Every one of these is built backwards from six o'clock, because that is when the Kecak and Fire Dance starts and the seating is first come, first served.
The most-booked evening on this coast. A private car from the afternoon, the six o'clock performance and seafood on the sand, with a cap of six travellers.
From $31 per person
Free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead.
Both tickets already bought and a guide at the entrance. Two hours, no vehicle, and the one seat that runs out on busy nights is already yours.
From $28 per person
Free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead.
A whole day down the peninsula that finishes at the same six o'clock curtain, with temple and dance entry inside the lowest per-person fare of anything on this coast.
From $20 per person
Free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead.
Every ticket and the meal in one price, with two hours at Jimbaran afterwards. Vegetarian and non-seafood menus if you say so when you book.
From $65 per person
Free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead.
Eight stops along the southern coast before the clifftop, capped at ten travellers and needing two. The dance ticket and the food are named as extras rather than inclusions.
From $76 per person
Free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead.
Two unhurried hours at the temple before the light goes, longer than any other evening allows, with the Kecak seat and the Jimbaran dinner offered as booking options rather than assumed.
From $45 per person
Free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead.
The performance the sunset lands in, with the ticket bought before you arrive.
Check availabilityIt is a day timed against a performance rather than against opening hours. The Kecak and Fire Dance is staged at 18:00 in an open-air amphitheatre cut into the cliff beside the temple, it runs about an hour, and the seating is unreserved. Everything else on these trips is arranged so that you are in a seat before it starts.
What you watch is a chorus of men chanting the rhythm with no gamelan behind them at all, telling the Ramayana around a ring of fire. It was created in the 1930s by the Balinese dancer Wayan Limbak with the German painter Walter Spies. They adapted a trance ritual for an audience, which makes it genuinely Balinese and genuinely modern at the same time.
You get two performances, at 18:00 and 19:00. The sun sets between about 18:08 in May and 18:46 in January, so it always goes down during the first and never during the second. Booking the evening rather than turning up is how you avoid being sold the later one.
Temple admission is never a problem; the box office beside the amphitheatre is. It opens in the late afternoon and sells out on busy nights, so a trip that holds your seat takes that risk off you entirely.
Arriving at four rather than half past five buys you the northern arm of the path in falling light. Most of the crowd is already walking the other way toward the seats.
Most of these finish at Jimbaran Bay, where the seafood grills put your table directly onto the beach. Which fares actually cover that meal varies more than the titles suggest.
| Sunset visit | Morning visit | |
|---|---|---|
| Crowd | Heaviest of the day from 16:30 | Close to empty at 07:00 |
| The performance | Yes, 18:00 or 19:00 | None |
| Light on the cliff | Low and warm, behind the temple | Behind you, across the ocean |
| Heat | Falling | Rising, no shade on the path |
| Macaques | Active and practised | Quieter |
| The drive | Slow both ways | Clear both ways |
| Cost | Entry plus a dance seat | Entry only |
See the evening trips above Compare every Uluwatu Temple tickets option
You get the timing solved, which is the whole product. Most of these fares also cover temple admission and the dance seat, and several add hotel pickup, a driver-guide for the afternoon and dinner at Jimbaran.
What you do not automatically get is that dinner. One listing here sells the evening on the strength of Jimbaran Bay and then names food and drinks among its exclusions, alongside the Kecak ticket. Its card says so, and so does this sentence, because it is the single easiest thing to get wrong on this coast.
Work backwards. A seat needs you in the amphitheatre by about half past four, and the cliff path needs an hour before that, so aim to be through the gate at four. From Seminyak that means leaving by two, and from Ubud earlier still.
Add half an hour in the wet season and in July and August. Sunset times for every month are on the weather page, and journey times on the map.
Anyone whose interest is the temple rather than the performance. Uluwatu at seven in the morning is close to empty, the light comes from behind you, and the macaques have not started work. It costs the gate fee alone, and nothing here sells it, because there is nothing to sell.
Anyone travelling with a very young child should weigh the 19:00 finish and the drive after it. It is manageable, and the timings that make it work are set out in the Uluwatu with kids post. If you want beaches and the statue as well as the clifftop, the full day down the peninsula is the better shape. The itinerary guide plans it hour by hour, and the fares are compared on Uluwatu Tours.
The one show the sunset lands in, with the seat held and the drive handled.
Check availability