some parks, big stretches are still empty of roads.

The park is the core of a system that includes Kenya’s Maasai Mara, the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and several game reserves. That whole ecosystem supports more than a million wildebeest, hundreds of thousands of zebras and gazelles, and the predators that follow them.

Where are the wildebeest right now?

The herds circle the ecosystem in a roughly clockwise loop, guided by rain and grass. Timing shifts each year, but the general pattern holds:

• January to March: the southern plains and Ndutu. Most calves are born from late January to March.
• April to May: the herds move north through the central Serengeti as the long rains fall.
• June to July: the Western Corridor and the Grumeti River, where the first crossings occur.
• July to October: the north of the park, at the Mara River, including the famous crossings.
• November to December: the herds return south for the short rains.

Nobody can tell you the herds’ exact location weeks in advance. The migration calendar covers this in more detail.

Best regions for different trips

Seronera in the central Serengeti is the most accessible and good for lions and leopards year-round. The southern plains and Ndutu are best from December to March. The Western Corridor is a gamble but rewarding in June and early July. The north has fewer roads and camps, and it’s where you go from July to October.

Fees and costs

Tanzania National Parks (TANAPA) charges non-resident adults about US$82.60 per 24 hours in the Serengeti, including VAT, as of September 2026. Children aged 5 to 15 pay a reduced rate. Vehicle fees are extra, and payment for park fees is now made electronically rather than in cash at the gate. Lodges and camps vary widely, from budget tented camps to some of Africa’s most expensive properties. A mid-range Serengeti safari usually costs more per day than an equivalent trip in Kenya.

Getting there

Most visitors fly from Arusha or Kilimanjaro Airport to airstrips at Seronera, Ndutu, Kogatende and elsewhere. Flights take about an hour and a half and usually stop at more than one airstrip. By road, the drive from Arusha takes eight hours via Ngorongoro and the Naabi Hill gate, and is often combined with a night on the Ngorongoro rim.

Balloons and mobile camps

Balloon safaris depart from Seronera at dawn and finish with a bush breakfast. Mobile camps are set up seasonally and reposition to follow the herds, with a simpler but more immersive experience. Ask how many nights a mobile camp will stay in the same place. In migration season, a camp that stays put may be nowhere near the herds after a few days.