Xi'an is easy to get around as the layout of today's city closely follows the ordered grid map of the ancient one, with straight, wide streets running along the compass directions. The centre is bounded by square city walls, with a bell tower marking the crossroads of the four main streets, Bei Dajie, Nan Dajie, Dong Dajie and Xi Dajie - north, south, east and west streets. Another major street runs south from the train station, where it's called Jiefang Lu, across the city, crosses Dong Dajie where it changes its name to Heping Lu, then to Yanta Lu outside the walls and continues all the way to the Big Goose Pagoda in the southern outskirts , where many of the city's sights are. The only exception to the grid plan of the central streets is the Muslim quarter , northwest of the Bell Tower, around whose unmarked winding alleys it is easy (though not unpleasurable) to get lost.

The modern city , extending far beyond the confines of the walls, in general adheres to the same ordered pattern, with two large highways forming ring roads, the innermost of which goes around the outside of the city walls.