Styria, Austria

State guide with cities, regions, and key information.

AustriaEurope
Introduction
Styria (Steiermark) is Austria's second-largest federal state by area and the country's self-styled 'green heart' — sixty per cent forested, threaded by the Mur and Enns river systems, sliding from the Northern Limestone Alps and the Dachstein massif in the north-west to the Pannonian-influenced thermal-and-wine belt in the south-east. The state capital Graz, with its UNESCO World Heritage old town and Schloss Eggenberg, is the second-largest city in Austria after Vienna. A single state holds the Schladming-Dachstein ski region with its glacier and World Cup downhill stages, the Lipizzaner stud farm at Piber that supplies the Vienna Spanish Riding School, the Riegersburg medieval fortress, the Mariazell pilgrimage basilica that has drawn central European pilgrims for over eight centuries, and the South Styrian Wine Road that traces the rolling vineyards along the Slovenian border. Styria also produces some of Austria's most distinctive food and drink — pumpkinseed oil (Steirisches Kürbiskernöl, EU-protected), Schilcher rosé, Vulcano dry-cured ham, and the Sulmtaler chicken — that anchor a regional cuisine widely treated as Austria's most distinctive.

Discover Styria

Graz, the Styrian capital and Austria's second-largest city, has the country's largest preserved medieval and Renaissance old town — a UNESCO World Heritage site since 1999, extended in 2010 to include Schloss Eggenberg on the city's western edge. The Hauptplatz, dominated by the Italianate town hall and the Renaissance Landhaus arcaded courtyard, anchors a city compact enough to walk in a morning yet dense enough in cafés, bookshops, and arcades to absorb several days. The Schlossberg, a forested rock outcrop in the centre, holds the medieval clock tower (Uhrturm) — Graz's iconic landmark, with its hour-and-minute hands reversed since the 1560s — and is reached by the Schlossbergbahn funicular, a glass lift cut into the rock, or a covered staircase. Schloss Eggenberg, three kilometres west of the centre, was built from 1625 by north-Italian architect Pietro de Pomis for Hans Ulrich von Eggenberg as a calendrical-cosmological palace: 365 windows, twenty-four state rooms (one per hour), 52 doors per floor, all centred on the Planetary Room with over five hundred ceiling paintings. The surrounding Romantic landscape garden, with peacocks and a maze, is one of Austria's finest historical parks.

Travel Types

Graz Renaissance & UNESCO Heritage

UNESCO old town with the Renaissance Landhaus arcades, Schlossberg clock tower, the Italian-baroque Hauptplatz, the Murinsel and Kunsthaus 'Friendly Alien' on the river, and the co-listed Schloss Eggenberg with its 365-window cosmological design and Planetary Room ceiling paintings — Austria's largest preserved medieval-and-Renaissance city ensemble.

Schladming-Dachstein Alpine & Ski

Four-mountain Ski Amadé connection (Planai, Hauser Kaibling, Reiteralm, Hochwurzen) with FIS Ski World Cup races and the floodlit Schladming Nightrace, plus the Dachstein glacier Sky Walk and ice palace at 2,700 metres, Gesäuse National Park white-water gorges, and the Erzberg iron mountain at Eisenerz.

Vulkanland Thermal Spas & the Riegersburg

Friedensreich Hundertwasser's Bad Blumau spa with grass-roofed colourful pavilions, the giant Loipersdorf complex, baroque Bad Radkersburg on the Slovenian border, and the medieval Riegersburg fortress on its 482-metre basalt plug — supplemented by Vulcano dry-cured Mangalitza ham from the volcanic-soil pastures.

South Styrian Wine Roads & Schilcher

Südsteirische Weinstraße rolling through Sauvignon Blanc, Morillon, and Welschriesling vineyards along the Slovenian border with Buschenschank wine taverns and timber Klapotetz wind-rattles, plus the Schilcherland West Styria region with its indigenous Blauer Wildbacher rosé and the Vinofaktur Vogau curated Styrian-wine showcase.

Lipizzaner Stud & Equestrian Heritage

Lipizzanergestüt Piber breeds the white stallions of the Spanish Riding School in Vienna — visitors tour the stud farm, the breeding barns, and the Alpine pastures where mares and foals spend the summer months, with seasonal stallion-presentation 'Ladies' Days' and a Saint Hubertus mass each November.

Pumpkinseed Oil, Backhendl & Styrian Cuisine

Steirisches Kürbiskernöl PGI dark-green pumpkinseed oil — Styria's signature export — alongside Vulcano dry-cured ham, the Pöllauer Hirschbirne pear, the indigenous Sulmtaler chicken breed, Backhendlsalat fried-chicken salad, Buschenschank brettljause cold platters, and the Sterz polenta tradition that anchor what is widely treated as Austria's most distinctive regional cuisine.

Styria — Practical Travel Notes
  • •Graz is the most usual base for both visa-related travel and tourism — Hauptbahnhof connects to Vienna (Railjet, 2h40), Klagenfurt (Koralm Tunnel, under 1h once fully open), Linz, and Maribor in Slovenia within day-trip range.
  • •Schladming-Dachstein winter season runs roughly mid-December to mid-April, with the Dachstein glacier accessible year-round but with restricted hours outside ski season — check cable-car operating windows before travelling, especially in shoulder seasons.
  • •The Schladming Nightrace (men's FIS Ski World Cup slalom in late January) draws the largest single-night crowd in Alpine racing — accommodation books out a year ahead and prices triple on race weekend.
  • •Schloss Eggenberg's State Rooms are accessible only on guided tours (English available with prior booking) — buy combined tickets including the Planetary Room and the Romantic landscape garden, and arrive at the Eggenberg tram terminus early to avoid afternoon coach groups.
  • •The Riegersburg medieval fortress is reachable by foot (steep, twenty minutes), inclined elevator, or chairlift — the chairlift saves the climb but closes in winter weather. Allow three hours for the witches' museum, the weapons collection, and the falconry-display arena.
  • •Steirisches Kürbiskernöl is widely counterfeited internationally — buy bottles inside Styria with the holographic Steirisches-Kürbiskernöl-g.g.A. seal, or directly from a Buschenschank wine tavern, to avoid blended imitations.
  • •Buschenschank wine taverns operate seasonally on a rotating schedule (ausg'steckt) signalled by a pine branch over the door — many open for two-to-three week windows, then close while another producer in the village opens. The South Styrian Tourism Board publishes the current ausg'steckt rota online.
  • •Schilcher rosé is almost unknown outside Austria — for the strongest expression of the style, taste in West Styria's Schilcherland (Stainz, Deutschlandsberg) rather than buying mass-produced bottles in supermarkets.
  • •The Lipizzaner stud farm at Piber operates daily tours from late March to early November — tours are run in German with English audio guides; the summer Alpine-pasture tours to the Stubalpe (where the foals live) require advance booking and run only in July and August.
  • •Bad Blumau and Loipersdorf thermal spas accept day-pass walk-ins but on weekends and Austrian school holidays sell out by midday — book in advance, particularly for the steam-and-sauna sections.
  • •Styria operates in Austrian German with strong Styrian-dialect inflections in rural areas; English is universally spoken in tourism, hotels, and Graz urban contexts. Greeting is 'Grüß Gott' or, in deeper Styrian, 'Guten Tag' more often than 'Hallo'.
  • •The Mur Cycle Path (Murradweg) is well-signposted and largely flat through Styria — bicycle rental is available at most stations along the route, and luggage-transfer services between accommodation make multi-day cycling unencumbered.
Cities in Styria

1 city with detailed travel information

Graz