El Jem – Tunisia’s Grand Colosseum
Years ago, when I was very much into travel and had major dreams of seeing the world, I stumbled across a photo of a massive amphitheater. I think I had been on a string of finding roman ruins in the North African countries i.e. Leptis Magna in Libya, which was a no-go zone anyway. I had to put that one on a pause. This one was different though. It was somewhere accessible, as large as the one in Rome, and seemingly rising out of nowhere. That image stuck with me for many years till now.
And finally in April 2025, almost 8 years since first knowing about this place, I was fortunate to visit.
El Jem is everything I imagined—and more. A huge, towering, untouched relic with no crowds, no ropes, just yourself, the sun-soaked stone, and a view into the ancient Roman life. You can feel the same intensity that the gladiators must have felt when fighting on the arena floor.
The colosseum itself is made of giant stones with no mortar or concrete, which makes it impressive as it has three different stories, and an underground tunnel system that held gladiators, animals, and criminals when in use. Hundreds of the arches are still locked together via gravity and a tenuous compression that holds them in place. One half of the building still remains much in tact, while the other side has the seating reconstructed but missing the older outer ring structure. Much of the outer wall remains in tact though.
Furthermore, the nearest quarry is over 30km away, making construction an even more difficult process.
With its grand size, you can only imagine how strong of a political and economic hub this city was to the romans. It is the third biggest colosseum in the world.
They estimate the capacity to be that of some 30,000 people.
We were some of the few people visiting and I can only imagine going to the one in Rome packed to the brim with other tourists.
It’s quite unreal to see in person.
There is a small 12 dinar entrance fee but this gives you access to El Jem Museum, which holds hundreds of beautiful artifacts and well preserved mosaics. And when visiting, you can leave your bags at one of the gate side restaurants that are right in front of the entrance. They’ll hold your bag till you come back and afterwards you can enjoy a nice meal with the colosseum in the backdrop.
Everywhere you point your camera, there’s a good view.
It was worth of an Instax Camera pic as well. I carry this almost everywhere I go when travelling and all the photos come out so well, especially at the most premier sites.
This one is the new Instax Wide 400, which has a built in self-timer, and they removed the motor that changed the focal length. This is a major improvement because now the camera can be manually turned on and it doesn’t break if you leave it in the bag and the power button is accidentally touched.
I still enjoy my Canon DSLR though, although using a smaller camera would help lighted the load.
It’s hard to capture it all. Here’s some close ups of the walls and stonework. Further down is the ground view looking up to the top level seating.
There’s a lower level tunnel area that you can also climb down to. There are some chambers that would have held wild animals and people before the shows.
So overall, El Jem is one of the most impressive sights you’ll see in Tunisia. From here, we made our way over to Sfax to get to the next part of our Tunisia trip.
Location:
El Jem is about 3 hours from Tunis and can be reached easily by train, louage or bus. You can check the train schedule on www.sncft.com.tn but it’s always best to go to the train station and ask the ticket operators to know when it is running that day. Buses are a good second option as they drive more carefully compared to louages. If you take the shared mini van, then use the seatbelt as these drivers go super fast around in the traffic. After visiting, you can go further south to Monastir or Sousse or Sfax. Or you could easily go to Kairouan as well.
We took the louage from Tunis->Monastir->El Jem->Madhia->Sfax.
The amphitheater is only 10 minutes walk from the louage or train station so everything is quite close.
Also you will want to visit the El Jem Archaeological Museum which houses many complete Roman mosaics from the surrounding villae. These are some of the finest you’ll find in the world.
More Posts Here:
Our Exact Trip and Itinerary: Two Weeks in Tunisia
Explore the whole country: Your Travel Guide to Tunisia
Explore the South of Tunisia: A Visit to the Sahara and Dahar region.