The practical guide: tickets, fees, hours, how to get in from the airport, and the small habits that make the city easier. Every price and rule is dated.
Rome is easy to visit and surprisingly easy to visit badly. The same fifteen minutes can be a queue in the sun or a quiet look at something magnificent, depending on when you arrive and what you booked. This is the guide we send our own guests, written by people who live here.
A note on how we write it. Prices, hours and rules change, so every fact below comes from an official page or a named source, and carries the date we last checked it. Where something has moved recently, we say so. If a fact is not here, it is because we could not confirm it.
Getting in
Border checks and travel authorisation
Two European systems are changing how non-EU visitors enter Italy. One is already running; the other has not started and its start date is moving. Check both again within a month of your trip.
Indian passport holders need a Schengen visa and should apply well ahead through the Italian consulate or its authorised visa centre. US and UK passport holders do not currently need a visa for stays of up to 90 days in any 180.
From Fiumicino to the centre
Taxis also run from the airport, which can be the easier option with luggage or after a night flight. Use the official white taxis at the rank, and ask what the fare will be before you set off.
The big sights
Four places account for most of a first visit. Book each one before you leave home.
Colosseum, Roman Forum and Palatine
The Pantheon
The Vatican Museums
St Peter's Basilica is a separate entrance from the museums and is free, with a security queue that is longest in the middle of the day. The Sistine Chapel is at the end of the museum route, so you cannot enter it separately. Cover your shoulders and knees for the basilica.
The Trevi Fountain
Our advice: look at it from the piazza, early or late, and skip the basin unless you really want to stand beside it. Throw a coin over your left shoulder if you like. The tradition is a single coin, so that you return to Rome.
Money and costs
Many restaurants add a coperto, a small per-person cover charge for bread and the table, which is normal in Rome and listed on the menu. It is not a tip, and tipping is not expected beyond rounding up the bill or leaving a few euros for very good service. Carry some cash for small bars and markets, though cards are accepted almost everywhere now.
Small habits that help
Drink the water. Rome has a great many free public drinking fountains, nicknamed nasoni, with cold, clean water. Bring a refillable bottle (not glass, if you are going into the Colosseum).
Coffee at the counter is cheaper than coffee at a table. Order, drink, pay and go, standing, in about two minutes. Cappuccino after about eleven in the morning marks you out as a tourist, but nobody will stop you.
Lunch is from about 12:30 to 14:30 and dinner rarely starts before 19:30. A restaurant that is full of diners at 18:30 is probably full of visitors.
Churches expect covered shoulders and knees. Carry a light scarf and you will never be turned away.
Many shops, small restaurants and some museums close on Mondays, and the city is noticeably quieter in the middle of August, when a lot of locals leave.
Pickpockets work crowded buses, the metro and busy sights. Keep your phone and wallet in a front pocket or a zipped bag, and you will be fine.
Walk. Almost everything in the centre is within a half-hour of everything else, and you see more on foot. Wear comfortable shoes: the cobblestones (sampietrini) are hard on thin soles.
When to go
April to June and September to October are the best months: warm, long days and manageable crowds. July and August are hot and busy, with the best light at dawn and dusk, and a lot of the city shut for the break. November to March is quiet, mild and cheap, with short days, and the best time to see the big sights without a queue.
How to use this guide
Write to us if anything here has changed. We update this page whenever we find a change and keep a list of what we check in the Journal. The date at the top is the date we last went through every fact.
