Colosseum tickets in 2026: how to buy and what is included

Which ticket to choose

There are six tickets for independent visitors, and they differ not in “quality” but in where exactly you are admitted. The important thing almost nobody states plainly: every ticket already includes the Roman Forum and the Palatine Hill. You do not pay for them separately.

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Two points people trip over most often.

“Only Arena” is not only the arena. The name misleads: besides twenty minutes on the arena it includes the Forum, the Palatine and the SUPER sites. It does not, however, admit you to the tiers of the amphitheatre itself.

Full Experience is not “two days in a row”. You visit the Colosseum once, strictly at the booked date and time. The Forum, Palatine and SUPER can be visited the day before, the same day or the next — the window is wider than people usually write.

What the SUPER sites are

SUPER is a set of places inside the Forum and on the Palatine that are closed on an ordinary ticket: the House of Augustus and the House of Livia, the Temple of Romulus, the shrine of Vesta, the Palatine Museum. They are not included in the EUR 18 ticket.

If you want to go in, there is a supplement: EUR 4 on top of the “24h — Colosseum, Forum, Palatine” ticket. It must be bought for the same day or within twenty-four hours either side of your booked time. All the Full Experience tickets and Only Arena already include the SUPER sites.

With children under ten we would not pay it: these are interiors and mosaics that interest an adult, while the child has already walked their limit around the Forum by then.

Under-18s: free, but the ticket is compulsory

Entry to the Colosseum is free for anyone under 18, whatever their nationality.

And now the trap. Free entry does not mean “without a ticket”. A separate zero-price ticket must be booked for the child on the same official site. You cannot simply bring a child in on your own ticket: tickets are counted by head at the entrance.

Buy the children’s tickets in the same transaction as the adults’ — then the whole family has the same entry time. You may be asked for a document proving the child’s age, so keep a birth certificate or passport to hand.

About the booking fee. Many sites state that EUR 2 is added to every ticket, including a free child’s one. In the official regulations the EUR 2 is named only for Roma Pass holders who book their entry time separately. We found no confirmation on the official pages that the fee applies to all tickets — so simply check the total at the last step before paying.

Days when entry is free for everyone

The Colosseum is part of the state free-days programme. Entry is free:

• on the first Sunday of every month;
• 25 April — Italy’s Liberation Day;
• 2 June — Republic Day;
• 4 November — National Unity Day.

An honest warning: with children this is a bad idea. On free days there are so many people that the security queue stretches for hours and there is no room to move inside. You save EUR 36 and lose a day.

How to buy a ticket, step by step

1. Open ticketing.colosseo.it and choose the section for individual visitors — it covers groups of 1 to 8. A family of four fits there.
2. Count the date: tickets appear exactly 30 days before the day of the visit. If you are travelling in high season, set an alarm for the day sales open.
3. Choose the ticket type and entry time. Entry is strictly by slot.
4. Add every member of the family to one order, including children with free tickets.
5. Enter the names. The ticket is personal and the name on it must match the document.
6. Pay by card. The ticket comes by email and does not need printing — the phone screen is scanned at the entrance.

We give the instructions but do not sell tickets and have no connection to the official site. The booking remains your responsibility: check the date, the time and the spelling of the names in the email straight after paying.

A personal ticket: what it means in practice

The holder’s name is printed on the ticket, and it can be changed only once, and only until midnight seven days before the visit. There are just three accepted reasons: an obvious typo in the name, a mixed-up ticket type within one order (for example a free ticket issued to an adult) and documented serious circumstances.

What follows from that: do not buy tickets “in my name, we’ll sort it out” if the group of travellers might still change. And check the spelling of names in Latin letters at once: transferring a ticket to somebody else the day before will not work.

How many days ahead to buy

Tickets appear 30 days ahead, and that is the only window. Nowhere can you buy earlier — not on the official site and not from resellers, whose “tickets six months ahead” mean a promise to buy later on your behalf; if sales run out, you are left with no ticket and a refund.

• Spring and autumn — buy two or three weeks ahead.
• Summer, June to August — on the very day sales open.
• The underground — only at the moment sales open: groups of no more than 25 people are admitted every 15 minutes, so places are physically few.

The underground and the attic: special rules

If you did manage to get Full Experience with the underground, note two things. You must arrive 30 minutes before the time on your ticket — that is a requirement, not advice. And groups are let in to a timetable, so being late means not getting in at all.

With children under eight we would not take the underground: narrow passages, uneven floors and not much to look at through a child’s eyes. The attic — the upper tiers with the panorama — works better, but it means height and stairs.

Opening hours and last entry

The Colosseum is open all year except 25 December and 1 January. Closing times follow the season, and “last entry” matters more here than the closing hour.

With children take the 8:30 slot or one after 16:00. In the middle of the day there is no shade at all on the arena, and in July it is physically hard going. That applies to adults too, but the child gives up first.

What to do inside with a child

The Colosseum is a difficult place for a child. From outside it is a postcard; inside it is brick walls with no captions, and a crowd. A child walks round in twenty minutes and asks for food, and the parents are left feeling they queued for nothing.

What works: not telling dates but searching. Where the animal cages stood. Why the walls are full of holes — they were not bombed, the metal clamps were pulled out. Where the bronze colossus went that gave the amphitheatre its name. Where the women sat and where the slaves did. Why there is sand on the arena, and how that word is connected to the word “arena” itself.

And a free bonus next door: the Arch of Constantine stands right beside the Colosseum and can be visited with no ticket and no queue.

The Roman Forum can be added to the quest: an hour and EUR 60. To be clear — entry to the Forum is already in your EUR 18 ticket. Those EUR 60 are for the guide’s work, not for admission.

Where to go after the Colosseum

The Colosseum is almost always the first stop, and the question follows: what is nearby and how to keep the mood. The Forum and the Palatine are already in your ticket — the obvious next step. But the amphitheatre only explains the spectacles; how Romans lived day to day is not visible there.

If the gladiators caught your child’s imagination, there is a sequel for the same day: gladiator school at EUR 150 — they are given a wooden sword and taught the stances.

And when the budget is tight, there is an option eight times cheaper: a quest in the LooksArt app at EUR 29 for the whole family — you walk it yourselves, at your own pace, and the app works offline.

And if Rome is only just beginning for you, see our guide to where to go in Rome with children.