How to Climb the Eiffel Tower While Scared of Heights

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As soon as my husband and I decided to go to Paris for the first time, a visit to the Eiffel Tower was first on our list. Once I saw you could climb the stairs instead of taking the elevator to its famous views, I knew that was the option I wanted. Despite being scared of heights, climbing the Eiffel Tower would be the perfect opportunity to confront these fears.

Much as I hate heights, I’m more afraid of letting my fear control me. After I paid admission to and then almost didn’t climb North Carolina’s Currituck Lighthouse, I knew this was something I’d have to work at. I love traveling and exploring way too much to let my fear keep me from new experiences.

Long story short, I did complete my mission, fears be darned. If you would also like to climb the Eiffel Tower despite being scared of heights, below I am sharing my personal tips for success!

This post was originally published in September 2019 and was last updated in September 2023.

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Climbing the Eiffel Tower: How I Overcame Being Afraid of Heights

Related: The Real Cost of a Trip to France

The First Time I Confronted My Fear of Heights

If you read my lighthouse story, then you know I didn’t go up.  In fact, I sent my husband up without me. Yep – I felt like such a failure that day.

However, you also know that I returned the next day and climbed all 220 of those steps with hip hop music in my ear buds. It’s funny because what bothered me most was the stairs themselves (metal with see-through holes in them). Each stair also had these awful gaps in between them, which were making me wobbly at the knees and a bit nauseous.

However, I forced myself up the lighthouse stairs because I didn’t want to about-face at the first sign of fear in the future. Being a bit of an overthinker and an anxious personality, there are a lot of things I’d have to stop doing if I let me worries take over. Therefore, I decided to confront my fear of heights head-on.

When you overcome your fear of heights once, it only gets easier from there

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Tips for Climbing the Eiffel Tower When You’re Scared of Heights

Tip #1: Seek Out Encouragement

When we were making our travel plans for Paris, climbing the Eiffel Tower was definitely part of them. The only thing was that the Eiffel Tower is MUCH taller than the Currituck Lighthouse. It has a lot more stairs, and oh yeah – the walls are just a gate and you can totally see down to the ground the whole way up.

During planning, I would actually start to clam up and feel my chest tighten when I thought about it. After spending at least a week totally fixated on this, I found online forums where others were expressing the same concerns. It turns out there are a lot people that are afraid of heights and want to climb the Eiffel Tower! 

Tip #2: Block Out All Negativity

I found a lot of the advice on the forums to be helpful, but a few said something to the effect of “why punish yourself?” or put yourself through this torture when you can appreciate the tower from the ground. Some commenters even went on to list all the reasons why facing this fear was a bad idea. 

These people don’t get what it’s about. Sure, you could see the Eiffel Tower from the ground, but you could also see Paris from Google Images. Can you imagine if we never did anything that made us feel fear or discomfort? It would be a pretty boring life, that’s for sure. 

Tip #3: Distraction is Key

This worst thing you can do when having fear and anxiety is fixate on those feelings. Where your attention goes, energy grows. Therefore, you have to put your attention and energy towards something else instead.

This will be something different for everyone, and maybe you’ll even want to try a variety of tactics. Here are just a few ideas, including ones that got me up those 674 steps:

• Listen to music on headphones. It helps to make a motivational playlist!
• Count each step as you climb
• Climbing the stairs fast. You will be more focused on your exhaustion than anything else. Plus, the faster you climb, the faster it’s over.
• Marvel at the view (trust me – awe can conquer fear). Doing your climb during the magic of golden hour can help with this.
• Climb with a buddy and chat the whole time
• Go through each of your five senses and name one thing you see, smell, hear, touch, and taste. Bringing a water bottle (no glass) can help with the last one.
• Remember logic and trust the engineering. I personally do not understand physics, but that’s somebody else’s job. It’s no use questioning them.
• Breathe through it. Not only does this help divert your attention, but some types of breathing are actually very calming. My favorite is breathing in for a count of four and breathing out for a count of eight. Seriously, try it sometime.

How I Climbed Up the Eiffel Tower While Being Afraid of Heights

Wearing yoga pants and a sweatshirt and donning earbuds with a playlist on the ready, Aaron and I entered the line for the stairs. There was almost no one ahead of us, and our online tickets got us in right away.

Upon exiting the metro, my stomach had already been tying in knots as the Eiffel Tower came closer into view. As we got closer to it, I slowly began to feel a low grade nausea and my heart started racing. I was grateful for the short line, as it did not leave extra time to overthink the ensuing experience and possibly change my mind. 

Related: Packing for Paris Made Simple & Chic: Carry-On Only Edition

Level 1

I started my playlist and was off.  I found myself winding around people as I hustled my way up. Sometimes individuals would be walking two in a row, blocking me from passing and I’d have to try not to be rude as I fought my way around them. In the meantime, I would once in a while look through the fence to take in the view of Paris. 

I didn’t like slowly getting further and further from the ground. That being said, the sun was beginning to set and the city was hitting golden hour. If there is a perfect time to climb the Eiffel Tower while scared, I would definitely recommend this one. It’s a lot easier to appreciate the views when they are at their most gorgeous and romantic.

Before no time at all, I found myself at the first level. My husband was steps behind me looking slightly out of breath. He commented that I was climbing rather quickly, but I was just doing what was necessary to get up those freaking stairs!

Level 2

We didn’t linger too long on the first floor, as I really wanted to continue the climb before I changed my mind. So, we continued on, muscling our way up the stairs.

The second set of steps was harder for me and it wasn’t necessarily because of the height. I mean, once you’re uncomfortably far from the ground, does an extra couple hundred feet really make a difference? 

No, it was actually because the lactic acid was starting to set in and I was getting pretty worn out.  I had to slow down a little, and the second floor didn’t come quite as fast as the first did.

Sure enough, though, we soon found ourselves entering the second floor, which was abuzz with people. We did a lap around the space, taking in different scenes of Paris from each side: the Seine River cutting through the city, a perfect view of the Champ de Mars, the butte of Montmarte leading up to Sacré-Cœur. Ooh la la indeed.

You could say the views were worth the stress (and sweat). It was amazing to be able to say I climbed the Eiffel Tower stairs and to be a part of the energy of the other tourists experiencing similar exhilaration. 

Heading Back to Solid Ground

We didn’t linger too long, and eventually had to start our trudge back down the stairs. This was a bit more painful heights wise, as it was hard not to look at the ground. 

A couple times, I jokingly asked myself what I had done. I felt like a kitty that gets stuck in a tree, except that I was a capable adult human that had to get myself back to the ground.

Although I was pretty relieved when we got back to the ground, in a way I was sad that this challenge and amazing experience was now behind me. I was also incredibly proud that I pushed myself to do this and got to share the experience with my husband.

Related: Ultimate Paris Solo Travel Guide

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If you want to climb the Eiffel Tower steps but are scared of heights, I hope my story has shown that it is possible for you. Clearly, a fear of heights is something I continuously work through, but the more times you confront it, the easier it gets. I hope the tips in this post help you do your own Eiffel Tower climb despite being afraid of heights!

Are you scared of heights, but wanting to climb the Eiffel Tower?