Chocolate Nation, the world’s largest Belgian chocolate museum, aims to make museum visits accessible to visitors with autism. To help you prepare for your visit, we’re happy to provide a visual step-by-step guide.
You’ll recognize the Chocolate Nation building on Koningin Astridplein right away. It’s the rounded building right next to the Chinese gate. You’ll see the name “Chocolate Nation” in large letters on the facade.
You enter the museum via the stairs on the corner. If you have limited mobility, you can also use the accessible entrance. You’ll find it just around the corner, on Van Wesenbekestraat. It’s the first door on the right at the very beginning of Van Wesenbekestraat. There, we have a special lift that makes it easy for you to enter the museum. Our staff will be happy to assist you.
A visit to the world’s largest Belgian chocolate museum takes 70 to 90 minutes. Upon entering our main entrance hall, you ’ll walk past the entrance to our shop toward the reception desk. The tour also ends in our shop, so we recommend that you visit the shop only after completing the museum tour.
Upon entering, you can leave your coat, backpack, and other belongings in our free lockers. Then, check in at our reception desk, where our staff will welcome you.
Each visitor receives an individual audio guide at the start. We offer audio guides in Dutch, French, English, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, and Mandarin Chinese. Our staff will explain how to use the audio guide, after which you’ll walk a few meters to the large start screen. There, you’ll activate the audio guide by scanning an audio tag. All you have to do now is sit back, relax, and listen to the commentary.
As soon as the white door to the first room opens (you’ll wait no more than 5 minutes), your museum tour begins.
You’ll enter the first room. It’s quite dark. Hold your audio guide up until you hear a beep. Then music will start playing in the room, and the audio guide will begin its narration. In the center of the room, a large rotating ballotin filled with pralines will come into view.
The presentation in this room lasts about 3 minutes. The doors to the next room open automatically.
You walk into our jungle. In the center of the room stands a life-size cacao tree. Animations are projected onto the cacao fruits on the tree while the audio guide provides further explanation. Light projections cause the surroundings to change color periodically.
At the end, the doors to the next room open automatically again.
The third room is designed to look like a large shipping container. So it feels as if you’re stepping inside a container full of cacao beans. In the center of the room, a film is projected onto the floor. The audio guide tells you more about the harvest of the cacao fruits and their transport to Antwerp, the world’s largest port for storing cacao beans.
After the film ends, the doors open and you walk on to the fourth room, where a gigantic fantasy chocolate machine stands.
The fantasy chocolate machine shows you the entire production process, from the cocoa bean to the finished product. This involves a variety of sound and light effects.
After about four minutes, the doors open automatically.
You descend the stairs and walk into an old shopping street downstairs. There, the audio guide automatically starts narrating again. In this shopping street, you can look around at the display cases depicting Belgian chocolate traditions, with several iconic Antwerp buildings in the background and a beautiful photo of Antwerp’s impressive skyline.
At the end of the street, you’ll see a large double door with mirrors on your right. This door opens every 3.5 minutes. As soon as the doors open, you’ll walk into a fictional little restaurant. Take a seat at one of the tables. You won’t need the audio guide in this room. An automatic projection begins on the plates. You’ll see our Petit Chocolatier at work, preparing a delicious chocolate dessert.
After the projection ends, the restaurant’s second set of double doors opens, and you can walk through to the next room.
After the restaurant, you’ll walk into the antique shop. Here you’ll also find our Wall of Love, featuring love stories from Belgian chocolatiers. In the shop, you’ll see plenty of Belgian chocolate packaging and examples of advertising campaigns.
Starting in this room, you’ll find audio tags everywhere—these are white tags featuring the Chocolate Nation logo. You can scan these audio tags with your audio guide. As soon as you scan a tag, the story about that topic will begin playing. If you want to skip part of the explanation, you can scan the next audio tag while the current one is playing. This will start the next story. If you’d like to listen to something again, you can scan the same audio tag a second time.
From the shop, walk on to the icon gallery. There, the 8 proud icons of Chocolate Nation are on display. Using the audio tag, you can discover all the stories behind these Belgian icons.
You step into a beautiful, peaceful space where you can admire stunning chocolate sculptures in the glass display cases. Next to some of the display cases, you’ll also find audio tags that you can scan to listen to the story behind that specific chocolate creation.
After the Art Gallery, you’ll enter the Royal Purveyors’ area. This installation is illuminated by bright, crisp white light, making it feel much lighter than the previous rooms.
In the center stands a rotating chocolate crown. On the other side of the room, you’ll see nine packages from the Belgian Royal Warrant Holders. There are no projections or special sound effects in this room. You can take your time looking around, scan the audio tag, and decide for yourself how long you’d like to stay.
Turn left into the hallway and you’ll arrive at the chocolate castle. This castle was created in collaboration with PIVA, the Antwerp school for chocolatiers. The delicious scent of chocolate greets you here. Next to the castle, you’ll see our workshop spaces, where a group of people might just be learning how to work with chocolate.
You continue walking and head back upstairs via the staircase. You walk past our mold wall, which is a wall covered with old chocolate molds. You’ll get more information via the audio guide. You’ll pass the Forrest Gump bench, where you can take some fun photos, and continue up the stairs.
Upstairs, you can watch our packaging team at work in the packaging workshop. Here, the chocolate products made by our chocolatiers are professionally packaged into beautifully finished final products.
At the packaging workshop, turn right and continue through our exhibition space. There, you’ll walk among large panels featuring fun photos, quotes, and scenes.
When you leave the Expo Area, you’ll arrive at our photo booths and our chocolatiers’ production workshop. Here, you can watch a video and see our chocolatiers at work. They make artisanal chocolate products every day. There’s also an audio tag you can scan to get more information.
Continue walking past our Fun Facts Wall, where you can discover 15 different chocolate facts. You’ll learn these facts by scanning the audio tag at each stop.
One important thing to know about our Fun Facts Wall is that the numbers are listed in reverse order. This is because, in the museum’s early days, this hallway had a two-way flow. For the comfort of our visitors, we later added the exhibition space to the museum tour. As a result, we split the walking route so that visitors don’t have to cross paths. The facts are therefore listed in descending order, but they’re all equally interesting.
After the facts wall, you’ll enter the Beyond Chocolate Zone. Here, you’ll discover how the chocolate industry is working toward a more sustainable future. Learn about the Beyond Chocolate initiative and find out why collaboration between chocolate brands, governments, and NGOs is so important.
Lift a real bag of cacao beans in the selfie booth and experience just how heavy a cacao farmer’s harvest can be. Next, discover the different cocoa varieties, where cocoa grows, and which countries are the largest producers today. Also take a look inside our bean-to-bar workshop, where you’ll see how a cocoa bean is turned into a chocolate bar.
Finally, two animations show how the sector is working to ensure a living income for cocoa farmers and to combat deforestation. This gives you a nuanced picture of both the challenges and the solutions.
To finish up, head down the stairs to Taste Heaven. One of our staff members will be waiting for you downstairs. Hand over your audio guide and receive a small spoon. Our staff will explain how to operate the machines to taste the chocolate. You can sample 10 different types of chocolate.
Once you’ve tasted our 10 flavors, you’ll leave the Taste Heaven. You can leave your spoon in the trash can, open a large door, and walk into the shop.
You can stay in our shop as long as you like. In addition to our own chocolate products, you’ll find most of the well-known Belgian chocolate brands there. If you have any questions, our staff will be happy to assist you. You can pay for your purchases at the register.
Next, walk out of the shop and you’ll be back in the main entrance hall. Here, you can retrieve your belongings from the lockers and use the restrooms.
If you’d like to have a drink or a bite to eat, you can stop by Octave from Wednesday through Saturday. Octave is Chocolate Nation’s food bar and restaurant. You can sit on Octave’s indoor terrace in the main entrance hall or walk through the door in the entrance hall to Octave itself. Enjoy your meal!
We hope this visual step-by-step guide has given you a clearer idea of what to expect at Chocolate Nation. Be sure to check out our social media channels as well, where you’ll find plenty of photos and videos.
We look forward to welcoming you to Chocolate Nation.
© Chocolate Nation 2026