Siem Reap Markets: Old Market, Made in Cambodia, the Night Markets and Psar Leu, Which Is Which (2026)

Siem Reap has one market where Cambodians shop, one market where Cambodians and visitors cross paths, and four night markets that sell the same imported goods at the same prices to people who have just left Pub Street. Asking for the best market in Siem Reap is the wrong question. The right one is what you want to carry home, because the answer decides whether you go at 6:00 a.m. to the Old Market, at noon to Oum Khun Street, or at 8:00 p.m. to the river.

The lists online rank markets by review count, which rewards the ones nearest the bars. They rarely say that the $3 “silk” scarf is polyester from Thailand, that the wooden elephants are turned in Vietnam and Indonesia, or that the only market with a Cambodian-made rule has 20 stalls and closes at 6:00 p.m. They also skip Psar Leu entirely, which is the one market in town that was never built for anyone but the people who live here.

This guide takes each market and each of the shops that do what the markets claim to do, with hours, what is on the tables, what a fair price looks like and what should stay on the table. Prices, hours and transport times below were checked against operator websites, local directories and recent reporting in October 2026.

Three Kinds of Market, Not One Ranking

The trap is treating Siem Reap’s markets as versions of the same thing. They are three different institutions that happen to share a word.

The town market. Psar Leu Thom Thmey on National Road 6 feeds and clothes Siem Reap. It opens before dawn, sells in riel and has no souvenir section. Psar Chas, the Old Market, used to be this and still is between 6:00 and 9:00 a.m., when the fish and pork counters in the center are working and the scarf stalls on the rim are shuttered.

The visitor market. From mid-morning the Old Market’s outer ring turns into one, and the night markets around Pub Street and across the river are nothing else. Their stock comes from the same wholesalers: T-shirts, elephant pants, polyester scarves, carved wooden animals, magnets, “silver” bangles, paintings of Angkor Wat at sunrise. The prices are the same from stall to stall because the cost prices are. Choosing between these markets is choosing a walk, not a selection.

The curated market and the workshop. Made in Cambodia Market admits only vendors whose goods are made in the country and fixes price ranges. Artisans Angkor, Senteurs d’Angkor, Theam’s Gallery and the ceramics, lotus and spirits workshops make what they sell on site and let you watch. Prices are higher, fixed, and buy something that exists because of Cambodia rather than something that passed through it.

A good shopping afternoon uses all three. A bad one spends three hours comparing the same T-shirt at four night markets.

The Market Where Both Worlds Meet

Psar Chas, the Old Market

The honest verdict: the one market worth visiting for the building itself, as long as you arrive before the tour buses come back from Angkor. Psar Chas occupies the block between Pub Street, the river and Hospital Street, two minutes on foot from the Pub Street junction. The center of the covered hall is a wet market: river fish still moving, pork cut to order, frogs, herbs by the bunch, dried fish, fermented fish paste (prahok), palm sugar in cakes, cashews, chili, lemongrass, kaffir lime. This part is busy from about 6:00 a.m. and thins out by 10:00 or 11:00 a.m. The outer ring is the souvenir market: kramas, T-shirts, silk-look table runners, coconut-wood spoons, stone and wood carvings, silver and silver-look jewelry, spices in sealed bags, lacquer boxes, paintings. These stalls open from about 9:00 a.m., most close around 6:00 p.m., and the row facing Pub Street and the river stays open to 8:00 or 9:00 p.m. There are also gold shops, hardware, bedding and beauty counters, which is the clue that Cambodians still use the place.

What is worth buying here: the food. Kampot pepper by weight, dried chili, palm sugar, a bag of cashews, a granite mortar and pestle, kitchen tools. Vacuum-sealed spice packs travel, and most customs regimes accept dried spices and refuse fresh produce. Among the souvenirs, the stone carvers who work near the market are real and their reproductions are legal to export. Most of the rest is the same stock the night markets carry.

How to pay: dollars for anything over a dollar, riel for change below it, at the street rate of 4,000 riel to the dollar. Torn or written-on dollar bills will be refused, so check your change. A few stalls take cards for large purchases and add a fee. The money guide covers the torn-note problem in detail.

The limitation: the aisles are narrow, the crowd is dense after 10:00 a.m. and pickpockets work it. Keep the bag in front, and read the scams guide before the woman with the baby and the formula tin finds you outside. For the neighborhood around the market, the cafes on Alley West and the river, see Pub Street and the Old Market.

The Night Markets

Four markets sit within a 15-minute walk of Pub Street and sell to the same people on the same evening. The honest verdict on all of them together: go to the one closest to where you are eating, buy the T-shirt there and do not cross town for another. The exception is Road 60, which is not a souvenir market and is covered separately below. The cluster guide on the night markets compares them stall by stall.

Siem Reap Art Center Night Market

The one to pick if you want a night market at all. It sits on the east bank of the river directly opposite the Old Market, reached by the footbridge, so it costs nothing to get to and sits beside the quieter riverside restaurants. The directory updated in October 2026 lists hours of 4:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m., Monday to Saturday, with Sunday closed, and its Google listing shows the same hours. Older guides say it opens around 11:00 a.m. and runs daily, and some stalls do open in the afternoon. The stock: sportswear and copy-brand clothing, bags and wallets, some crocodile leather, wooden crafts, paintings, toys, with a row of foot-massage chairs and a coffee stand. Despite the name, there is little art and no center.

The limitation: nothing here is made in Siem Reap except the paintings, and the hand-woven textiles are from Thailand and Vietnam.

Phalla Angkor Night Market

The Sivatha Boulevard option, just off the boulevard a few minutes’ walk west of Pub Street, open daily from 4:30 p.m. to midnight. It is a covered lane of stalls with bars, restaurants and massage shops built in, which makes it the one that functions as a place to spend an evening rather than a place to shop for 20 minutes. Stock is the same as the Art Center market.

The limitation: the bars push the stalls into the role of decoration, and prices on the drinks are Pub Street prices.

Angkor Night Market

Status unclear in October 2026, and that matters because it is the one every older guide names first. Angkor Night Market opened in 2007 on the street now named after it, off Sivatha Boulevard, as the first night market in Cambodia, with two linked sections, an Island Bar with live music, a Dr Fish tank and a small cinema showing a film about landmines. A Siem Reap directory updated in October 2026 states that it has not reopened since the pandemic. Generic hotel listings still quote 4:00 p.m. to midnight daily, and a directory refreshed in January 2026 repeats the old description without hours. Google reviews posted between October 2025 and July 2026 under the Angkor Night Market street listing describe vendors trading, without saying whether that is the original market or stalls along the street. If it is operating, expect the same stock as the other two plus more paintings and silk-look scarves. If you are told it is closed, nothing is lost: the Phalla market is two minutes away.

Noon Night Market and the Sivatha lanes

Between Sivatha Boulevard and the Angkor Night Market street there are smaller lanes of stalls that older directories call Noon Night Market and Siem Reap Night Market, plus the alley of stalls at the Pub Street entrance under the bars. They open when the bars open and sell the T-shirts, scarves and sarongs that the bigger markets sell. No directory dated 2025 or 2026 confirms which of these lanes still trade under those names. Treat them as one continuous strip. The limitation: the shortest stall rows have the highest opening prices, because the walk-by trade is drunk.

Road 60 Night Market

The honest verdict: the only night market in Siem Reap worth a tuk-tuk ride, and the only one that is not for you. Road 60 runs north from National Road 6 past the Angkor ticket office, and from about 4:00 p.m. its shoulders fill with vendors renting mats, grills doing chicken and fish, noodle soups, fried rice, banh chao, fried insects, offal skewers, sour green fruit with chili salt, corn, popcorn, candy floss, durian in season and ice cream. There are stalls of pajamas, shoes, toys and phone cases, a small fairground of rides and shooting games, and Cambodian families who come every week. It was pushed back along the road in 2015 when car parks were built, and reporting from October 2024 describes it as poorer and quieter than it was, with a newer, pricier competitor in the Palm Container Night Market drawing the younger crowd. It is 15 minutes from Pub Street by tuk-tuk, about $3 each way. Arrive an hour before sunset for the light and ask the driver to wait, because rides back are scarce after dark.

The limitation: hygiene is street-food hygiene. Choose a grill with a queue and food cooked in front of you, and read street food in Siem Reap for what is safe.

The Market Built to Fix the Problem

Made in Cambodia Market

The honest verdict: the one market in Siem Reap where everything on the table was made in the country, and the one to send anyone who has an hour and wants to buy something real without arguing about the price. Founded in 2013 by Oun Savann and Aebe Christian De Boer, it has moved several times and since February 2022 has occupied a 420-square-meter plot on Oum Khun Street, west of Shinta Mani Angkor and near the Angkor Hospital for Children, 10 minutes on foot north of the Old Market. Around 20 stalls, open every day from noon to 6:00 p.m., with some vendors staying until 8:00 p.m. The rules are the point: goods must be made in Cambodia, vendors may not call out or press a sale, products must differ from stall to stall, and prices sit within ranges approved by the organizers. Vendors named in 2024 reporting include Ammo and Saomao (jewelry from spent bullet casings), Can’Art (bags from drink-can ring pulls), Sombai (infused rice spirits in hand-painted bottles), Angkor Silk and Loom and The Art of Scarf (hand-loomed scarves), Moradok Ceramic, I Dig Herb, Cambodia Natural Seed, Sister Creation, Small Art School and Crafting a Future. Kampot pepper, Pailin beads, palm-sugar ice cream, recycled tire and buffalo-horn goods, leather, wood, copper and silver decor fill in the rest. In its early years the market ran weekends only with Phare performers on stage. It is now daily, and the performances paused in the pandemic were expected to resume.

The limitation: it is small, and a visitor who wants the bulk and noise of a market will walk through it in 15 minutes. Prices are two to five times the night-market price for the same category of object, because the object is not the same.

The Market Where Cambodians Shop

Psar Leu Thom Thmey

The honest verdict: the market to visit if you want to see what a Cambodian market is, and the wrong one if you want to buy souvenirs. Psar Leu, the Upper Market, sits on National Road 6 toward the airport and Phnom Penh, 10 to 15 minutes by tuk-tuk from Pub Street and $4 to $6 for the round trip with a wait. It is the largest market in Siem Reap and the oldest in function. Street vendors outside the entrance start as early as 3:00 or 4:00 a.m. with roasted nuts, lotus flowers, snails and shellfish. The produce entrance is on Lok Ta Neuy Road beside the CP Freshmart. Arrive at 7:00 or 8:00 a.m. for the fish, pork, vegetables, prahok and eggs, because the produce sellers pack up by mid-morning. Inside, the aisles sort into groceries and household goods, fabric and clothing with tailors on site, footwear, a beauty section with manicure chairs and a wall of creams, gold shops, hardware and electrical, kitchenware, baked goods, wedding dresses and fortune tellers. Most shops close around 5:00 p.m. and the food stalls on the rim run an hour or two longer. Across the road, Psar Samaki sells wholesale fruit and vegetables and gets busy an hour before sunset when Psar Leu is winding down.

What to carry home from here: a granite mortar and pestle, a hand-forged knife, a steel tiffin box, a woven grass mat, a batik sarong, an everyday cotton krama from the fabric section, dried Kampot pepper by weight, palm sugar. Prices are in riel and posted or stated once, with little room to bargain because they are already local prices.

The limitation: there is nothing to look at as a visitor except the life of the place, no English signs, and the heat inside after 10:00 a.m. is real. For how Psar Leu fits into the town’s geography, see Siem Reap neighborhoods.

Shops That Do What the Markets Claim To

The markets sell the idea of Cambodian craft. These places make it, and most of them let you watch for free.

Artisans Angkor

The honest verdict: the one stop that settles the silk and stone questions in an hour, free. Artisans Angkor grew out of the Chantiers-Écoles training program of the 1990s and now employs several hundred artisans across workshops in Siem Reap province. The craft center on Stung Thmey Street, five minutes on foot west of the Old Market, is open daily 7:30 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. with free guided tours of the stone carving, wood carving, lacquer, gilding and silk painting workshops throughout the day and a boutique at the same address. The Angkor Silk Farm on National Road 6 in Puok district, 16 km west of town, is open daily 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. and shows the full process from mulberry trees and silkworms to dyeing and hand looms. Travel sites still list a free shuttle from the craft center at 9:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m., booked by phone on +855 12 222 404. The company’s own site no longer mentions it, so call before counting on it. A tuk-tuk to Puok and back with a wait is quoted at $15 to $20. Boutiques also operate in the departures area of Siem Reap-Angkor International Airport. Prices are fixed, far above the market and not published online: a hand-loomed silk scarf, a carved sandstone apsara, a lacquer box each cost what the hours in them cost. The Artisans Angkor and silk farm guide walks through both sites and what is worth buying at each.

The limitation: it is a company with a polished retail floor, and a visitor who expects a village workshop will find a showroom. The silk farm is a half-day once transport is counted.

Senteurs d’Angkor

The honest verdict: the right address for the edible and scented half of a souvenir list, Kampot pepper, palm sugar, spices, teas, coconut oil, soaps and the balm sold everywhere else at a markup. Senteurs d’Angkor makes all of it in a workshop and botanical garden in Srangae commune, out along National Road 6 on the airport side, open every day 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. with a free guided visit of the soap, candle, spice and palm-leaf packaging workshops and a garden of more than 100 plant species. The town shop is on Preah Sangreach Tep Vong Street a short walk from the Old Market, same hours, and there is a counter at the airport. Packaging is sugar-palm leaf and palm wood, which is itself the Cambodian product. A paid candle-making session of about two and a half hours runs from the workshop.

The limitation: the shop is a shop, and the workshop visit is worth the tuk-tuk only if combined with the silk farm or the airport road.

Kandal Village

The honest verdict: the street for a concept-store afternoon in the shade, not for market prices. Kandal Village is the local name for Hap Guan Street and its neighbors, five minutes on foot northwest of the Old Market, where about 25 small businesses, boutiques, cafes, galleries and spas, set up in old shophouses during the 2010s. The shops stock Cambodian-designed homewares, lacquer, ceramics, linen and cotton clothing, prints and jewelry, mixed with pieces from the wider region, so read labels for origin. Hours are shop hours, roughly 10:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., and some close on Sunday or Monday. Individual tenants change often enough that a 2024 article is already a historical document. The Sok San Road and Kandal Village guide keeps a current list.

The limitation: prices are set for the visitor who has already decided not to bargain, and a few shops sell goods from Thailand and Indonesia under a Cambodian-looking label.

The social enterprise shops

The honest verdict: five or six shops in town turn a souvenir purchase into a wage for someone who needed one, and they are easier to find than the markets suggest. The social enterprises guide sorts the genuine ones from the marketing. The ones confirmed trading in October 2026:

Smateria on Alley West, the lane off Pub Street, open daily 10:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m., and at the airport. Bags, wallets and cases hand-sewn in the company’s Phnom Penh workshop from nylon fishing net, recycled plastic fabric and factory remnants, under fair-trade employment. The limitation: the workshop is in Phnom Penh, not here, so there is nothing to watch.

Satcha at #256 BBU Road, open daily 8:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. A showroom of more than 1,000 Cambodian-made products, carving, lacquer, weaving, jewelry, with a free visit to the workshops and a coffee shop. The limitation: it is out toward the airport road, 10 minutes by tuk-tuk, and feels like a retail hall.

Sombai in the Wat Damnak area across the river, 10 minutes on foot from the Old Market. Rice spirit infused with local fruit, spices and herbs in hand-painted bottles, with a free workshop visit and a tasting at $5 booked ahead. Small bottles fit a carry-on. The limitation: it is alcohol, so check your home customs allowance.

Fair Trade Village on Road 60, open daily 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. A permanent covered market of handicrafts from rural artisans, certified by the Angkor Handicraft Association, with some items made on site. The limitation: it sits on the tour-bus circuit and the selection leans to what fits a bus.

Satu Concept Store on Pokambor Avenue by the river, Monday to Saturday 9:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., Sunday from 10:00 a.m. Products from more than 70 Cambodian brands, candles, Kampot pepper, prints, spirits, bags and jewelry, under one roof at fixed prices. The limitation: a concept store at concept-store prices.

Theam’s Gallery on Road 30 in Phum Veal, Kokchak, 100 meters past Mok Neak high school, 10 minutes by tuk-tuk toward the temples, open daily 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., entry $5 for foreigners and free under 12. The home, studio and gallery of Lim Muy Theam, trained in France and a former artistic director at Artisans Angkor, with apprentices lacquering and sculpting on site, pavilions of Khmer architecture and everyday objects, and the lacquered elephants that the markets copy badly. The limitation: a $5 entry to a shop puts some people off, and it is hard to find without a driver who knows it. The galleries guide covers it with the contemporary studios.

Khmer Ceramics and Fine Arts Centre at #0207 River Road in Slorkram, on the upper riverside 10 minutes north of the Old Market on foot. Hand-thrown tableware, celadon-style glazes, Buddha figures and tiles made on site. The center’s own site gives hours of 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. and a 1 hour 45 minute pottery wheel class from $25. The limitation: a directory updated in January 2026 gives a 7:30 p.m. close, so do not arrive in the last half hour.

Lotus Silk Farm by Samatoa at 9 Road 63 near Phnom Krom, about 25 minutes south toward the lake, open daily 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Textile spun from lotus stem fiber, a slow process that makes the fabric expensive and the visit interesting. The limitation: it is a lake-road detour and the fabric costs more than silk.

Golden Silk Pheach near Banteay Srei, about 30 km north, founded in 2002 by Sophea Pheach as an NGO employing women from the surrounding villages, weaving fine golden silk on wooden looms, with a donation requested. Reviews from late 2025 show it still receiving visitors. A Siem Reap tour operator’s factsheet gives visiting hours of Monday to Friday 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. and Saturday 8:00 a.m. to noon, booked at least a day ahead. The limitation: only worth it combined with Banteay Srei, and only with an appointment confirmed by your driver.

What Is Actually Cambodian, and What Is Not

Krama

The checked cotton scarf is the one souvenir that is a daily object in every Cambodian household: head wrap, towel, sarong, baby sling, sweat cloth, shopping bag. The $1 to $2 krama at the Old Market is usually a polyester-cotton blend, machine woven and imported, and it will not absorb water. A hand-loomed cotton krama is heavier, slightly uneven, soft after one wash and costs several times more at Made in Cambodia Market or a weaving workshop. The stalls do not publish prices. Krama Krama, a brand woven by a Siem Reap workshop, lists hand-woven cotton kramas at $35 to $65 online in 2026. The traditional colors are red and white or blue and white. Psar Leu’s fabric section sells the everyday cotton kramas Cambodians buy.

Silk

Cambodian silk is real and the sericulture at Puok and Banteay Srei is real, but very little of it reaches a market stall. Hand-loomed silk is heavy for its size, slightly irregular, warm to the touch and does not shine evenly under a light. A silk scarf at Artisans Angkor costs what the days at a loom cost. The company does not publish prices online and no 2025 or 2026 report quotes one, so ask at the counter. A scarf for $3 to $5 labeled silk at the Old Market or any night market is polyester or a blend from Thailand or Vietnam. The burn test (silk smells of burnt hair, polyester melts) is not something to do at a stall, so trust the price. If it is cheap, it is not silk.

Kampot pepper

Kampot pepper from the southern coast holds a protected geographical indication, Cambodia’s first, and the black, red and white grades are among the few Cambodian products with an international reputation. Genuine Kampot pepper carries the producer’s name and the PGI mark on the packet. It is sold at Senteurs d’Angkor, Satu Concept Store, several stalls at Made in Cambodia Market, and by weight at the Old Market and Psar Leu where the provenance is the vendor’s word. Senteurs d’Angkor’s own shop lists Kampot pepper at $5 to $6 for a 50 g pouch and $11 to $14 for a 150 g box in October 2026. By weight at the market it costs less. Red and white grades cost more. Loose pepper sold as Kampot at a $1 price is pepper, but probably not from Kampot.

Silver

Khmer silverwork, repoussé boxes shaped like fruit and animals, betel sets, belts and bowls, is a court tradition that survives in workshops around Phnom Penh and in a few Siem Reap shops. Market “silver” is mostly plated alloy. Real pieces are stamped, heavy and priced by weight plus work. A 2025 price guide puts sterling silver pieces at 100,000 to 600,000 riel, about $25 to $150. Artisans Angkor and the boutiques in the Raffles and FCC arcades carry stamped silver. At the markets, buy the plated bangle as a plated bangle and pay $2 to $4 for it.

Stone and wood carving

Sandstone reproductions of Angkorian apsaras, Bayon faces and lintels are carved in Siem Reap, at Artisans Angkor and by independent carvers around the Old Market and on the roads to the temples. They are heavy, legal to export and better bought with a receipt. The small polished wooden elephants, Buddha heads and salad servers at every market stall are turned in Vietnam and Indonesia and sold here because tourists expect them. The lacquered elephants at Theam’s Gallery are the original that the market stalls imitate. Anything described as old is covered under What Not to Buy.

Palm products

The sugar palm is the national tree and produces the most honest souvenirs in town: palm sugar in cakes or jars, palm-leaf boxes and packaging, palm wood bowls and spoons, woven palm and grass mats, palm wine not worth carrying. Senteurs d’Angkor packages everything in palm leaf. Psar Leu and the Old Market sell palm sugar by the cake at the food counters.

What is imported

Elephant pants, the printed rayon trousers sold at every stall, are made in Thailand and sometimes India. Copy-brand sportswear, bags and sunglasses are imported. Polyester scarves and sarongs come from Thailand and Vietnam. Magnets, keyrings and most of the “I love Cambodia” T-shirts are printed in China or Vietnam. The paintings of Angkor at sunrise are painted here, often by the person selling them, and are the one made-in-Siem-Reap item at the night markets. None of this is a scandal. It is what every tourist market in Southeast Asia sells. The scandal is paying Cambodian-craft prices for it.

How to Bargain and How Far

Bargaining is expected at the tourist stalls of the Old Market and at every night market, and nowhere else on this page. Made in Cambodia Market, Artisans Angkor, Senteurs d’Angkor, the social enterprise shops, Kandal Village and the food counters of any market have fixed prices. Trying to bargain there is a misreading, and at the food counters it is rude.

Where bargaining applies, the opening price is typically 30 to 50 percent above the settling price. Ask the price, offer about half, and expect to meet at 60 to 70 percent of the opening number. A T-shirt opened at $5 sells for $3. Two or three identical items drop the unit price further. Ask the price of several things at once and walk a few stalls before buying, because the stock is identical and the second vendor has heard what the first one said. Decide the price you are happy to pay before you start and stop there, in either direction. Walking away is allowed and often produces the price. Coming back after walking away is also allowed.

Pay in dollars for anything over a dollar and accept riel change below it at 4,000 to the dollar. Carry small bills, because a $20 note for a $3 purchase stalls the sale and invites a short-change. Do not hand over torn or heavily marked dollar bills and do not accept them. Do not haggle over the last 2,000 riel, about 50 cents, with someone whose margin on the item is a dollar. Vendors in these markets are mostly women supporting households, and the entertainment of winning a 50-cent argument is not worth what it costs them. What the tipping guide says about proportion applies here too.

What Not to Buy

Antiquities, or anything sold as old. Cambodia’s 1996 Law on the Protection of Cultural Heritage prohibits exporting cultural objects, whether publicly or privately owned, and the country has ratified the 1970 UNESCO and 1995 UNIDROIT conventions. The United States restricts the import of Khmer objects from the Bronze Age to the end of the Khmer Empire without a Cambodian export permit. A fragment offered quietly as temple stone is either a fake aged with acid and dirt, in which case you have been robbed, or real, in which case you are carrying a looted object through two sets of customs. Buy a reproduction with a receipt.

Ivory, horn, tortoiseshell, animal parts. Cambodia is a party to CITES. Ivory bangles and carved tusks appear in some gold and souvenir shops, often labeled bone. Rhino horn, pangolin scales, tiger parts and tortoiseshell combs have all been seized in the region. Bringing any of it home is a crime at both borders, and buying it funds the trade that empties Cambodia’s forests. Buffalo horn jewelry from a named recycled-materials maker is the legal exception, and it says so on the tag.

Live animals and birds. The caged birds sold for release near pagodas are caught to be sold again. Do not buy them. The responsible travel pillar covers the logic.

Gems and “Pailin sapphires” at stall prices. Pailin, on the Thai border, was once a sapphire source. Faceted stones at a market stall for $20 are glass or synthetic. Pailin beads sold as beads at Made in Cambodia Market are what they say they are.

Counterfeit medicine. Pharmacies, not markets. See getting sick in Siem Reap.

Anything a child sells. Bracelets, postcards and books from children outside the market and at the temples keep the child out of school. Decline, and buy the book at a shop.

By Situation

You have one hour and want something Cambodian

Made in Cambodia Market on Oum Khun Street between noon and 6:00 p.m. Fixed prices, 20 stalls, no pressure, and every object on the tables was made in the country. Add a bag of Kampot pepper from Senteurs d’Angkor on the way back to the Old Market.

You want the market experience itself

Psar Chas at 7:00 a.m., while the fish counters are working and the souvenir rim is still shuttered, then coffee on Alley West. Come back after 4:00 p.m. for the scarves in the shade.

You want to see where Siem Reap shops

Psar Leu Thom Thmey by tuk-tuk before 9:00 a.m., $4 to $6 round trip with a wait. Buy a mortar, a knife and an everyday krama. Then Road 60 after 5:00 p.m. on another day for the food and the fairground.

You are buying silk or a carving worth real money

Artisans Angkor’s craft center on Stung Thmey Street for the free tour and the boutique, the Puok silk farm if you have a half day, Theam’s Gallery for lacquer. Keep the receipts for customs.

You need T-shirts, elephant pants and gifts for twelve people

Any night market near your hotel, the Art Center market across the footbridge if you are at the Old Market. Buy in multiples, settle at 60 to 70 percent of the opening price and stop comparing after the second stall.

You are traveling with children

The Old Market before 9:00 a.m. for the fish and the frogs, Road 60 at dusk for the rides and the popcorn, Theam’s Gallery for the lacquer workshop. The kids pillar has the heat timetable that decides whether any of this happens.

What It Actually Costs

Item or outing	Reference price	Where	Notes
Krama, polyester-cotton	$1 to $2	Old Market, night markets	Imported, machine woven
Krama, hand-loomed cotton	Not published at the stalls. $35 to $65 online for Krama Krama	Made in Cambodia Market, weaving workshops	Price by size and weave
“Silk” scarf	$3 to $5	Old Market, night markets	Polyester or blend
Hand-loomed silk scarf	Not published online	Artisans Angkor, named weavers	Fixed price, ask at the counter
T-shirt	$2 to $4 settled	Night markets	Opens at $4 to $6
Quick-dry sports shirt	$3 to $6 settled	Art Center Night Market	Copy brand
Elephant pants	$3 to $5 settled	Night markets	Made in Thailand
Kampot pepper, labeled PGI	$5 to $6 for 50 g, $11 to $14 for 150 g	Senteurs d’Angkor	Less by weight at Old Market, provenance unverified
Palm sugar, cake	Under $1	Old Market, Psar Leu	Riel prices
Plated “silver” bangle	$2 to $4	Markets	Alloy
Foot massage	$2 to $3	Night markets	Agree the length before sitting
Theam’s Gallery entry	$5 adult, free under 12	Road 30, Kokchak	Cambodians $2.50
Sombai tasting	$5	Wat Damnak	Workshop visit free
Artisans Angkor tour, craft center or silk farm	Free	Stung Thmey Street, Puok	Daily
Senteurs d’Angkor workshop visit	Free	Srangae, National Road 6	Daily 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.
Tuk-tuk, Pub Street to Old Market area or Sivatha	$1 to $2 one way	Central	Walkable
Tuk-tuk, Pub Street to Psar Leu	$4 to $6 round trip with wait	National Road 6	10 to 15 minutes
Tuk-tuk, Pub Street to Road 60	About $3 each way	Road 60	Driver should wait
Tuk-tuk, craft center to Puok silk farm and back	$15 to $20 with wait	National Road 6 west	Half day

Prices in dollars with change in riel at 4,000 to the dollar. Nothing on this table includes a tip for a waiting driver, which is a dollar or two for a long wait. For how shopping fits into a day’s spending, see what Siem Reap costs per day.

What Other Guides Get Wrong

1. Ranking the night markets against each other. They stock from the same wholesalers at the same cost prices. The only differences are location and the bars attached. Pick the nearest one.
2. Listing Angkor Night Market as open with hours of 4:00 p.m. to midnight. A local directory updated in October 2026 states it has not reopened since the pandemic, and generic hotel listings repeat pre-2020 hours. Ask before walking there.
3. Calling the Old Market a souvenir market. For three hours every morning it is a wet market serving the neighborhood, and that is the version worth seeing. The souvenir rim is the version to shop.
4. Describing the $3 scarf as silk and the wooden elephant as Khmer craft. The scarf is polyester from Thailand or Vietnam and the elephant is turned in Vietnam or Indonesia. The made-in-Siem-Reap item at the night market is the painting.
5. Placing Made in Cambodia Market on King’s Road. It left King’s Road years ago and has been on Oum Khun Street since February 2022. Guides that still send readers to the Hard Rock Cafe corner are copying each other.
6. Teaching bargaining as a sport. Opening prices at the tourist stalls run 30 to 50 percent high, and settling at 60 to 70 percent is normal. Fighting over the last 2,000 riel with a stallholder whose margin is a dollar is not thrift. It is the thing other travelers remember you for.

Detailed Guides

• What to buy in Siem Reap: krama, silk, Kampot pepper, silver and the fakes settles, item by item, how to tell the Cambodian-made version from the import and what each should cost.
• Siem Reap night markets: which is which and what is actually local walks the four markets around Pub Street stall by stall and names the one thing at each that was made here.
• Artisans Angkor and the silk farm: workshops, free tours and what to buy decides whether the Puok silk farm is worth the half day and which products justify the boutique price.
• Social enterprise restaurants and shops in Siem Reap that are worth it separates the shops where a purchase pays a wage from the ones where the label is marketing.
• Siem Reap galleries and studios: contemporary Khmer art covers Theam’s Gallery and the painters and sculptors whose work is not on any market stall.
• Pub Street and the Old Market: what it is, what it is not, and when to go gives the hour-by-hour life of the block the Old Market sits on.
• Sok San Road and Kandal Village: cafes, boutiques and where expats eat keeps the current list of Hap Guan Street tenants, which changes every year.
• Siem Reap scams: baby formula, temple guides, tuk-tuk detours covers the formula-tin routine that works the Old Market entrance and the gem and antique pitches.
• Money in Siem Reap: dollars, riel, ATMs and the torn-note problem explains why a stallholder refuses a torn $10 bill and what to do with 4,000 riel in change.

Where to Go Next

Shopping in Siem Reap happens in the hours the temples do not, so the market mornings and night-market evenings slot around the Angkor Pass and the itinerary in Siem Reap in three days. What you carry out of the markets has to go in the bag described in what to pack for Siem Reap, and the night markets sit inside the evening covered by the Pub Street guide. For the hours when the markets are too hot to stand in, the best time to visit Siem Reap explains why March to May moves everything to before 9:00 a.m. and after 4:00 p.m.