Is Fremantle Markets open every day?

No. Fremantle Markets trades Friday, Saturday and Sunday, 9am to 6pm. It has been in the same heritage-listed Victorian hall since 1897. The nearby E Shed Markets on Victoria Quay keeps the same three days and stays open later.

Are there night markets in Perth?

Yes, and most of them are seasonal. Twilight Hawkers Market fills Forrest Place on Friday evenings through the warm months, Scarborough Sunset Markets runs Thursday evenings from early November to late March, and Subi Night Market trades Saturday evenings from spring to autumn. Outside those months the city goes quiet after dark.

Which Perth farmers market is the best?

Mount Claremont Farmers' Market has the strongest claim, since it was Perth's first when it opened in 2007 and is still run by a primary school P&C to fund the school. It trades Saturday 7:30am to 11:30am. Subi Farmers Market, running since 2009 on the same not-for-profit model, is the other one worth a Saturday.

How do I get from Perth to Fremantle for the markets?

The Fremantle line train runs from Perth Underground and Elizabeth Quay and takes about half an hour, arriving a short walk from both Fremantle Markets and E Shed. Driving on a Saturday means competing for parking with everyone else who had the same idea.

Perth Markets, Starting in Fremantle

Perth's best market is not in Perth. It is in Fremantle, half an hour down the river, inside a Victorian hall that has been trading since 1897, and if you have one morning in this city that is where it should go.

That is the first thing to know. The second is that Perth puts its most enjoyable markets on in the evening, and only in summer, so the guide that works in January is the wrong one in July.

Start with Fremantle

Fremantle Markets trades Friday, Saturday and Sunday, 9am to 6pm. Heritage-listed, still doing fresh produce alongside the crafts and street food, and busy enough on a Saturday that the fresh hall is a genuine crush by midday. Come Friday if your dates allow it.

Five minutes away on Victoria Quay, E Shed Markets is Western Australia's only waterfront market, inside a 1929 timber wharf shed that was physically rotated 180 degrees and relocated in 1995. Same three days, open until 8pm, and a completely different feel: less produce, more browsing, and the harbour right there.

If you want the food rather than the atmosphere, Freo Farmers Market at Beaconsfield started in 2010 as a school P&C fundraiser and outgrew its original high school. It runs Sunday mornings.

Summer evenings are the local answer

This is the part visitors miss, because it does not exist for half the year.

Twilight Hawkers Market turns Forrest Place in the city centre into an open-air food hall every Friday evening through the warm months, with more than forty street food vendors and live music. It is the single best cheap dinner in central Perth.

Scarborough Sunset Markets runs Thursday evenings from 5pm to 9pm along the beach foreshore, early November to late March only. The whole format is built around watching the sun go down over the Indian Ocean, which is not a thing the east coast can offer.

Subi Night Market trades Saturday evenings from spring through autumn, in a Subiaco park set aside as the suburb's market square a century ago. And once a month, Kalamunda Artisan Market runs first-Saturday evenings up in the hills, Rotary-run since 2000 and responsible for more than $2 million returned to the local community.

Plan a summer visit around these. Plan a winter one around the daytime markets instead.

The suburban farmers markets

Perth's farmers markets are unusually school-linked. Three of the best exist to fund the primary schools they sit in.

Mount Claremont Farmers' Market was Perth's first, founded in 2007, and trades Saturday 7:30am to 11:30am. Subi Farmers Market has run since 2009 on the same model, also Saturday. On Sunday, Stirling Farmers' Market has been run entirely by the Rotary Club of Karrinyup for more than a decade, rain or shine, and Palmyra Western Farmers Market and The Local Farmers Market at Wandi both trade 8am to noon.

Further out, Kalamunda Farmers Market runs Sunday in the hills, and Melville Rotary Markets at Bicton opens at 6am and is done by ten. Perth's early finishes are not a suggestion.

The big weekend bazaars

Different proposition entirely: large, covered, cheap, and aimed squarely at locals doing a weekly shop.

Wanneroo Markets has been a northern suburbs institution since 1980, more than 180 stalls, Friday through Sunday. Gosnells Railway Markets runs Thursday through Sunday in the southeast. Malaga Markets keeps the same Friday-to-Sunday weekend.

South, Canning Vale Markets trades Sunday 7am to 1pm inside the same precinct as Market City, Western Australia's central wholesale produce complex since 1989, where the public can buy direct from wholesalers at the Saturday Clearance Market from 6am. Ten o'clock and it is over.

For an ordinary shop

Boatshed Market at Cottesloe opens every day from 6:30am, inside the actual boatshed where the America's Cup-winning yacht Australia II was built in 1983. Gilbert's Fresh Market at Midland does the same job daily on the eastern side.

Working out the season

More Perth markets are seasonal than in any other Australian capital, and the pattern is the reverse of Darwin's: Perth's outdoor evening markets run through summer and stop for winter, while the Top End's run through the dry and stop for the wet. Both are noted on the individual listings where the dates are confirmed.

For the current picture, markets in Perth this weekend resolves the dates, and Saturday and Sunday each have their own page. All 67 Western Australian markets sit on the WA markets hub, with the metro subset at the Perth city hub.