Every article you’ll read calls the Manaslu Circuit Nepal’s last “hidden gem”. And this is true to a large extent.
However in the recent 2025 season, over 12,000 foreign trekkers walked into the Manaslu Conservation Area, which is up from around 2,000 just three years earlier… The short version of this article is that the Manaslu Circuit is 100% worth it, but the window to experience the Manaslu I did may be closing fast.
I trekked the full circuit over 13 days from Kathmandu to Kathmandu. I went in mid-May, guided, with porters, and took every side trip the route offers.
Below is my verdict, the four situations where I’d tell you to trek somewhere else, and what I think the road building in the Budhi Gandaki is taking away. If you want the day-by-day breakdown instead, that’s in my Manaslu Circuit itinerary.
Manaslu Circuit Review - the short answer
Yes, the Manaslu Circuit is worth it. It’s the trek I’d send someone on ahead of Everest Base Camp, but the trip I experienced is disappearing one kilometer of road at a time, so go now rather than in eight years.
What you’re paying for is five roadless days between Namrung and Bimthang that no other teahouse trek in Nepal can currently match, plus the Larkya La - one of the most stunning and most accessible high altitude passes in the Himalayas.
However you need to know that to do the Manaslu Circuit, you need to pay a mandatory guide and a mandatory agency, (roughly US$550–650 in permits and high-altitude insurance).
| Worth it if… | Not worth it if… |
|---|---|
| You want mountain villages that aren’t reshaped around tourism | You expect fine dining or champagne at altitude |
| You can go in April, May or late November | You can only go in peak October and solitude is the point |
| You’d rather pay more for fewer people | The gap between US$900 and US$1,500 decides your trip |
| You want the trek, not the trophy | You’re chasing a serious physical test or climb |
What makes the Manaslu Circuit worth it
It feels like the Khumbu before the Khumbu
The difference hit me on day one. No helicopters overhead every ten minutes, no bakeries, no espresso machines, no lodge signage in four languages. That's all nice, but after visiting the Khumbu several times before I saw the Manaslu, I now understand that a part of the magic that makes the Himalayas has disappeared.
Roughly 60,000 people trek to Everest Base Camp each year by most counts. Manaslu’s around 12,000 is a fifth of that, and almost all of them funnel through two short seasons.
The teahouses feel like someone’s home because they are. In Samagaun we stayed at the Norling Hotel, owned by Mingma Lama, the first person from the Gorkha district to summit Manaslu’s main peak. You eat in the family’s dining room. That’s a different experience from a 40-bed lodge on the Everest trail, where I've noticed you are now starting to feel more like a number than a guest, very different from the first time I trekked in the Himalayas in 2018.
Larkya La is a better pass day than anything on the EBC trail
The EBC is a magical trek, but unless you're doing the Three Passes circuit, you don't really get that "summit" goal in the itinerary.
And let me tell you, the Larkya La is one of the most stunning and rewarding passes I've crossed in the Himalayas.
We were up at 3:00 am at Dharamsala, porridge down by 3:15, and on the trail with headlamps by 3:30. We were first out of the lodges that morning, which meant breaking trail through fresh snow along the edge of the Larkya Glacier, which is not incredibly hard work, but it explains why we made the pass in just under three hours.
The last stretch before the top opens into a flat basin holding four frozen lakes. The prayer flags on the pass appear across it as colored specks long before you reach them. That’s the moment I remember, not the summit photo.
Thick cloud sat on the ascent the whole way up and only broke for a few minutes at the top. We shared it with maybe a dozen other trekkers.
Insurance for Trekking & Climbing in Nepal
Read the fine print– Most travel insurance companies void coverage as soon as you step over 5,000 m. That's why I use and recommend Global Rescue, as the best high-altitude trekking insurance (no altitude caps).
The descent into Bimthang is one of the best trekking days I’ve had in Nepal
Once you’re off the icey passes the trail drops into pine forest, and then the valley opens completely with the entire south face of Manaslu standing at the end of it. This is an incredible feeling and reward after spending eleven days walking around that mountain seeing pieces of it. Here you get the whole thing at once, from below, with nothing in the way.
If your itinerary has a spare day, put it here. We pushed straight on to Tilje, and trekkers I’ve spoken to since who stayed two nights and walked up to Ponkar Lake - wish we did.
Samagaun and the Nubri villages are still working villages
Samagaun is a really vibrant village and incredibly beautiful. Kids messing about in the fields, the echo of men's hammers as they build stone houses by hand, women carrying babies in hand-woven baskets. Nobody’s performing anything for the trekkers walking through, it's a magical feeling to experience.
I recommend taking the rest day here properly. Birendra Lake is 45 minutes away via the monastery and over the moraine hill.
Pungyen Gompa at 4,050 m (13,290 ft) is a steady two and a half hours up the valley and one of the oldest Tibetan monasteries in the region, built by early Nubri settlers more than 400 years ago. It was locked when we arrived, so we peered through a window while our guide made tea and biscuits on the step outside.
From up there you get Manaslu (8,163 m), Ngadi Chuli (7,871 m), Himal Chuli (7,893 m) and Siringi Himal (7,155 m) in one turn.
The opportunity to trek to the Tibetan Border
The side trip from Samdo to the Tibetan border isn’t on most itineraries but I highly recommend it.
We climbed toward Rui La at around 5,030 m (16,500 ft) and started finding empty Chinese liquor bottles and rubbish with Mandarin script scattered down the valley. That’s how we knew we were close, before we saw anything.
The main route over the pass was snowed over, so we cut north and climbed loose scree to get around it. At the top, the barbed-wire border fence was almost completely buried in snow. Beyond it, a wide gravel road with a blue road sign runs right up to the fence and away into Tibet.
We sheltered from the wind behind a boulder for an hour and had the entire Larke Danda valley to ourselves for the whole day.
That’s the memory that has stuck with me. Nothing on the Everest trail as replicated it, and given how border access shifts, I’m not sure how long it stays available.
When the Manaslu Circuit is NOT worth it
Every article I've read about it concludes that it's “absolutely worth it.” And yes, I'm stoked about this trek but in the name of fairness, here are some rare situations where it may not be.
1. You need to be able to get out fast. You cannot bail out between Namrung and Bimthang. That’s five days. Once you’re past Namrung, your only realistic exit is over a 5,106 m pass or by helicopter. So you will need high altitude trekking insurance.
A note, the Larkya glacier valley traps cloud between huge peaks and whites out regularly. If you can’t accept a scenario where the weather pins you at Dharamsala for 48 hours at 4,460 m (14,630 ft) in a shipping container with no power and no phone signal, do a different trek.
2. Your budget is too tight. Trekking in Nepal is incredibly cheap for the experience you get. That said, this trek, as it's less commercialised, is slightly more expensive than the EBC trek. The cost floor here is hard and none of it is negotiable. A licensed guide is required by law. A registered agency is required—you can’t file the Restricted Area Permit yourself. And high-altitude insurance specifically covering the Manaslu Circuit is required in practice, because your agency submits your policy to get the permit and a good one will refuse if it’s capped below the pass.
3. It’s your first time at altitude. The Manaslu Circuit is not an overly difficult trek, and I firmly believe that even first time trekkers at altitude can do this if they prepare properly. That said, days are longer on Manaslu, the trail is rougher, and there are several exposed landslide traverses. Day two crosses a stretch of loose scree on a narrow path that’s holding onto ground actively moving underneath it.
I have to admit, that could be a lot for a first Himalayan trek. Note, if you are fit and stoked on this trek, do not let this stop you from doing it.
4. You want a very hard trek. The climb to Larkya La is less strenuous than any pass on the Three Passes, and we were at the top in under three hours. If you’re after a genuine physical test, check out the trekking peaks in the Himalayas instead like Island Peak or Mera Peak.
Is the Manaslu Circuit still uncrowded - and still remote?
It depends entirely on when you go, and being honest about it - take my experience as the best-case version.
In mid-May we shared the top of Larkya La with about a dozen people, had the Larke Danda valley to ourselves for a full day, and got a whole floor of a teahouse to ourselves on several nights.
However this was in 2023. The numbers these days suggest this likely won't be your expererience if you trek in October. Manaslu Conservation Area recorded 2,222 foreign trekkers in FY2078/79. By FY2081/82—July 2024 to July 2025—that was 12,512.
A 5.6× increase in three years, and nearly all of it lands in two narrow windows.
Trekkers I trust who’ve done the October crossing describe a different Dharamsala now: three container lodges serving the entire route, guides sent ahead from Samdo to sprint for beds, and breakfast pushed to 3:30 am because the dining shed can’t seat everyone at once.
My take: in April, May and late November, Manaslu still delivers the emptiness it’s sold on. In peak October, by every account I trust, it’s now a busy trail with a serious bottleneck. If solitude is why you’re picking Manaslu over Everest, go in the shoulder season - otherwise you’re planning a remote expedition for a trail that isn’t especially remote that month.
What the road has already taken and what I think it takes next
When I walked it, day two opened with two hours on unsealed road out of Maccha Khola before the first suspension bridge at Tatopani. Only a handful of tractors and two trucks passed us, but it’s a road.
On day three, past Salleri, the trail rejoined a newly cut vehicle road carved into perpendicular cliffs for another 90 minutes. On the way out, a new road ran all the way to Tilje, which is why our jeep met us there instead of at Dharapani.
We noticed those road extensions continuing further into the valley as we walked.
Since then, jeeps have pushed past Jagat. Trekkers used to start at Soti Khola; then it was Maccha Khola; now most 2026 itineraries drive higher still. That’s why you’ll see 110 km quoted for a circuit I measured at 175 km on my Garmin.
Losing those first two days isn’t a tragedy though, the lower Budhi Gandaki is hot, humid and the least interesting part of the route in my opinion. However, the experience is slightly lost. Before we at 830 m (2,720 ft) in subtropical forest and finished on a glaciated 5,106 m pass - that's one of the great altitude gradients in Nepal, and you can’t feel that from a jeep seat.
However looking to the future, I think it's what it likely takes next that is important. The road is climbing toward Deng and Namrung from the east, and there’s a stub pushing up below Bimthang from the west. The day those two meet, the Manaslu Circuit stops being a circuit and becomes a road with a walking section in the middle - which is exactly what happened to the Annapurna Circuit.
Does that change my verdict? No. Those five days between Namrung and Bimthang are still roadless and still the best consecutive stretch of teahouse trekking I’ve done in Nepal. But the honest answer to “is it worth it” means you have a short about of time to do it to get the full experience.
