What to See in Charleroi, Belgium: Free Audio Guide

Charleroi is a city in Wallonia, Belgium, where industrial heritage meets contemporary culture, offering visitors a chance to explore former coal mines, Art Deco architecture, and vibrant museums. Neywo provides a free audio guide for Charleroi with 38 narrated places, letting you discover the city at your own pace.

What to see in Charleroi

Bois du Cazier

The Bois du Cazier in Marcinelle is a former coal mine that began operations in 1822. On 8 August 1956 a fire underground caused the Bois du Cazier disaster, claiming 262 lives, many of them Italian workers. Today the site preserves headframes, historic buildings, an Industrial Museum, a Glass Museum, a small woodland park, and the Remise à locomotives locomotive shed.

Cartier Castle

Located in Marchienne-au-Pont, Cartier Castle (also known as Château Bilquin-de Cartier) is a listed monument in Hainaut province.

Castle of Monceau-sur-Sambre

The Château de Monceau, or Castle of Monceau-sur-Sambre, stands in Monceau-sur-Sambre and is a listed example of Mosan Renaissance architecture, reflecting a Walloon building tradition.

Belfry of Charleroi

Rising in front of Place du Manège in the Ville-Haute, the Belfry of Charleroi was inaugurated in 1936. It is the most recent of Wallonia’s belfries, distinguished by its Art Deco style and reinforced‑concrete structure, and serves as a symbol of the Pays Noir.

Église protestante de Charleroi

This Protestant church is a classified site and offers a distinctive place of worship within the city.

Église Saint-Christophe de Charleroi

Situated beside the town hall and the belfry, Saint-Christophe Church is a Roman Catholic landmark that forms part of the central civic and religious setting around Charleroi’s main square.

Église Saint-Laurent de Couillet

The Church of Saint Lawrence in Couillet combines Romanesque and Gothic elements, with its oldest surviving parts dating back to the ninth century. It is included in Wallonia’s inventory of immovable heritage.

Musée des beaux-arts de Charleroi

Housed in the former gendarmerie barracks of the old Defeld barracks in the Upper Town, this municipal art museum sits beside the Blue Tower designed by Jean Nouvel, creating a dialogue between historic and contemporary architecture.

Coron d’Appaumée

In Ransart, the Coron d’Appaumée is a historic ensemble that belonged to the former Appaumée coal mine and dates from the early twentieth century. It is the only significant surviving trace of that industrial activity at the site and was classified as an architectural heritage monument in 1994.

BPS22

BPS22 is the art museum of Hainaut Province, set in a striking glass‑and‑iron industrial building that is a listed historic monument. It offers roughly 2,500 square metres of exhibition space and presents the Hainaut Province collection alongside contemporary artistic practices from Belgium and abroad.

Museum of Photography in Charleroi

Located in a former Carmelite convent in Mont-sur-Marchienne, the Museum of Photography has occupied the site since 1987 and was expanded in 2008 with a modern wing by Olivier Bastin. Covering 6,000 square metres, it is described as the largest photography museum in Europe.

Walking Hunters Museum

The Walking Hunters Museum (Musée des chasseurs à pieds) is installed in the Caporal Trésignies barracks, uniting a military setting with its museum collection.

Chapelle Saint-Ghislain

This small Catholic chapel in Dampremy preserves the surviving choir of a sixteenth‑century parish church dedicated to Saint Remi. It has been a protected monument since 1950.

Église de l’Immaculée Conception

Built between 1863 and 1866, this church serves as a Catholic parish church in Jumet, specifically in the Gohyssart district.

Brussels South Charleroi Airport

Situated in Gosselies, the northern part of Charleroi, Brussels South Charleroi Airport handled more than 10.5 million passengers in 2024, making it Belgium’s second busiest airport and the busiest passenger airport in Wallonia. It is a major hub for low‑cost carriers such as Ryanair, as well as TUI fly, Wizz Air and Pegasus Airlines, and its official codes are CRL (IATA) and EBCI (ICAO).

Explore Charleroi with Neywo

Neywo offers one walking tour and one bus route in Charleroi. The walking tour “Black Country Capital: From the Sambre to the Art Deco Belfry” covers 3.62 km, takes about 116 minutes and includes 11 narrated stops such as Immeuble De Heug, Place Verte, Place de la Digue, Eden Charleroi, Palais des Beaux Arts de Charleroi, BPS22, Place du Manège, the Belfry of Charleroi, église Saint-Christophe de Charleroi, the Walking Hunters Museum and the Musée des beaux-arts de Charleroi. The bus line “Bus 18: Across the Black Country, Couillet to the Synagogue” runs 7.7 km, lasts roughly 33 minutes and stops at Amicale Solvay, église Saint-Martin de Marcinelle, the Walking Hunters Museum, BPS22 and the Synagogue of Charleroi. As you reach each location, the app tells the story of that place, allowing you to move at your own pace with no group and no schedule. Narration is available in 11 languages.

To experience Charleroi’s sights with these guided stories, download Neywo and start your self‑guided exploration today.

For further travel ideas in the region, you might also enjoy visiting nearby Walloon cities such as Dinant, Liège, Mons, Namur, Rochefort or Tournai, and learn more about the Wallonia region and Belgium as a whole.