Levi vs Rovaniemi: Which Lapland Base Is Right for You, or Should You Do Both?
If you only have three nights, base yourself in Rovaniemi. If the Northern Lights, skiing or a smaller village matter more to you than Santa Claus Village, Levi is worth the extra 170 km. If you have four nights or more, do what we did and split them.
We flew into Rovaniemi in mid-February, spent two nights at Apukka Resort, drove north for two nights at Northern Lights Village in Levi, and flew out of Kittilä. The two towns felt distinctly different, and with four nights to work with, splitting them gave us the best of both.
This guide covers what each base is like, which one wins for what you came for, the one-way route we drove, where we ate in Levi, and how to split your nights.
Rovaniemi vs Levi Quick Reference
How the two bases compared on our February trip. Tap a row name to jump to the full section.
| Rovaniemi | Levi | |
|---|---|---|
| Known for | Santa Claus Village and the Arctic Circle | Skiing, and Northern Lights cabins outside the village |
| Airport | Rovaniemi (RVN), about 3 km from Santa Claus Village | Kittilä (KTT), 15 km from the village center |
| Feel | Organized, festive, easy to navigate | Smaller, quieter, a ski town |
| Santa Claus Village | 8 km north of the center | About 170 km south |
| Skiing | Not the draw | The main draw |
| Our Northern Lights nights | One low sighting, one night clouded out | Both nights, long and bright |
| Nature nearby | Korouoma Canyon, Riisitunturi National Park | Pallas-Yllästunturi National Park |
| Eating out | We ate at the resort and at Santa Claus Village | A walkable village center with real choice |
WHAT’S IN THIS GUIDE
Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. If you book through them, I may earn a small commission at no additional cost to you. I only recommend experiences, accommodations, and services I’ve taken part in personally or researched thoroughly. See our Privacy Policy for more details.
Rovaniemi as a Base
Rovaniemi is the Santa Claus side of Lapland. The city calls itself the Official Hometown of Santa Claus, and the Arctic Circle runs straight through Santa Claus Village on its northern edge.
It is also the entry point to Lapland for most travelers, and it is set up for it. The airport is small and close to everything, the town feels organized and easy to navigate, and Santa Claus Village sits 8 km north of the center, about 3 km from the airport itself.
It has a strong network of established tour operators. Husky safaris, reindeer farms, snowshoeing, snowmobiling and ice floating all run in and around the city, and resorts such as Apukka Resort, Arctic TreeHouse Hotel and the Arctic SnowHotel coordinate activities directly or with partners they trust. If you want structured days and very little driving, this is the easier base.
Our two Rovaniemi days were full. We booked a private floating sauna at Apukka on the first evening. The next morning the car dash read -27°C on the way to Santa Claus Village, where we crossed the Arctic Circle line and ate at the Salmon Place, and the afternoon went to ice floating on a frozen lake and a tour of the Arctic SnowHotel, with snow tubing at sunset.
That sauna is worth singling out, because it was the most Finnish thing we did all week. It sat frozen into the lake for the winter, with a hole cut in the ice off the front deck. The next night we booked the sauna carriage instead, which was delivered to our cabin door at the time we reserved. Northern Lights Village has its own igloo sauna with a hot tub and a sky window, a warmer and gentler take on the same ritual. If going into the water is the part you are after, it is worth checking what your own place offers before you book. Both Apukka saunas, and what the ice hole is actually like, are in our Finnish Lapland winter guide.
Parts of it feel commercial, especially around the Village. It is also iconic, with the Arctic Circle line, Santa and the airport all within a few kilometers of each other.
Levi as a Base
Levi is the ski side. It bills itself as Finland’s leading ski resort, and since 2006 it has hosted the World Cup slalom races that open the Alpine skiing season each November.
It felt different almost immediately. Smaller, quieter, and more connected to the landscape around it.
There is a defined village center, with restaurants, shops and ski access you can walk between, but past that core the cabins and resorts spread out into the forest. The slopes draw Finnish skiers as well as international visitors in peak season. Even so, it never felt crowded. The slopes were expansive and the village felt active without being chaotic.
The Northern Lights are where Levi pulled ahead for us. At Northern Lights Village we saw the lights on both nights, long and bright with color beyond green, against one low sighting and one clouded-out night at Apukka. That is one trip and one run of weather, so read it as our experience rather than a rule. The Finnish Meteorological Institute puts the odds over the Lapland ski resorts, Levi among them, at roughly every second night, and publishes no separate figure for Rovaniemi. What Levi does offer is less concentrated light, especially once you are outside the village center.
Winter activities are just as easy to find here: husky safaris, snowmobiling, reindeer farms, skiing, snowshoeing and ice floating. The feel is more nature-forward and less event-focused than Rovaniemi.
Which Base Wins for What You Came For
| What you came for | Base | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Santa Claus Village and a festive feel | Rovaniemi | Without much debate. The Village is a short bus or taxi ride from the center and from the airport. |
| The Northern Lights | Either | The number of nights you give them matters more than the town. On darkness alone, Levi and its surrounding cabins have less light around them. |
| Skiing | Levi | The slopes are the reason many Finnish travelers are there in the first place. |
| Frozen waterfalls and marshmallow trees | Rovaniemi | Korouoma Canyon, known for its frozen waterfalls, and Riisitunturi National Park, famous for its snow-laden trees, are both easier to reach from there. Levi sits closer to Pallas-Yllästunturi National Park, better for fell hiking and wide alpine terrain. |
| A short trip with minimal driving | Rovaniemi | Most operators come to you or sit close by. |
| A village you can walk to dinner in | Levi | As long as you stay in or near the center. Many of the glass-cabin resorts, ours included, sit outside it. |
| A sauna with a hole in the ice | Rovaniemi | At Apukka we booked a private floating sauna frozen into the lake, with a hole cut in the ice, and booked the sauna carriage to the cabin door the next night. Northern Lights Village has an igloo sauna with a hot tub. Both are single properties rather than whole towns, so check what yours offers. |
If we could have built the trip out of parts, it would have been Apukka, in Levi. Everything about that resort worked for us, and Levi gave us the nights we came for. Nobody sells that combination, which is why we ended up splitting our nights between the two, and why most of what follows is about how to do that.
Doing Both: Our One-Way Route North
Rovaniemi and Levi each have their own airport, which makes doing both simple. Fly into one, cover the 170 km between them, and fly home out of the other. This is the route we took.
We connected in Helsinki and flew Finnair to Rovaniemi. The airport has two baggage belts that I saw, and with several flights landing close together it was busy. The rental counters are down a hallway to the left as you head for the exit. Our Avis counter was quiet, and we took an SUV, which I recommend in winter, parked in a numbered space out in the snowy lot. The road out of the airport is packed snow between trees bent double with frost, and the first few minutes of it felt like a lot. Finland takes care of these roads, and by the time we reached Apukka the driving felt ordinary.
Apukka Resort, a two-story Kammi glass cabin, the floating sauna and a full day at Santa Claus Village and on the ice.
We spent the morning at Apukka and then headed north. The roads were compacted snow rather than sheets of ice, and the winter tires held. We broke the drive at a Sámi family’s reindeer farm near Levi, fed the reindeer, snowshoed across a frozen lake toward the marshmallow trees, and reached Northern Lights Village just before seven in the evening.
A husky safari, pizza in the village, ice karting and two nights of Northern Lights from the cabin.
The airport is 15 km from Levi’s center. Avis was not open yet when we returned the car, so we parked in a marked Avis return space, dropped the key in the overnight box and pulled our luggage through the snow to the terminal. Inside, check-in was quick with no lines. Security was more thorough than we have seen lately in the U.S. or elsewhere in Europe, with every electronic and every liquid out of the bag, but with no crowd it moved smoothly. From there we flew to Helsinki and on to Copenhagen.
After we returned the car in Kittilä, the final charge did not close out on our credit card. The pending amount, deposit included, sat there for more than a week. A call to the local Avis office in Rovaniemi finalized it and the hold dropped shortly after. This may vary by location, but on a one-way rental between airports, allow extra time or follow up yourself.
Levi’s own travel page puts the town about 170 km north of Rovaniemi and reports frequent bus connections between the two. The nearest train station to Levi is Kolari, about 80 km away, with a bus meeting each arriving train. Finnair flies Helsinki to Kittilä daily all year, with several flights a day in high season. Northern Lights Village runs a daily shuttle into Levi center at 10:30 a.m. and 4 p.m. for 6 EUR a person. Schedules and prices change, so confirm before you travel.
There is also a transfer built as its own half day: a four-hour Rovaniemi to Levi adventure transfer that collects you, stops along the way and drops you at your Levi accommodation, which is worth a look if you have children or simply do not want to drive in winter.
Eating in Levi Village
Northern Lights Village serves dinner as a buffet. We arrived late our first evening and ate there, and we found it underwhelming. We typically prefer plated dinners after long activity days, which likely shaped our view, so after that first night we drove into the village instead.
Pizzeria Via Tribunali. Founded in Helsinki in 2017 and open in Levi since 2025, it serves Neapolitan pizza certified by the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana. We started with the Bresaola and one of the best Caesar salads we have ever had. My husband and I like to try more than one pizza, so we planned to split a Con Salame and a Diavola, and the staff made each of ours half and half so we could both taste both. Each person orders their own pizza here, children included, it arrives uncut, and most diners use a knife and fork. After days of lighter seasoning across Lapland, it felt like a reset.
King Crab House. It came recommended, and we wanted Arctic seafood. We started with the soup and the king crab cakes, and both were flavorful. Then we ordered the seafood platter to share, assuming one would cover the two of us. The king crab legs and the mussels were our favorites; the other parts suited our taste less. It ended up our most expensive meal in Finland and, for us, not the strongest value.
The platter was priced per person, 78 EUR each, with a two-person minimum, and some items we had already ordered, the crab cakes among them, came on it. Read the menu closely before you order, and check current prices on the day.
How to Split Your Nights
Tap the number of nights you have.
Two and two, and this is what we did. Rovaniemi first for the Village and the Arctic Circle, the drive north with a stop along the way, then Levi for the last two nights and an easy morning run to Kittilä.
Fly: into Rovaniemi, out of Kittilä. One road, driven once.
How much you fit into each day is your call. The split works as well with one activity a day and long evenings in the cabin as it does with three activities before dark.
Some glass-cabin properties set a minimum number of nights in winter, and peak dates can carry longer ones. Confirm the rule at both properties before you lock in two and two, or you may find one side forces three.
What We Would Do Differently
Two changes to the route itself, both from our own trip.
Split the car pickup from the luggage at Rovaniemi
It was busy with cars and buses when we landed, so we walked out to the car together and dragged the luggage through the snowy lot. Next time my husband would find the car and drive it to the covered pickup area by the exit while I wait inside with the bags.
Give Korouoma or Riisitunturi a day
We skipped both to fit in the Arctic activities and the second base, a hard call for someone who will travel out of the way to see a waterfall. Next time I would anchor more of the trip near Rovaniemi and build in the extra day.
The Local Rhythm & Unspoken Rules
On the Road Between Them
Finnish law requires headlights on at all times, in every season. Rental cars are usually set up for it, but check before you pull out of the lot.
Reindeer wander onto Lapland roads, and Visit Finland’s advice is to slow to a stop and let them move on in their own time; honking rarely helps. The Reindeer Herders’ Association puts road deaths and injuries at 4,000 to 5,000 reindeer a year in northern Finland, most often at dusk and dawn.
Functional winter layers were fine everywhere we went, including the restaurants in Levi’s village center. Nobody was dressed for fashion. Leave the jeans at home.
The Rules That Are Not Suggestions
Visit Finland states that winter tires are required whenever conditions demand them between November 1 and March 31. Confirm your rental has them.
Diesel is common in Finland, and our rental ran on it. Look before you reach for the pump.
The card terminal sits apart from the pump, our debit cards were refused, and you pre-authorize an amount first. We guessed 20 EUR and were charged only for what we pumped.
Don’t Make This Mistake
These are firsthand mistakes we actually made on this trip that cost us time, access, or a better experience.
We parked beside another car in a space with no obvious signage, and our husky guide kindly told us we needed to move. Levi has parking zones that are not clear to a visitor. Confirm you are allowed to be there before you walk away.
At Kittilä we parked first and then pulled every bag from the rental building to the terminal. It was not a long walk, but it was not a short one either. Drop the bags at the curb first, then return the car.
Other Common Pitfalls To Avoid
None of these will sink a two-base trip, but each one costs time you would rather spend outside.
If you fly in and out of Rovaniemi while staying in Levi, you drive the 170 km twice. Fly into one airport and out of the other.
Several of Levi’s glass-cabin properties, Northern Lights Village among them, sit outside the center. Check how you will get to dinner before you give up the car.
A car dropped at a different airport can price differently from a round trip. Compare the total with the drop-off included.
BSF Booking Essentials
Two Bases, One Road North
▲
Levi vs Rovaniemi: Frequently Asked Questions
With three nights or fewer, Rovaniemi is the easier base: short airport transfers, Santa Claus Village nearby and a strong network of tour operators. With four nights or more, splitting your time between Rovaniemi and Levi gives you both.
About 170 km by road. We drove it in February on compacted snow with winter tires and broke the trip with an afternoon at a reindeer farm near Levi. There are also frequent buses between the two.
Yes. Fly into Rovaniemi, drive or take the bus north, and fly home from Kittilä, 15 km from Levi. That one-way route avoids driving the same road twice.
On our trip it was: we saw the lights both nights in Levi and once, low on the horizon, in two nights near Rovaniemi. Cloud decides any given night, so the number of nights you book matters more than the town. Levi’s cabins outside the village do have less light around them.
Kittilä, 15 km from Levi’s center. Finnair flies there daily from Helsinki all year, with several flights a day in high season.
No. Buses run between Rovaniemi and Levi, trains reach Rovaniemi and Kolari, and many resorts run shuttles or transfers. We rented a car and found the winter roads manageable, and it let us stop along the way and eat in Levi village.
Rovaniemi. The Village is 8 km north of the city center and about 3 km from Rovaniemi Airport, with local bus 8 running there all year. From Levi it is about 170 km.
Inspired by This Guide?
Two bases, one route, planned around how you travel.
Splitting Lapland between Rovaniemi and Levi means a one-way car or transfer, two sets of cabin bookings with their own rules, and flights into one airport and out of another. That routing is exactly what we plan, along with the days in between.
Choose Trip Design for a ready-to-book blueprint, or Dream to Done for the whole trip handled start to finish.
The Rest of Our Lapland Winter
Huskies, reindeer, ice floating and what we packed are all in the full guide.