What is Old Batumi?
Old Batumi is the historic heart of the city: a grid of low and mid-rise streets behind the port, laid out mostly in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, with the original stretch of the seaside boulevard on one side and the towers of the newer city on the other. It is where Batumi's cafes, theatres, museums and squares are, and where life carries on in winter when the resort districts empty.
The name is used in three slightly different ways, and it helps to know which one a source means. Tourism bodies use it for the historic quarter. Galt & Taggart, the research arm of Bank of Georgia, uses "Old Batumi" as one of its market zones. And the listing site ss.ge files flats under an "Old Batumi District" label that also takes in high-rise towers on Chavchavadze and Ninoshvili streets of up to 46 floors. We found no published list confirming Old Batumi as an official administrative unit, so this page uses the name for the historic centre and the streets around it.
Map and boundaries
The Georgian National Tourism Administration describes Old Batumi as running from the port to Nuri Lake, between Iakob Gogebashvili and Petre Melikishvili streets, and south from the boulevard as far as Ilia Chavchavadze Street. Inside that frame are Europe Square, the Piazza, Theatre Square and the streets most visitors know by name: Memed Abashidze, Konstantine Gamsakhurdia, Zviad Gamsakhurdia, Kutaisi, Gorgiladze and 26 May.
Old Batumi stretches from the passenger port and the lighthouse past Europe Square and the Piazza to Nuri Lake and 6 May Park, with the old boulevard along the sea and Chavchavadze Street marking its inland edge.
Open the mapWho Old Batumi suits
- People who will live in Batumi all year: shops, cafes and services stay open out of season, and most daily errands can be done on foot.
- Buyers who value character: nineteenth-century facades, courtyards and the old boulevard are found nowhere else in the city.
- Short-stay hosts aiming at city-break guests: visitors who come for the old town want to sleep in it.
- Less suited to yield hunters: the zone has the highest prices and the lowest long-let yield in Batumi.
- Less suited to buyers who want quiet: the squares and bars stay busy late in the season.
From duty-free port to oil town
Batumi was under Ottoman rule from the sixteenth century and became part of the Russian Empire in 1878, when it was declared a porto-franco, a duty-free port, a status it kept until 1886. The railway from Baku reached the city in the 1880s, and between 1897 and 1907 an oil pipeline was built from Baku to Batumi, turning the town into one of the main oil-export ports of the empire. Merchants, shipping agents and oil companies built the houses that still define the old streets.
Many of the landmarks are dated precisely. The lighthouse was built in 1863 and renovated in 1882; the Orta Jame mosque on Kutaisi Street dates from 1866; a city garden was laid out near Nuri Lake in the 1880s, today's 6 May Park; and the colonnades linking the boulevard to the shore were added in 1930. The styles mix late Ottoman traces near the port, nineteenth-century eclecticism such as the first pharmacy at 36 Memed Abashidze Street, interwar modernism, and Soviet constructivism in the former Intourist hotel on Ninoshvili Street. The Drama Theatre on Rustaveli Street opened in 1952, and the Alphabet Tower and the Ali and Nino statue mark the north-eastern corner.
What flats cost
Old Batumi is the most expensive part of the city by a wide margin. Galt & Taggart's figures for new, finished flats in the second quarter of 2026 put the zone at nearly double the New Boulevard average, while the listing market shows a much wider spread because it mixes old houses, Soviet blocks and new towers.
| Measure | Figure | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| New finished flats, average | USD 3,239 per m² | Galt & Taggart zone, up 9.0% in a year |
| New finished flats, range | USD 1,710 to 9,450 per m² | Same study |
| Sales in the quarter | 349 | New flats, second quarter 2026 |
| Flats for sale on ss.ge | 909 | "Old Batumi District" label, all building types |
| Typical asking price on ss.ge | GEL 4,100 to 6,100 per m² | First page of 16 listings, about USD 1,600 to 2,350 |
| Older five-storey blocks | GEL 2,800 to 4,300 per m² | Same sample, about USD 1,100 to 1,650 |
| High floors in new towers | GEL 7,800 to 10,300 per m² | Same sample, about USD 3,000 to 4,000 |
The dollar figures for listings use the rate the advertisements themselves imply, about 2.6 lari to the dollar, and a first page of 16 listings is a sample, not a statistic. For comparison, Galt & Taggart put new finished flats across Batumi at USD 1,960 per m² in June 2026 and resale flats in newer buildings at USD 1,497. The gap between the zone average and most listings is explained by what is counted: the study covers new turnkey flats, while the listings are mostly resale in older buildings.
Demand has been strong. Sales of new flats in Old Batumi rose by 77.3% in 2025 to 1,727, the fastest growth of any zone, while the pipeline of 3,331 flats due by 2029 would last under 2 years at that pace, the smallest relative to sales anywhere in the city. Our comparison of Batumi zones sets these figures against the other districts.
What flats rent for
On 26 October 2026 ss.ge listed 1,309 flats for rent under the Old Batumi label. On the first page, one-bedroom flats of 34 to 43 m² asked about USD 500 to 700 a month, two-bedroom flats in mid-rise buildings about USD 550 to 700, and three-bedroom flats about USD 800 to 1,000; two-bedroom flats high up in a 43-storey tower asked about USD 1,350 to 1,400. These are October asking rents, at the start of the quiet season.
Galt & Taggart puts long-let rents in the zone at USD 11.9 per m² a month, which works out at a gross yield of about 4.4% at today's new-flat prices, the lowest in Batumi. Short stays earn more but are seasonal: across the city, Galt & Taggart reported an average nightly rate of about USD 35.6 in 2025 and short-stay yields falling from 8.8% in 2024 to 7.4%. We found no short-stay figures for Old Batumi alone. Our guide to Airbnb in Batumi covers the rules and the season.
Heritage and building rules
According to a 2019 academic study, a protection zone for historic Batumi was first drawn up in 1987 and later expanded, and a framework plan funded by the Ministry of Culture in 2007 set out conservation principles. In practice, protection has been contested. Between 2009 and 2013 the city ran a programme to rehabilitate historic districts that the Georgian Young Lawyers' Association and academic critics described as modernising facades rather than conserving buildings. A house at 13 Vazha-Pshavela Street was listed as a monument in 2015 and demolished by its owner the same year, according to the association.
The seaside boulevard itself is a cultural heritage monument. In 2022 the Public Defender found that the Adjara heritage agency had allowed a planned 3-storey building on the site of a former marine polyclinic on the boulevard to grow to a 16-storey hotel and then 2 more storeys, and asked for the decisions to be annulled; we did not find the outcome. In August 2019 the city council approved a development plan for 9.7 hectares between Gogebashvili Street and the sea that allows several high-rise buildings, which the lawyers' association challenged in court. Since 2022 a change to the Spatial Planning Code has let Batumi City Hall exceed normal height and density limits until a new general plan is approved, expected in 2027; the Public Defender has challenged it in the Constitutional Court.
For a buyer, this means two things. A view or a quiet street is not protected by the age of the neighbourhood, and works on a listed building need permits from the heritage authorities. Our guide to historic buildings explains the national heritage rules, which apply in Batumi as in Tbilisi.
Old buildings: condition and safety
The older housing stock needs careful checking. On 8 October 2021 part of a Soviet-era residential block at 13, 26 May Street collapsed, killing 9 people; renovation works on the ground floor and in the basement carried out without full permission were reported to have removed supporting structures, and three people were charged with breaching construction safety rules. In June 2022 Parliament heard that Batumi had expert opinions on 118 hazardous buildings housing about 3,000 families, under a state programme called "Batumi without Hazardous Buildings".
Batumi's seismic design level is lower than the capital's: the 2009 building code assigns the city intensity 7 on the MSK-64 scale, against 8 for Tbilisi. Buildings put up before the code came into force in 2010 were designed to older norms. Ask for a structural survey of any pre-war or Soviet building, check that no load-bearing walls have been cut in the flat or the shops below, and look at the condition of roofs, gutters and basements, because humidity is the first thing to check in any Batumi building and old houses are the most exposed.
Flooding after heavy rain
Heavy rain overwhelms Batumi's drainage from time to time. In August 2020 the city water company reported flooding on Chavchavadze, Griboedov, Khimshiashvili and other streets, and supermarkets on Gorgiladze and Griboedov streets in the old town were flooded the same year, with residents blaming the drains. We found no 2023 to 2026 report singling out the old town, but basements, ground-floor flats and shops are the units to check: ask neighbours where water collects and look for tide marks on walls.
Getting around
Most of Old Batumi is walkable, and the beach, the boulevard and the passenger port, where cruise ships berth, are a few minutes from any flat. City buses are run by the municipal company Batumi Autotransport and do not take cash; the Batumi Card gives the lowest fare, and contactless bank cards also work. Street parking is sold as passes for a day, a week, a month or longer, tied to the car's number plate and paid at terminals, in banking apps or online. We could not confirm the current tariffs from the operator's own site, so check them before relying on street parking; many older buildings have no parking of their own.
Living in the old town
The Piazza and Europe Square are the social centres of Old Batumi, surrounded by pedestrian streets with cafes, restaurants and street performers. That life is the attraction and also the main drawback: flats overlooking the squares, the boulevard or busy junctions can be noisy late into the night in summer, and traffic is heavy in the narrow streets. A flat a street or two back, or facing a courtyard, is often a better compromise for full-time residents.
Pros and cons
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Historic streets and the old boulevard | Highest prices in Batumi |
| Life continues all year | Lowest long-let yield, about 4.4% |
| Walk to the sea, port and services | Noise near the squares in summer |
| Little new supply relative to demand | Old buildings need structural checks |
| Strong demand from city-break visitors | Heritage rules and contested high-rise plans |
To be added by the team: photos for the team to take: the Piazza, Europe Square, the old boulevard and the colonnades, a courtyard house on Memed Abashidze Street, the Orta Jame mosque, the lighthouse by the port, and a tower on Chavchavadze Street for contrast.
Checking a flat in Old Batumi step by step
Get the registry extract
Owners, area and any mortgage.
Ask about heritage status
Listed building or protection zone.
Check the structure
Survey walls, floors and the shops below.
Look for damp and flooding
Basement, roof and ground floor.
Visit at night
Hear the street in season.
Price it against the zone
Compare old stock with new towers.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a flat in Old Batumi cost?
New finished flats averaged USD 3,239 per m² in mid-2026; most listings in older buildings ask about USD 1,600 to 2,350 per m².
Is Old Batumi a good rental investment?
For long lets the gross yield is about 4.4%, the lowest in Batumi; buyers pay for location rather than income.
What does a one-bedroom flat rent for?
About USD 500 to 700 a month in October 2026 listings.
Is Old Batumi an official district?
We found no official list confirming it; the name is used by tourism bodies, researchers and listing sites.
Are old buildings safe?
Many are sound, but get a structural survey; a 2021 collapse on 26 May Street followed unpermitted works.
Does the old town flood?
Heavy rain has flooded some central streets; check basements and ground floors.
Can new towers be built next to my flat?
Yes, in parts of the centre; plans approved since 2019 allow high-rise buildings.
Is it quiet in winter?
Quieter, but Old Batumi is the part of the city where life carries on all year.
Sources
- Old Batumi, Georgian National Tourism Administration (accessed 26 October 2026)
- Batumi Residential Real Estate, 2Q26 Overview, Galt & Taggart, and Sector snapshot: Batumi residential real estate, Investor.ge, 20 April 2026
- Flats for sale and for rent in Old Batumi, ss.ge (accessed 26 October 2026)
- Recommendation on the Batumi boulevard monument, Public Defender of Georgia, 2022
- Works at 13 Vazha-Pshavela Street and court challenge to the Batumi Riviera plan, Georgian Young Lawyers' Association
- Study of the rehabilitation of historic Batumi, Heidelberg University journal, 2019
- Constitutional challenge to Batumi's temporary building rules, Public Defender of Georgia
- Batumi tragedy: the city mourns the dead, JAMnews, 13 October 2021
- Amendments to the Spatial Planning Code, Parliament of Georgia, 22 June 2022
- Seismic building code PN 01.01-09, Legislative Herald of Georgia
- Heavy rains flood Batumi streets, First Channel, 23 August 2020
- Parking in Batumi and public transport fares, Madloba (accessed 26 October 2026)
Change log
- - Area guide published from Galt & Taggart Batumi reports, ss.ge listings, the Georgian National Tourism Administration, the Public Defender, the Georgian Young Lawyers' Association, Parliament of Georgia, JAMnews, First Channel and the seismic code PN 01.01-09.