The Ananda Temple is a Buddhist temple in Bagan, Myanmar, completed around 1105 under King Kyanzittha of the Pagan Kingdom and considered one of the finest surviving examples of the early Mon-influenced style of Bagan temple architecture. Built on a cruciform plan around a square central core, the temple rises through receding terraces to a corncob shaped stupa finial gilded in gold, and each of its four faces holds a standing Buddha image roughly nine meters tall. Its whitewashed exterior, restored after damage in a 1975 earthquake, and its glazed terracotta relief tiles depicting Jataka tales around the lower terraces, have made it one of the most visited of the thousands of temples that survive across the Bagan plain. Bagan as a whole, including the Ananda Temple, was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2019.
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Consecrated 1105 CE under King Kyansittha, its corridor-vaulted brick plan and gilded spire a peak surviving example of Bagan-period temple architecture.
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