Berlin offers lively nightlife, many cafes, clubs, and bars and for its numerous museums, palaces, and other sites of historic interest.

Although badly damaged in the final years of World War II and broken apart during the Cold War, Berlin has reconstructed itself greatly, especially with the reunification push after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. It is now possible to see representatives of many different historic periods in a short time within the city center, from a few surviving medieval buildings near Alexanderplatz, to the ultramodern glass and steel structures in Potsdamer Platz. Because of its tumultuous history, Berlin remains a city with many distinctive neighborhoods.

In Berlin there is more than one downtown area. Berlin has many boroughs or districts, called Bezirke, and each borough has its distinctive style. Each Bezirk is composed of several Kieze—a Berlin term referring to "neighbourhood," with their unique style. Some boroughs of Berlin, as noted below, are more worthy of a visitor's attention than others.