Venice

Veneto

A lagoon city built across 118 islands linked by canals and some 400 bridges, with no road traffic in its historic center and a population under 50,000 residents.

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Around Venice

Activities

What to do

NeighborhoodDurationCostBooking

St Mark's Basilica

Byzantine~60 min

San Marco

Ticket price & opening hours: €10 timed basilica entry for individuals; €20 basilica plus either the Pala d'Oro or the Museo and Loggia dei Cavalli; €30 for the full combined ticket. Museo/Loggia alone €14. Open Mon–Sat 09:30–17:15 (last entry 16:45); Sundays and holidays the basilica opens at 14:00 while the museum opens 09:30.
Entry: Timed entry — arrive on time
Ticket validity: Timed entry — arrive on time

Advance booking required

The doges' state church, consecrated in 1094 on a Greek-cross plan modeled on Constantinople's Church of the Holy Apostles, with roughly 8,000 square meters of gold-ground mosaics. The Pala d'Oro altarpiece and the upstairs Museo di San Marco with the original bronze horses are ticketed separately.

Tickets & availabilityBackground

Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute

Baroque~45 min

Dorsoduro

Ticket price & opening hours: Main rotunda free. Guided visits to the sacristy, basilica and terrace are ticketed. Basilica open roughly 09:00–12:00 and 15:00–17:30 from April to October; sacristy closed Monday and Tuesday morning.

Advance booking recommended

Baldassare Longhena's octagonal domed church at the entrance to the Grand Canal, begun in 1631 as a votive offering after the plague and completed in 1687. The sacristy holds Titian ceiling panels and Tintoretto's Marriage at Cana.

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Basilica di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari

Gothic~60 min

San Polo

Ticket price & opening hours: €8 at the ticket office; €9.50 online with priority access. Senior over 65 €5, students 12–29 €3, under 12 free. The basilica does not take part in the Chorus Pass, Venezia Unica or other city passes. Summer hours (25 Apr–31 Oct) Mon–Fri 09:00–19:30, Sat 09:00–18:00, Sun and holidays 13:00–18:00.
Ticket validity: Valid all day

Advance booking recommended

A vast Franciscan brick church completed in 1443, holding Titian's Assunta over the high altar and his Pesaro Madonna, Giovanni Bellini's Frari Triptych and Donatello's wooden St John the Baptist. Titian and Canova are both buried here.

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San Giorgio Maggiore

Renaissance~45 min

Giudecca & San Giorgio

Ticket price & opening hours: Church free, open daily 09:00–18:00; ACTV line 2 from San Zaccaria takes about three minutes (vaporetto fare applies). The campanile lift is temporarily closed for maintenance.

Usually works as a walk-in

Palladio's Benedictine abbey church on its own island facing the Piazzetta, built 1566–1610 with a white Istrian-stone temple front. The chancel holds two late Tintorettos, the Last Supper and the Gathering of the Manna.

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Doge's Palace and Bridge of Sighs

Palaces & villas~120 min

San Marco

Ticket price & opening hours: €35 for the St Mark's Square Museums ticket, which also covers Museo Correr, the National Archaeological Museum and the Monumental Rooms of the Biblioteca Marciana; €30 if bought online 30 or more days ahead; reduced €15. The €50 Museum Pass adds the other civic museums. From 1 May to 26 September 2026 the palace stays open until 23:00 on Fridays and Saturdays (last entry 22:00).
Entry: Timed entry — arrive on time
Ticket validity: Timed entry — arrive on time

Advance booking required

Seat of the Venetian Republic's government and courts, rebuilt in Gothic form from 1340, with Tintoretto's Paradise in the Sala del Maggior Consiglio. The route crosses the Bridge of Sighs into the New Prisons.

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Gallerie dell'Accademia

Art~120 min

Dorsoduro

Ticket price & opening hours: €20 full price; €2 reduced for EU citizens aged 18–25; under 18 free. Open Tue–Sun 09:00–19:00, last tickets 18:00, closed Monday. Free on the first Sunday of each month. TicketOne/Eventim is the only authorised online seller.
Ticket validity: Valid all day

Advance booking recommended

The state collection of Venetian painting from the 14th to the 18th century, housed in the former Scuola della Carità and its adjoining church and monastery. Holdings include Giorgione's Tempest, Veronese's Feast in the House of Levi and Leonardo's Vitruvian Man, the drawing shown only occasionally for conservation reasons.

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Peggy Guggenheim Collection

Art~90 min

Dorsoduro

Ticket price & opening hours: €17 full; €14 over 70; €9 students under 26 with ID; under 10 free. Open daily 10:00–18:00 except Tuesdays and 25 December, last entry 17:00. Timed online booking recommended.
Ticket validity: Valid all day

Advance booking recommended

Peggy Guggenheim's personal collection of European and American modern art in the single-story Palazzo Venier dei Leoni, her Grand Canal home from 1949 until her death in 1979. Works by Picasso, Pollock, Ernst, Magritte and Brancusi hang alongside a canal-side sculpture garden.

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Scuola Grande di San Rocco

Art~75 min

San Polo

Ticket price & opening hours: €12 full; €10 for over 70s, Touring Club and Rolling Venice holders; €8 students under 26; €3 ages 8–18. Open daily 09:30–17:30, ticket office closes 17:00; closed 1 January, Christmas and Easter. No online ticket sales — pay at the door.
Ticket validity: Valid all day

Usually works as a walk-in

A lay confraternity building whose halls Tintoretto covered with more than 50 canvases between 1564 and 1587, including the enormous Crucifixion in the Sala dell'Albergo. Mirrors are provided so visitors can study the ceiling paintings without straining.

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Ca' Rezzonico

Palaces & villas~90 min

Dorsoduro

Ticket price & opening hours: €15 full; €7.50 reduced (ages 6–14, students 15–25, over 65, Rolling Venice and ISIC). 1 April–31 October 10:00–18:00, last entry 17:00; 1 November–31 March 10:00–17:00. Closed Tuesdays. May–September open until 20:00 on Fridays and Saturdays. Also covered by the €20 Museums of 18th-Century Venice ticket and the €50 Museum Pass.
Ticket validity: Valid all day

Advance booking recommended

A Longhena-designed Grand Canal palace completed in 1756 and now the Museum of 18th-Century Venice, with period rooms, Tiepolo ceilings and Pietro Longhi's genre scenes.

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Piazza San Marco

Free~45 min

San Marco

Ticket price & opening hours: Free and open at all hours. Venice's day-tripper access fee (contributo di accesso) ran on 60 dates from 3 April to 26 July 2026 at €5, or €10 booked within three days; the city has confirmed the trial ended and that from 27 July 2026 no payment or exemption request is needed. Any reintroduction after 2026 is for the City Council to decide, so check cda.ve.it before a spring trip.

Usually works as a walk-in

The only square in Venice called a piazza, enclosed by the Procuratie wings, the basilica, the campanile and the 15th-century Clock Tower. It sits among the lowest ground in the city and floods first during acqua alta.

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Rialto Bridge

Free~20 min

San Polo

Ticket price & opening hours: Free, open at all hours. Crowds are heaviest between roughly 10:00 and 18:00; early morning and late evening are noticeably quieter.

Usually works as a walk-in

The oldest of the four bridges over the Grand Canal, built in stone by Antonio da Ponte between 1588 and 1591 to replace a wooden predecessor. Its single 28-meter arch carries three walkways and two rows of shops.

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Lido di Venezia beaches

Free~180 min

Lido

Ticket price & opening hours: The free public stretches (spiagge libere) at Murazzi, San Nicolò and Alberoni cost nothing but have no facilities — bring your own umbrella. Concession beaches charge for loungers and cabins, typically €15–40 per day in high season. Getting there costs a vaporetto fare: €9.50 single, or use a travel card.

Usually works as a walk-in

An 11-kilometer barrier island between the lagoon and the Adriatic, with sand beaches, Liberty-era hotels and the Palazzo del Cinema that hosts the Venice Film Festival each September. It is one of the few parts of Venice with cars and roads.

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Campanile di San Marco

Ticketed~45 min

San Marco

Ticket price & opening hours: €15 for individual visitors, lift included; children 10–18, students under 26 and over 65s get a further reduction. Summer hours 09:30–21:15 with last entry around 20:00–20:30; winter closes 19:15. Timed booking strongly advised — the lift queue is the longest in the piazza.
Ticket validity: Valid all day

Advance booking recommended

The 98.6-meter bell tower of St Mark's, rebuilt identically after the original collapsed in 1902. A lift reaches the belfry for a panorama over the city, the lagoon and, on clear days, the Dolomites.

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Ponte dell'Accademia

Free~15 min

Dorsoduro

Ticket price & opening hours: Free, open at all hours. Best light for the Salute view is early morning and around sunset; it is the classic Grand Canal photograph and gets busy at both times.

Usually works as a walk-in

A wooden-decked bridge over the Grand Canal, built in 1933 as a temporary replacement for the iron bridge inaugurated in 1854 and rebuilt in the same form in 1985. From the crown the canal opens straight down to the dome of Santa Maria della Salute.

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Rialto Market

Markets~45 min

San Polo

Ticket price & opening hours: Free to walk through. Erberia Mon–Sat roughly 07:30–13:00; the Pescheria trades Tue–Sat only and is closed Sunday and Monday. Trade is liveliest between 07:00 and 10:30 and stalls start packing up well before the stated closing time.

Usually works as a walk-in

Venice's produce and fish market beside the Grand Canal, trading on the same site since the 11th century. The Erberia sells fruit and vegetables, much of it from the lagoon island of Sant'Erasmo, while the neo-Gothic Pescheria hall of 1907 handles the fish.

Cicchetti and bacari crawl

Tours~150 min

Cannaregio

Ticket price & opening hours: Cost varies. Going on your own is the cheapest option: cicchetti generally run €1.50–4 each and an ombra €1–4, so a filling crawl across three or four bars lands around €25–35 per person. Guided cicchetti tours with a local guide typically cost €60–95 per person including food and drink; there is no official operator, so compare providers.

Usually works as a walk-in

Cicchetti are small plates eaten standing at a bacaro, a traditional Venetian wine bar, typically with a small glass of wine known as an ombra. The Fondamenta della Misericordia and Fondamenta degli Ormesini in Cannaregio hold one of the densest runs of bacari in the city.

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Gondola ride

Tours~40 min

San Marco

Ticket price & opening hours: Official municipal tariff, set by City Council resolution 89 of 20 April 2023 and still in force: €90 for 30 minutes between 09:00 and 19:00, €110 between 19:00 and 04:00. The price is per gondola for up to five passengers, not per person, and longer rides are charged pro rata. Rates are posted at every stazio; anyone quoting a different price is not authorised. Songs and serenades are extra and not part of the tariff.

Usually works as a walk-in

Gondolas are licensed by the city and depart from fixed stations (stazi) such as Bacino Orseolo, San Tomà and Santa Maria del Giglio. Around 400 remain in service, down from thousands at the height of the Republic.

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Grand Canal by vaporetto line 1

Tours~45 min

San Polo

Ticket price & opening hours: €9.50 for a single 75-minute ticket, valid on all ACTV waterbuses, buses and trams. Travel cards are far better value if you make more than two trips: from €25 for 24 hours, €35 for 48 hours, €45 for 72 hours and €65 for 7 days. Ride outward-facing seats at the bow or stern for the views.

Advance booking recommended

ACTV line 1 runs the full 3.8-kilometer length of the Grand Canal from Piazzale Roma to San Marco and on to the Lido, stopping at almost every pontoon. It passes the major palace facades at walking pace and takes roughly 40 minutes end to end.

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Murano, Burano and Torcello

Day trips~360 min

Lagoon Islands

Ticket price & opening hours: Islands are free to walk. Transport is the real cost: ACTV lines 12, 4.1 and 4.2 from Fondamente Nove, where a 24-hour travel card from €25 beats several €9.50 singles. Optional museums: Murano Glass Museum €15, or a €20 combined Island Museums ticket covering the Glass Museum, Burano's Lace Museum and Torcello. Torcello's basilica charges separately. Allow a full day; Burano is roughly 45 minutes from Venice by waterbus.

Advance booking recommended

Three northern lagoon islands usually visited in one loop: Murano, where the Republic moved its glass furnaces in 1291; Burano, known for painted houses and needle lace; and Torcello, whose 11th-century cathedral holds Byzantine mosaics including a Last Judgement. Torcello was the lagoon's first major settlement and now has fewer than 20 residents.

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Venetian Ghetto and Jewish Museum

Neighborhoods~120 min

Cannaregio

Ticket price & opening hours: The campi and calli are free to walk. Jewish Museum admission with the free multilingual app audioguide is €12 full, €10 for children 6+, students to 26, journalists, FAI-card holders and Coop Alleanza 3.0-card holders, and €7 for Venetians by birth and/or residence; under-6s, disabled visitors with one companion and ICOM members are free. Online advance sale fee €2. The ticket office closes 45 minutes before the complex; closed Saturdays and Jewish holidays.

Advance booking recommended

Established by Senate decree in 1516, this was the first area in Europe to be called a ghetto and gave the word to every other language. Five synagogues sit hidden in the upper floors around the Campo di Ghetto Nuovo, whose tall buildings are the tallest residential blocks in old Venice.

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Teatro La Fenice

Tours~60 min

San Marco

Ticket price & opening hours: €12 self-guided with audioguide in ten languages; €9 over 65; €7 ages 7–26; under 6 free. Family passes from €25. Guided tours with a live guide €14 (€8 for 7–26s). Visits normally run daily 09:30–18:00 but are suspended for rehearsals and performances, so check the calendar the day before. Performance tickets are sold separately.

Advance booking recommended

Venice's opera house, opened in 1792 and rebuilt after fires in 1836 and 1996, where Verdi premiered Rigoletto and La Traviata. Daytime visits cover the auditorium, royal box and Apollonian rooms, with a permanent Maria Callas exhibition.

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Libreria Acqua Alta

Neighborhoods~20 min

Castello

Ticket price & opening hours: Free to enter, open daily 09:00–19:10; last entry is 19:00. The external book staircase and gondola stop admitting visitors at 17:15, and may close in adverse tide or weather conditions. Small and extremely popular — go at opening if you want space to browse.

Usually works as a walk-in

Planning days in Venice?

Around Venice

What to do

St Mark's Basilica

Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute

Basilica di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari

San Giorgio Maggiore

Doge's Palace and Bridge of Sighs

Gallerie dell'Accademia

Peggy Guggenheim Collection

Scuola Grande di San Rocco

Ca' Rezzonico

Piazza San Marco

Rialto Bridge

Lido di Venezia beaches

Campanile di San Marco

Ponte dell'Accademia

Rialto Market

Cicchetti and bacari crawl

Gondola ride

Grand Canal by vaporetto line 1

Murano, Burano and Torcello

Venetian Ghetto and Jewish Museum

Teatro La Fenice

Libreria Acqua Alta

Where to stay

Danieli, Venezia, A Four Seasons Hotel

The Gritti Palace, a Luxury Collection Hotel

Hotel Cipriani, A Belmond Hotel

Aman Venice

The St. Regis Venice

Ca' Pisani Hotel

Baglioni Hotel Luna

Elizabeth Unique Venice

JW Marriott Venice Resort & Spa

NH Collection Venezia Grand Hotel Palazzo dei Dogi

NH Collection Venezia Murano Villa

Airelles Palladio, Venice

NH Venezia Santa Lucia

Hilton Molino Stucky Venice

Hotel Ai Reali di Venezia

Ca' di Dio

Il Palazzo Experimental