Tickitaly is able to offer two exclusive private Vatican tours, both in the company of a dedicated English-speaking tour guide who will introduce you to the artistic and architectural wonders of the Vatican City, Rome. These are private tours - the group will comprise your party and your party only, offering you a privileged and dedicated tour. If you want to take place in a scheduled group tour then click here to see what's available.
These are exclusive tours, and the price reflects this. However, there is one enormous advantage - peace of mind. Most Vatican tours are put together at the last minute, and may well see timings changed, or not happen at all. You'll book your spot, perhaps months in advance, but you may well not receive confirmation until the day before your tour is due to start. This is not scare mongering, it's just the way that collective tours of the Vatican work. With tickitaly.com you'll set off for your trip to Italy knowing that all arrangements have been finalised well in advance.
Both tours last three hours and both tours include visits to the Sistine Chapel and the Vatican Museums. The difference between the two is simple - the first tour also takes in St Peters - the second does not, and includes a longer and more thorough visit to the Vatican Museums. Both tours are available in English, Italian, French, German, Spanish, Polish, Russian, Portugues and Swedish.
Opening times:
The Vatican is not open to visitors on Sundays, and is open from 9.00 AM to 6.00 PM Monday to Saturday, with last entrance usually at 3.00 PM. There are some exceptions to this, with late night openings on Friday during the summer, and with some tours offering priviliged early access, ahead of normal opening hours.
Pricing:
Prices are all inclusive, covering the cost of the tour guide, booking fees and entrance tickets. For groups of more than six people the Vatican insist on the use of the 'Whisper' audio system in the Basilica. Your guide will be talking into a small microphone and you'll each be listening on special earpieces. There will be a small charge (currently €1.50 per person) that needs to be paid in cash on the day.
The buttons below will give greater detail on the tours, but it doesn't follow that they're always available ... so please do use our calendar to check availability!
The following tickets are not currently available but may return in the future:
Vatican & St. Peter's Private Guided Tour - 3 HoursPlease note: Recent years have seen an incredible surge in bookings for
the Vatican, and a less-than-perfectly-organised administration has seen some small amount
of queueing necessary in peak season, even for private pre-booked tours such as ours. There
is simply nothing that can be done about this. Again, this affects everyone, and if you find
someone claiming to be able to bypass this, then they're being disingenuous, to put it
mildly.
Morning or afternoon?: in the past we used to recommend booking tours in
the early morning - not so now. Several enormous tour operators have begun to block-book the
early morning tours, and are being allowed to do so; consequently, the Vatican has started
to shunt forward other early morning tours, sometimes by one or two hours. They don't
always do this, but if they do they'll do so with total disregard to previously booked
dates. Should this occur, and should it affect one of our bookings, we will give notice,
via email, at least 15-20 days before the tour date.
We are therefore now advising that you try to opt for late morning or early afternoon tours, where there is less
chance of timings being shifted. Note we said less chance - the Vatican does what
the Vatican wants, and there can be no absolute guarantees. Please also note that we would
recommend avoiding Saturday if at all possible - some level of queueing seems inevitable if
recent times are anything to go by.
Dress code & access:
You'll need to be wearing clothes that do not leave your shoulders/arms or lower legs bare.
No shorts, short trousers, short skirts, sleeveless shirts or bare shoulders. All visitors
to the Vatican Museums will be required to pass through a metal-detector prior to being
granted admittance. Wheelchairs are available onsite and do not need to be reserved.
Persons with disabilities or those of very advanced years will never have to queue at
any point (in fact the Vatican has won an award in this area), but they can only be
accompanied by one person, others in such a group will need to queue regularly, unless a
paid tour is booked for these people as well.
Wheelchairs are supplied free of charge inside the Vatican, but the tour here follows a
different route, and more than 2 people may not accompany the person in the wheelchair. If
a group is larger than this, they'll need to book a disabled tour and a non-disabled tour,
unless they choose to take the person in the wheelchair along with them on the standard
route and carry the chair themselves when necessary (stairs).
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Your tour guide: More often than not, your guide will be Federica, an officially licensed Rome Tour Guide. Federica, a native roman, graduated in Art History, with an M.A in conservation and restoration of works of art. Federica is the author of 'Rome, Then And Now' - Amazon link |
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The information on this page relates to Tickitaly's private tours of the Vatican. We also offer group Vatican tours, as well as Vatican tickets for those who would rather explore by themselves, not take part in a tour. We also offer visitor information for various sites of the Vatican City, Rome.
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