Zehlendorf

Zehlendorf is a locality (Ortsteil) of the Steglitz-Zehlendorf district in the far south-west of Berlin. It covers about 16 km² and had about 55,000 registered residents on 30 June 2026, so it is far less densely populated than the inner city. In December 2020 parts of Zehlendorf and Nikolassee were combined into the new locality of Schlachtensee; the lake and S-Bahn station of that name now belong to it.

Settlers founded villages here around 1200, and Zehlendorf was first recorded in 1242. The first Prussian railway, from Berlin to Potsdam, reached it in 1838, which made it attractive for commuters. Zehlendorf became a municipality in 1872 and part of Greater Berlin in 1920; villa building accelerated during the twentieth century.

Notable places include the octagonal village church (1768), the art-nouveau Mexikoplatz station (1904/05) and its square, the Haus am Waldsee, a 1920s villa that is now a venue for contemporary art, and the Museumsdorf Düppel, an open-air museum with a reconstructed medieval village.

Zehlendorf is the quietest and oldest locality in this set: about 30% of residents are 65 or over (Berlin: about 19%), and about 15% held a non-German citizenship on 30 June 2026 (Berlin: about a quarter). It is popular with families looking for space and greenery, and with international households linked to schools and institutions in the south-west, such as the John F. Kennedy School.

Its parts include:

• Zehlendorf-Mitte around the village church and Teltower Damm, the local shopping street.
• Zehlendorf-West around Mexikoplatz, with villas and tree-lined streets.
• Zehlendorf-Nord with the 1920s Onkel-Tom estate near the U3, designed in part by Bruno Taut.
• Düppel and Zehlendorf-Süd / Schönow in the south, with more recent estates and houses.

• S1: Sundgauer Straße, Zehlendorf and Mexikoplatz. Northbound it runs via Rathaus Steglitz, Schöneberg and Potsdamer Platz to Friedrichstraße and Gesundbrunnen; southbound to Schlachtensee and Wannsee, where you can change to the S7 for Potsdam.
• U3: Krumme Lanke (terminus, a 1929 station by Alfred Grenander) and Onkel Toms Hütte, then via the Freie Universität and Dahlem to Wittenbergplatz, Kreuzberg and Warschauer Straße.
• Buses link the S-Bahn and U-Bahn with the residential areas in between.

Journeys to the eastern districts take a long time, and many households here also use a car or a bike for local trips. Check your commute in the BVG journey planner before you commit.

Zehlendorf has a higher share of detached and semi-detached houses and villas than most of Berlin, alongside 1920s and 1930s estates such as the Onkel-Tom estate, postwar apartment buildings and newer developments in the south.

There is no official rent figure for Zehlendorf alone. As a citywide anchor, the IBB Housing Market Report 2025 found a median asking rent of €15.78 per m² net cold for flats advertised in Berlin in 2025. For houses, the IBB recorded a median asking purchase price of €874,879 for one- and two-family houses in Steglitz-Zehlendorf in 2025, the second highest of all districts. Use the official rent index query (Mietspiegel 2026) to check rents for flats.

Children under 15 make up about 12% of residents (Berlin: about 13%, 30 June 2026). Outdoor space is the big draw:

• The Krumme Lanke lake at the edge of the Grunewald forest, close to the U3 terminus.
• The Schlachtensee lake just over the boundary in the neighbouring locality.
• Smaller parks such as the Schönower Park, Heinrich-Laehr-Park and Schweizerhofpark.
• The Museumsdorf Düppel open-air museum.

For childcare, search by address in the city's Kita-Navigator. Primary school places are normally allocated by registered address, as decided by the district school office; the school directory lists bilingual and other special programmes.