Rome to the Amalfi Coast, booked in advance.
Which Colosseum ticket puts you on the arena floor. How far ahead the Last Supper really sells out. What a day on the coast road costs before lunch. Every tour in Italy, reviewed.
The six sights an Italian itinerary is built around.
The Colosseum, the Sistine Chapel, the David, the Doge’s Palace, a buried Roman town and the coast road south of Sorrento. Six days most trips are planned around, and the best way to book each.
The tours travellers in Italy book most.
Every review →These fill up first, from Vatican entry tickets to the Colosseum morning, and each one earns its slot for a different reason.
1
Museums & Sistine Chapel Entrance Ticket
Save time at the Vatican Museums and Sistine Chapel with timed entry, optional audio guide, and a self-paced route through world-famous art.
From · $38
Read our review →
2
Vatican Museums & Sistine Chapel Tour with Optional Basilica
from $79
3
Colosseum, Roman Forum & Palatine Guided Tour
from $78
4
Cathedral and Duomo’s Terraces Entrance Ticket
from $30
5
Doge’s Palace Reserved Entry Ticket
from $41
6
Vatican Museums, Sistine Chapel & St Peter’s Basilica Guided Tour
from $22
7
Colosseum, Palatine Hill and Roman Forum Guided Tour
from $52
8
Guided Tour of Colosseum, Roman Forum & Palatine Hill
from $55
In Rome, the queue is the thing you are actually booking around.
All 877 Rome tours →
Ancient Rome and the Vatican sit twenty minutes apart and neither lets you walk up on the day in season. These three carry the most travellers; the full list splits the rest by how much ground you want to cover.
Colosseum, Forum and Palatine on one ticket
One ticket covers the arena, the Forum and the hill above it. The guided version walks you through the Colosseum gate rather than the general line, and turns the Forum from rubble into streets.
Vatican Museums, Sistine Chapel, St Peter’s
The museum route runs one way and finishes in the Sistine Chapel. An early slot with reserved entry is the difference between a good morning and two hours of shuffling.
Trastevere and the Jewish Quarter after dark
Supplì fried to order, artichokes done the Roman-Jewish way, a bakery still warm at nine. The food walks cross the river once the day tours have finished.
Book these before you fly to Italy.
Most of Italy can be arranged from the hotel the night before. These cannot. They run on timed slots and daily caps that were set months before your flight was.
- 01Da Vinci’s Last Supper Guided TourFifteen minutes, twenty-five people at a time. Slots are released in batches and go the same day.
- 02Skip-The-Line Uffizi Gallery Timed Entry TicketTimed entry only, and the morning windows are the first to close. The gallery caps how many people are inside at once.
- 03Timed Entrance Ticket to Michelangelo’s DavidOne statue, one timed queue. In summer the walk-up tickets are gone by mid-morning.
- 04Colosseum & Forum with Audio Guide App -Optional ArenaThe arena floor and the underground level run on a small daily permit count, separate from the standard Colosseum ticket.
Venice empties at six, and that is when to walk it.
The Doge’s Palace, the basilica and the lagoon islands all run on reserved entry, so book those for the middle of the day. The evening, once the day boats have gone, needs no booking at all.
Florence is small. Its two queues are not.
The Uffizi and the Accademia hold the Renaissance between them and both run on timed entry. Everything else in the centre is a fifteen-minute walk, which leaves the afternoon free for Chianti.
What a day out costs in Italy.
Every tour on the site, grouped by what it actually charges. A good Italian day starts at the price of a gallery ticket.
Entry tickets, street food walks, gallery slots and pasta classes with the wine included.
The full days out: Pompeii and Vesuvius, the Chianti wineries, the coast road to Positano.
Private guides, boat charters around Capri and the once-a-trip splurge that earns its price.
South of Naples the coast road does the sightseeing for you.
Pompeii is half an hour from the city and Vesuvius an hour past it. Then the road turns west along the cliffs to Positano and Amalfi, which is the whole reason to come down here.
- 1Naples Underground Entry Ticket and Guided Tourfrom $21
- 2Entry Ticket and Guided Tour with an Archaeologistfrom $35
- 3Entry Ticket with Optional Audio Guidefrom $26
Three days no other country can hand you.
Galleries and walled towns turn up all over Europe. A Roman town under ash, a sea cave lit from underneath and a live volcano with a cable car do not.
Pompeii Under the Ash
Vesuvius buried the town in a single afternoon and preserved what it covered: cart ruts worn into the paving, bread ovens, painted shop signs, a street grid you can still get lost in. A guide matters here more than anywhere else in Italy, because without one it is a very large field of low walls.
- 1Entry Ticket and Guided Tour with an Archaeologist★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 19,459 reviews
- 2Entry Ticket with Optional Audio Guide★★★★★★★★★★ 4.2 · 12,360 reviews
- 3Small Group Tour with an Archaeologist★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 12,264 reviews
The Blue Grotto
A cave on the north coast of Capri with an entrance barely a metre high. You lie flat in a rowing boat to get through it, and inside the water glows electric blue because the light arrives through a second opening below the surface. Any real swell and the boatmen close it, so every visit is a morning gamble.
- 1Exclusive Capri Boat Tour and Optional Blue Grotto★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 3,170 reviews
- 2Capri Blue Grotto Small-Group Boat Day Tour From Sorrento★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 2,511 reviews
- 3Island Boat Tour with Blue Grotto Stop★★★★★★★★★★ 4.1 · 2,071 reviews
Mount Etna
Europe's most active volcano runs from lemon groves to black ash in one drive. A cable car and a 4x4 get you to around 2,900 metres, where the ground is warm underfoot and the summit craters steam. Eruptions close the top without notice; the lava caves lower down stay open all year.
- 1Mount Etna Morning or Sunset Day Trip with Tasting★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 4,028 reviews
- 2Mount Etna: Guided Volcano Summit Hiking Tour with Cable Car★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 3,784 reviews
- 3Sunset Jeep Tour of Mount Etna and Lava Flow Caves★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 2,113 reviews
When the Italian weather turns, go indoors and eat.
August in Rome sits in the high thirties and the northern autumn brings real rain. The answer is the same either way: a kitchen with a chef in it, a cellar under a piazza, a gallery with the air conditioning on, or the tunnels under Naples.
Rome after dark belongs to the neighbourhoods.
All evening tours →Trastevere or Jewish Quarter Street Food Tour
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Pasta & Tiramisu Class with Fine Wine by the Vatican
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Trastevere & Campo de Fiori Street Food Walking Tour
Read our review →Rome, Florence and Venice fit into one week of trains.
Rome
Florence
Siena
Venice
Milan
NaplesFrom the lakes down to Sicily
Gallery day, coast day, kitchen day
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