Sihanoukville

Cambodia's main coastal city and the gateway to the country's best beach islands, with around 200,000 people on the Gulf of Thailand. The relaxed backpacker resort it once was turned, between 2017 and 2020, into a casino town: Chinese investment put up more than a hundred casinos, concrete façades, many of them half-built and abandoned. Today Sihanoukville is mostly a transit point — most travellers head straight out to Koh Rong or Koh Rong Sanloem. Check the current situation before you travel.

The main sights

• Otres Beach — Sihanoukville's best beach, and the one that has kept something of the old easy-going resort feel.
• Serendipity Beach — the main tourist beach, now heavily altered by development.
• Sokha Beach — the private beach behind the Sokha hotel; you pay to get in, but it is the cleanest in town.
• Independence Beach — the original beach, ringed by hotels and pleasant enough for a walk.
• Koh Rong — the main beach island, 30 minutes away by fast ferry, with 43 km of coastline and more than twenty beaches, plus bioluminescent plankton that lights the water at night.
• Koh Rong Sanloem — the neighbouring island, quieter and prettier, with the best beaches at Saracen Bay and M'Pai Bay.
• Koh Ta Kiev — an uninhabited island with beautiful lagoons, the wildest option of the lot.
• Ream National Park — mangroves, monkeys and beaches, 17 km from the centre.
• Wat Leu (the Upper Pagoda) — a Buddhist temple on a hill, with a view over the town.
• Wat Krom (the Lower Pagoda) — another Buddhist temple, this one by the sea.
• Otres Market — the main tourist market, with craft stalls.
• Kep — the neighbouring seaside town two hours away, with its crab market (it has its own page, along with Kampot).

Food and prices

The cooking is Khmer and coastal: crab with green pepper (a Kampot speciality, easily found in Sihanoukville), amok, lok lak, grilled fish and tropical fruit. Lunch in a café is $5–10, dinner in a restaurant $12–30, fresh lobster $15–25. Petrol is about $1 a litre and a tuk-tuk across town $2–5. Prices are as of 2026. Cambodia uses the riel, but almost everything is quoted in US dollars.

Transport

Sihanoukville International Airport (KOS) has limited service from Cambodia Angkor Air and AirAsia. From Phnom Penh it is a four-hour bus ($10–15). Around the area you use tuk-tuks or a scooter at $7–10 a day. Ferries to Koh Rong and Koh Rong Sanloem take 30 minutes and cost $20–30 return, run by Speed Ferry Cambodia and Buva Sea.

When to go

November to March is dry, 25–32°C, and ideal. April and May bring extreme heat, 35–38°C. In the rainy season (June–October) downpours are short but heavy and island ferries can be cancelled. One caveat worth repeating: Sihanoukville has changed beyond recognition through Chinese development, and many travellers now go straight to the islands, or to Kampot and Kep instead.