Four hours is where Ephesus stops being a queue and becomes a place. This is the version worth planning for.
Start at the Upper Gate at opening — 08:30 — if you possibly can.
08:30 — Upper Gate
You will have the site more or less to yourself until about ten.
08:40 — The upper city, properly
Twenty-five minutes rather than ten. The Odeon, the State Agora, and the corner behind the Odeon where the Prytaneion stood — the two great Artemis statues in the museum in Selçuk came out of that ground.
Then Domitian Square, the Memmius Monument and the Pollio Fountain at the head of the hill.
09:10 — Curetes Street, slowly
Forty minutes. Everything in the two-hour route, plus the covered pavements with their mosaic floors on the right-hand side, the Hercules Gate at the top, and the shopfronts behind the columns.
09:50 — The Terrace Houses
Forty-five minutes to an hour. Go in now, before the first groups reach the door. The case for the extra ticket is here; at four hours the answer is not in doubt.
10:50 — The Library of Celsus
You will arrive into the busiest hour. That is fine — sit on the steps of the agora gate opposite, let it move around you for ten minutes, then take the photograph.
11:20 — Marble Street and the theatre
An hour for both. Climb high in the theatre and stay there a while; it is the best view on the site and almost nobody sits down.
12:20 — Harbour Street, the Church of Mary, the Experience Museum
Walk to the end of Harbour Street and look at the plain. Then, on the way to the Lower Gate, the Church of Mary — where the Council of Ephesus met in 431 — and the Experience Museum, twenty minutes, already paid for.
Out by about 13:00
Which puts lunch in Selçuk at half past one and the Ephesus Archaeological Museum at three, if you want to make a day of it.
The variant nobody tells you about
If you have four hours and it is high summer, invert the whole thing: do the site from 16:00 to 20:00 instead. The groups have gone, the light is long, and the last hour on Curetes Street is the best hour of the day. The one cost is the Terrace Houses, whose ticket office closes at 18:00 — so go there first.
Is four hours too long at Ephesus?
No. Four hours is the first duration that fits the whole site, the Terrace Houses, a proper climb in the theatre and time to sit down.
What is the best time to start a half day at Ephesus?
08:30, at opening. In high summer the alternative is 16:00 to closing, with the Terrace Houses done first because their ticket office shuts at 18:00.
