In Rome, make sure to book in advance for the Colosseum, the Vatican Museums and the Borghese Gallery. For other attractions, booking in advance will help with planning or reducing waiting times. However, it is not necessary to book your entire stay in advance.

I know a thing or two about this. During several visits to Rome, I was unable to get into some museums or galleries precisely because I underestimated the importance of booking tickets in advance.

• Our tips: Accommodation in Rome
• Public transport in Rome: which ticket options were best value for me

The 10 best hotels in Rome

💬 Do you know of any other places in Rome where you need to make a booking? Let me know in the comments below the article. I’d be happy to update the post based on your recommendations. Thanks!

Tickets for Rome’s attractions: prices and bookings

The table shows standard adult admission prices without discounts. A booking fee is included for the Vatican Museums and the Borghese Gallery. Special tours, exhibitions and certain vendor fees may increase the price.

The links in the last column lead to the official ticket sales site or the booking page for the attraction itself.

Attraction	Standard price	When and where to book
Colosseum + Roman Forum + Palatine Hill	18 eur	30 days in advance
Vatican Museums + Sistine Chapel	25 eur online	Ideally 4–6 weeks in advance
Galleria Borghese	Standard admission 18 eur with booking	Ideally 3–4 weeks in advance
St Peter’s Basilica	Free; optional booking is subject to a fee	A few days in advance if you want a timed entry
Castel Sant’Angelo	18 eur	Ideally 1–3 days in advance
The Pantheon	7 eur	Ideally 1–3 days in advance
Galleria Colonna	From 15 eur depending on the route	Ideally 5–7 days in advance
Passetto di Borgo	Depending on the tour	3–4 weeks in advance

Places where you can’t get by without a booking

Here’s an overview of places where you should book several weeks in advance – ideally straight after buying your flight tickets.

The Colosseum + Roman Forum + Palatine Hill

Rome’s biggest tourist attraction – and it certainly looks the part.

All three sites can be visited with a single ticket.

💡 You can visit the Forum and the Palatine Hill at any time of day, but you must have a ticket for a specific time slot to enter the Colosseum.

• Colosseum – tickets are also available at the door, but only for a fixed time slot, and they may be sold out for that day
  • This is particularly likely at weekends between April and October
  • I recommend buying tickets on the official website as soon as you know the date of your visit
  • I describe my experience in detail on the Colosseum page
• Roman Forum + Palatine Hill – you can buy tickets on the spot without a specific time slot
  • With an online ticket, you’ll save yourself a queue that usually takes 20–30 minutes
  • I describe my experience in detail on the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill page

Vatican Museums + Sistine Chapel

It’s practically not worth going there at all without a booking.

Queues on the day can easily be 2–3 hours long. In peak season, even longer. I gave up just at the sight of the queue, which snaked its way through several streets.

• Entry is at a specific time (even if you buy your ticket on the spot, so you might end up queuing for three hours only to find the next available slot is several days away)
• Online booking is essential at least two weeks in advance, otherwise there won’t be any places available
• The official website is museivaticanitickets.com,and I describe my experience in an article about the Vatican Museums

Villa Borghese Gallery

One of the best galleries in Europe – and also the most restricted.

• Admission is by 2-hour time slots only
• Limited number of visitors
• Virtually impossible to visit without a booking; book via the official websiteborghesegallery.com
• It’s usually fully booked 3–4 weeks in advance

Book this first thing, straight after buying your flight ticket.

Where is the gallery and what can you see there? We’ve covered this in our article on Villa Borghese.

Passetto di Borgo

I didn’t manage to get in here precisely because I hadn’t booked my ticket in time.

It is an elevated walkway connecting the Vatican to Castel Sant’Angelo and is only open twice a week to a limited number of visitors.

• Book your entry via the official websitecoopculture.it
• Ideally, at least3–4 weeks in advance

Where booking is advisable but not essential

St Peter’s Basilica

We’ll stay in the Vatican a little longer.

The world’s most famous church is open to the public free of charge without the need for a booking, but that is precisely why queues can form during the day, sometimes lasting more than three hours.

If you book your visit in advance, you’ll pay a small fee, but you’ll save a lot of time.

• Book only via the official website and not from scammers on the spot
• Booking is worth it if you want to visit the basilica and the dome between approximately 9.00 and 18.00
• Before 9.00, the queues are minimal
• The queue for those with a booking is only for the security check (around 20 minutes)
• I describe the details of how and when to book your visit in my article on St Peter’s Basilica
• I recommend booking online at least2–3 days in advance

Castel Sant’Angelo

It’s not quite as busy as St Peter’s Basilica, but queues do form.

• No booking is required
• during peak season, however, it can save you up to an hour in the queue
• You just need to book 1–2 days in advance for a specific time

I provide detailed information in the article on Castel Sant’Angelo.

Galleria Colonna

The beautiful interiors of the Colonna family’s palace are open to the public only twice a week: on Fridays and Saturdays.

Although I managed to book a place on the day of my visit, I would recommend booking5–7 days in advance, particularly in summer and especially on Fridays, when only guided tours are available.

I’ve written about how much I enjoyed my visit and where I booked my tickets in my article on the Palazzo Colonna.

What worked well for me?

The best strategy is a combination of:

• booking the key attractions I definitely want to see in advance (for me, next time that’ll be the Vatican Museums and the dome of St Peter’s Basilica; I’d also like to visit the Galleria Borghese at some point, but you really do need to book that well in advance)
• keep the rest flexible
• and organise the itinerary around the time slots of the bookings

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How to save money (and avoid overpaying for admission)

Official websites are often cheaper than resellers. The only exceptions are when:

• you want skip-the-line packages
• or combined tickets
• which are very common on GetYourGuide

Although I often use GetYourGuide to book excursions (most recently, for example, on Koh Samui in Thailand or in Cancún in Mexico), in Rome I booked everything solely through the official websites listed in our guide to places to see.

Where to stay to save time

Location in Rome matters more than anything else.

The ideal option is:

• the historic centre (more expensive, but saves the most time)
• Trastevere (better prices + atmosphere)
• the area around the metro (a compromise)

Compare hotels in Rome by location