15 Facts About Ancient Pyramids in Egypt You Didn't Expect

Here is one of the facts about ancient pyramids in Egypt that most visitors do not expect: Egypt has between 118 and 138 known pyramids, not three, built over roughly a thousand years from about 2650 BC. The Great Pyramid of Khufu at Giza, the largest of them, was about 146.6 metres tall when finished and stayed the tallest structure on Earth for some 3,800 years, until medieval cathedral spires in England passed it.

Our Egyptologist guides take travellers to Giza, Saqqara, Dahshur and Abu Rawash throughout the year. Below are 15 facts about ancient pyramids in Egypt that we find surprise people most, then the real scale of the big ones, how many pyramids exist and where to see them. Where a popular "fact" is a theory or a myth, we say so.

1. The first pyramid grew out of a flat tomb

Before pyramids, kings were buried under mastabas, low rectangular tombs. Around 2670 to 2650 BC the architect Imhotep built a stone mastaba for King Djoser at Saqqara, then enlarged it several times, stacking six steps to about 62 metres. The Step Pyramid is the oldest large cut-stone building in the world. See our Saqqara guide.

2. One king built more pyramids than Khufu

Sneferu, Khufu's father, finished or built three large pyramids: Meidum, the Bent Pyramid and the Red Pyramid at Dahshur. Together they contain more stone than his son's Great Pyramid. His builders were learning on the job, and you can see it. Dahshur also has a later pyramid with a mud-brick core, the Black Pyramid of Amenemhat III, which cracked and was never used for his burial.

3. The Bent Pyramid shows a mid-course correction

The Bent Pyramid starts at a steep angle of about 54 degrees and changes to about 43 degrees halfway up. Most Egyptologists think the builders saw cracks and instability and reduced the angle. Sneferu then built the Red Pyramid nearby at the lower angle from the start: the first successful smooth-sided pyramid, and you can still walk inside it. Read about the Red Pyramid.

4. The Great Pyramid points almost exactly north

The sides of Khufu's pyramid deviate from true north by only about 3 to 4 minutes of arc on average, roughly a twentieth of a degree. Researchers think the builders used the stars or the sun's shadow to find north. Nobody knows the method for certain.

5. The builders were paid workers, not slaves

The idea of slaves building the pyramids comes from later stories, not from Egyptian evidence. Since 1990 archaeologists have excavated the workers' cemetery and town south of the Sphinx: crews with names like "Friends of Khufu" lived there, ate bread, beer and beef, and were buried with honour next to the king's monument. Skeletons show healed fractures and even amputations, which means they received medical care.

6. We have the logbook of a man who delivered the stone

In 2013 a French-Egyptian team found the oldest inscribed papyri in Egypt at Wadi al-Jarf on the Red Sea coast. One of them, the Diary of Merer, is the logbook of an inspector whose crew shipped white limestone from the Tura quarries across the Nile to Giza in the 27th year of Khufu's reign. It is the closest thing we have to a first-hand record of the work.

7. A lost branch of the Nile ran past the pyramids

A 2024 study using satellite radar and soil cores traced a buried branch of the Nile, about 64 kilometres long, that once flowed along the desert edge past Giza, Saqqara, Dahshur and Lisht. The authors named it the Ahramat ("pyramids") Branch and argue it explains why so many pyramids stand in one line: boats could bring stone and workers close to the building sites.

8. Wet sand made the heavy blocks easier to drag

A wall painting in the tomb of Djehutihotep shows a man pouring water in front of a sledge carrying a colossal statue. In 2014 physicists at the University of Amsterdam showed that the right amount of water roughly halves the force needed to pull a sledge over desert sand. Combined with ramps, levers and large organised teams, this explains much of how the blocks were moved.

9. The pyramids were white and shining

The pyramids were finished with a casing of fine white Tura limestone, polished smooth, with a capstone (pyramidion) on top. Most of the casing was later stripped and reused in medieval Cairo. The top of Khafre's pyramid still keeps a section of casing, and the lowest courses of Menkaure's pyramid keep their red granite.

10. There are empty spaces inside the Great Pyramid that nobody has entered

The ScanPyramids project measured cosmic-ray particles (muons) passing through the pyramid. In 2017 it announced a "big void" at least 30 metres long above the Grand Gallery. In 2023 it confirmed a corridor about 9 metres long behind the chevrons over the entrance, and filmed it with an endoscope. What the void was for is still unknown.

11. A full-size royal boat was buried beside the pyramid

In 1954 workers found a sealed pit beside the Great Pyramid containing a dismantled cedar boat of about 1,200 pieces. Restored, it is about 43 metres long. Since 2021 it has been displayed at the Grand Egyptian Museum. More in our article on Khufu's ship.

12. Almost every pyramid was robbed in antiquity

No intact royal burial has ever been found inside a pyramid. Most were robbed within centuries, which is why the sarcophagus in the King's Chamber is empty. Our article do the Dahshur pyramids have bodies? looks at what was found.

13. The pyramids were part of temple complexes

A royal pyramid was never alone. Each had a temple against its east face, a causeway down to a valley temple at the edge of the floodplain, small pyramids for queens and a ritual satellite pyramid, and boat pits. The Great Sphinx sits beside Khafre's valley temple as part of his complex.

14. The last royal pyramids in Egypt were built about 1,000 years after the first

Middle Kingdom kings at Lisht, Lahun, Hawara and Dahshur kept building pyramids with mudbrick cores, which is why they now look like eroded hills. The last royal pyramid in Egypt was built for Ahmose I at Abydos around 1525 BC. After that, kings were buried in hidden rock tombs in the Valley of the Kings. Later, the Nubian kings of Kush built hundreds of smaller, steeper pyramids in what is now Sudan.

15. Herodotus wrote about the onions, not the slaves

The Greek historian Herodotus visited Egypt around 450 BC, some 2,000 years after the Great Pyramid was built. He wrote that an inscription on it recorded how much was spent on radishes, onions and garlic for the workers, and that 100,000 men worked in three-month shifts for 20 years. His figures came from local guides of his day and are not reliable, but they show that the pyramids were already ancient tourist sights.

• The Orion correlation: the idea that the three Giza pyramids copy the stars of Orion's Belt is a modern theory, not accepted by Egyptologists. The pyramids were placed where the ground and the king's family tombs allowed.
• Pi in the Great Pyramid: the base perimeter divided by the height comes close to 2 x pi. Most scholars think this follows from the slope the Egyptians used (a rise of 1 cubit for every 5.5 palms), not from knowledge of pi.
• Aliens or lost civilisations: quarries, tools, workers' towns, papyri and unfinished pyramids show every stage of the work. See our article on how long it took to build the pyramids.

The Great Pyramid is the giant, but its neighbours are close. These are the main figures accepted by Egyptologists:

A few numbers help with the scale of Khufu's pyramid:

• About 2.3 million blocks, most of them limestone of around 2.5 tonnes; the granite beams over the King's Chamber weigh 25 to 80 tonnes and came from Aswan, some 800 kilometres up the Nile.
• About 6 million tonnes in total.
• The base covers about 5.3 hectares (13 acres), and it is level to within about two centimetres.
• It lost about 8 metres of height with its casing and capstone.
• Khafre's pyramid looks taller than Khufu's in photos because it stands on higher bedrock and still has its pointed top.

The usual answer is 118 to 138. The number moves because experts count differently and because new ones are still found:

• What counts: some lists include only royal pyramids; others add queens' and satellite pyramids, unfinished bases and small step pyramids in the provinces.
• Ruins: mudbrick pyramids of the Middle Kingdom collapsed into mounds; some are known only from 19th-century maps, such as the "Lepsius" pyramids.
• New finds: archaeologists still uncover queens' pyramids at Saqqara and Dahshur.

Sudan, not Egypt, has the largest number of pyramids, built by the Kushite kings much later.

For the less visited sites, read our guides to the Pyramid of Djedefre and the Pyramid of Sahure.

• Tickets: the Giza plateau ticket costs EGP 700 for a foreign adult and EGP 350 for a student, and the site opens from 8:00 to 16:00 (official monuments site, checked 4 November 2026). Entering a pyramid needs an extra ticket: EGP 1,500 for the Great Pyramid and EGP 280 for Menkaure's pyramid for a foreign adult. Our guide can you go inside the Great Pyramid? explains what you see inside.
• Timing: arrive at opening. Coach groups arrive from about 9:30, and from May to September the plateau is very hot by noon.
• Order: we usually do Giza first, then Saqqara and Dahshur after lunch, when the southern sites are quiet.
• Inside a pyramid: the passages are low and steep and the air is warm and humid. Skip it if you are claustrophobic or have knee or back problems; the Red Pyramid's descent is long but wider.
• Museum first or last: Khufu's boat and many finds from the pyramid sites are at the Grand Egyptian Museum, about 2 km from the plateau.

Our Giza pyramids and Sakkara tour covers the Great Pyramid, the Sphinx, the Step Pyramid and Dahshur in one day with an Egyptologist. If you only have half a day, the private day trip of Giza focuses on the plateau. More options are in our Cairo day tours.

How many pyramids are there in Egypt?

Between 118 and 138 are known, depending on what is counted. Most stand on the desert edge west of the Nile between Abu Rawash and Fayoum.

What is the oldest pyramid in Egypt?

The Step Pyramid of Djoser at Saqqara, built around 2670 to 2650 BC by the architect Imhotep.

Who built the pyramids?

Paid Egyptian workers and craftsmen organised in crews, supported by seasonal labour. Their town and cemetery have been excavated at Giza.

How tall is the Great Pyramid?

It was about 146.6 metres when finished and is about 138.5 metres today, after losing its casing and capstone.