One of beautiful and largest spice park in Sri Lanka. Government institute. Maintain and monitoring under the Department of Export Agriculture. Wide range of spice can be seen here. Both commercial varieties as well as wild types are planted. Black pepper, Nutmeg, Coffee, Vanilla, Cardamom, Areca nut, Kithul and oil plants are few of them. Nicely arranged the spice crops in the field as elegant order. it is complete with facilitated information center. Comfortable small conference hall also there. Attractive surrounding because land is situated somewhat upper elevation. Compare with other spice garden around the Matale, this is beyond the expectation. Really value for foreigners who need to know trusted information regarding spices including correct spice plants, growing pattern and spice products. Well known instructors are here to guide in both Sinhala and English medium. But need to book the place in a formal manner if any group need such a service. Sale center and nursery also situated other side of road and good quality spice products and nursery plants can be purchased here. Best place for Agriculture university students, Diploma holders and school children who learn and find the details about spice crop. Some of modern cultivation demonstration filedes are been developed and it is important to spice farmers who interest to learn correct agronomy practices.

This place is a gem! We arrived straight from a commercial spice garden. This place is so much superior- more fun and informative, much larger and without any sales push. We were greeted by Kavitha who became our guide, walked us around the garden and explained all the details of producing certain spices- all with a wide smile on her face. She’s done a terrific job! If you are nearby and have an hour for a fun tour- visit National Spice Garden!🪴🌱

We had a very inspiring and educative tour trough the gardens. They take the time to tell you everything and we even had a demonstration on how cinnamon is harvested. What I read about other spice gardens is that they are mostly a torus or scam. This is nothing alike. The garden is property from the government and is used for educational purposes, and some export. The attached spice shop has fair prices.

We wanted to know how are produced the spices we use commonly. Nice garden out of the city of Matale. Our guide Mr Archer knows really well his subject. We appreciated a non-commercial approach to the subject of spices. Moreover, the garden is located in a nice environment.

A wonderful oasis, would highly recommend for a visit (and much bigger than Ranweli). This is actually the government research centre for breeding new varieties of spices and herbs. A super interesting and scenic tour given by Mr Bandara. I recommend calling ahead to check they are able to give a tour in English- not many tourists visit here!

Really nice tour, very informative on how spices grow. We were having a great time. Big thank you to the guide!

Best spice garden run by government. You get 1h+ long free tour with educated and knowledgeable guide for free. You are not pushed into tipping or forced to buy their products but you will do so anyway becuase they sell premium quality spices for really good value. Avoid comercial spice gardens.

We visited the National Spice Garden without previous notice, but were received in an extremely friendly manner by the Assistant Director of Research, Mr. Harsha Dissanayake, who gave us an extensive tour of the garden with excellent explanations. It was very instructive and much better than visiting one of the private spice gardens.

This is located in Matale . This place have thier own research center . They are research export items.

The place is function as the Export Research Centre where Sri Lankan Spices are research and quality improvements.

Place still not formaly opened for visitors but we have been lucky... Our guide was professional and explaind us so many details about Sri Lanka plants that we need to make notes...to do not forget 😊 it tooks us 2.5h but after that we have been so excited that we decided to visit other Spice Garden to consolidate our knowledge. All was free of charge! Transport - Bus costed us 40rupi per person but you can take tuk tuk app. 300 rupi one way Recomended place

New object, they are still developing the place. Nevertheless staff is very informative and the garden is very well maintained! If you like to see how the plants and fruits of coffee, pepper, cinnamon and multiple different herbs look like that’s a right place. The tour with a guide can take 30-40 min and it’s free of charge. There is shop where you can buy some spices.

We were there 2 hours. The young guy who showed us a lot of different plants was amazing. Thank you for nice visiting. Please support this place. Thank you

The best place to visit, be sure to not miss it if you are interested in plants, spices and mainly knowledge!

We had a really nice private tour here, full of exclusive taste and smells. Our guide (only one they have) was really nice and kind person, with big knowledge. You should definitely go here

One of the best places to study about the spice in Sri Lanka. The staff is very helpful and they explain you everything in detail. They have grown many rare spice verities here. Many experiments are undergoing. They have a selling centre of spice -oriented products and you can by the best. If you visit Matale, and are interested in Sri Lankan flavours, Note it that this is one of the Must-Visit destinations.

We had a good time with our guide. The service is free and he can adjust the time of the visit as you wish. We have learn a lot about spices in Sri lanka: we could see and smell the spices as we were walking in the garden and even taste some. Definetly a good activity if you are around and have some time!

The tour guide was excellent today. She was very knowledgable, informative and spoke very well. She answered all of our questions with ease. Lovely, gentle easy walk around the property. It was interesting to learn about the production process of the spices and to understand how they grow and what they look like from paddock to plate as we say in Australia. We also purchased some high quality products from the store across the road. Great to also see the research they are doing. Highly recommend.

Got to learn a lot about the plants that are grown in Sri Lanka produce the spices we use with food. In addition heard about research into how the plants can be used additional purposes. Tour is free & was well worth an hour to undertake.

Do not skip this place if you’re visiting Sri Lanka. The visit is free, you’re accompanied by the staff of thr garden. We can’t praise Kavitha enough for all her knowledge and patience to answer our questions on a very hot day. It works on a walk in basis, no reservation required.

This was an amazing stop when driving between Dambulla and Kandy. The gardens are beautiful and our tour guide was very informative. It was great to see how common spices are grown and harvested. Our tour guide was very knowledgeable and was great (and patient) with our 2 year old son This was a free tour and is run as part of a research institute, nothing like the tourist spice gardens. I'd recommend to anyone passing through Matale

We really enjoyed the spice garden tour. The guide was very knowledgeable and super friendly. This spice garden is part of Sri Lanka’s department of agriculture. They help educate local farmers to sustain the local market. Because they are part of a governmental agency, they don’t try to entice tourists to purchase anything. We highly recommend stopping here and taking the 1-1.3hrs tour!!

well maintained. Pure and authentic sri lankan food product outlet available. You can buy plants as well. Good place to gather knowledge about spices. All the awareness programs are available.

The experience in the National Spice Garden has been very good, the guide was very expert and very good to explain the topics. This Is not so much touristic and for free. Very recommended

This is a pleasant spot offering intriguing guidance and a complimentary 5-minute massage. Like many similar places, the primary focus is to provide tourists with an experience that they can later use to sell their products, often at prices ten times higher than the actual cost. As a smart tourist, it's important to acquire knowledge and show appreciation to your guide through tipping, but avoid impulsively purchasing anything. It's worth noting that your guide or driver may receive a bonus for bringing you to these locations.

A lovely place, maintained well and Mr. Harsha taught us and shared some valuable information regarding the spices. Great hospitality 👍🏼

When we visited matale in November 2020 for a trip. We wanted to visit National Spice Garden. Unfortunately on Weekends and poya days it's closed.

Spice garden which maintain by govt. Confidential service place for tourism.

We visited the National Spice Granden on our free day in Matale and it was the best activity we could do. We appreciated that it was a very educative and non-commercial visit. The staff was very welcoming, spent really a lot of time with us. Thank you once again!

The only spice garden managed under the department of Export Agriculture

Very nice shop, good service and many options for gifts and takeaways. We did not visit the garden much due to rain

Wonderful experience! I didn't expect so precisely explanation about species. If you are looking for the best spice garden, don't hesitate to visit this place!

Certainly one of the most interesting visits of our stay, strangely absent from our guide (Routard). This is certainly explained by the fact that it is a state garden without payment of commissions to the guides 😏 Long (1h30) commented walk in this very beautiful garden in the company of Kavitha, a young woman who is a teacher and a smile . There are only a few guides, it is possible to join a visit that has already started. It's free but the tip is naturally necessary given the quality of the service. To do !

Great experience

Spice Garden good research plance matale

Beautiful gem just out of Matale, very informative and accurate tour with Bandara , a very knowledgeable person that tells you everything about the plants and spices that are growing in the gardens and it's open to answer at all your questions. Also a practice demonstration of how cinnamon it's harvested . If you are into plants and wanna know more about spices this is the place to go. No fee , just donation at the end of the tour.

This place is most important for students.

Has all many types of spices

We've visited the garden right after its opening after corona break. The garden is beautiful and contains every possible spice cultivated in Sri Lanka! Now you cannot buy the harvest but it is soon to be expected! I keep fingers crossed for this project, as it has a big part in reserach of new types of spices. And we got a lot of leaflets with tons of information. As for the owners my feedback would be to have clearer signs where is the entrance to the park or where to park a car/tuk tuk.

Very beautiful place. Ms Renu our guide described every plant and it is way bigger than other commercial spice gardens. Must visit.

great place to visit and get some information about sri lankan spices

we did a very nice tour of the garden. We got a lot of information about plants, spices and the way they are produced. Our very special guide was very competent and extremely friendly. The shop is also a very good place to buy local produced spices and the people there is kind, friendly and nice. Very nice experience!!

We had a great experience travelling to this place. Mr. Bandara educate us about the plants and even arrange a demonstration on how to peel the cinnamon properly. Overall it was a nice tour...

The guide explained the trees/ plant collections in an interesting way. Had good understanding on the spices around Sri Lanka.

Do not go to any other spice garden - this is the one to go to. Our driver wanted to take us to another tourist trap spice garden but we insisted on this one because of the reviews and it exceeded our expectations. Thorough, personalized tour that was customized to the amount of time we had. We learned a lot and got great recommendations from our guide on additional activities to do. The shop also had a great selection that we bought for gifts as well as personal use.