The Colosseum is a marvelous structure to behold. It’s a physical connection to the ancient history of the world, and it is full of incredible stories. All of this makes it a very popular place to visit. In fact, around 5 million people per year come to see it. So, it can be busy during peak season. However, its popularity won’t affect your visit if you follow our five tips for visiting the Colosseum in peak season.
Plan ahead and book in advance
Touring the Colosseum with a good quality tour provider is well worth it. You’ll gain so much from the tour guide’s knowledge, experience and enthusiasm. On the flip side, going solo means that you could miss out on the details, or not fully appreciate the stories behind what you’re looking at. If you are visiting Rome, and especially so if you are visiting in peak season, I would encourage you to do a little research about what you want to see and select a tour you want to be part of. Booking in advance means that you’re more likely to get the time slots that are best for you and you may even be able to take advantage of special offers for advanced bookings.
The Colosseum is one of Rome’s most popular sites. However, it is a vast space, so once inside, there is plenty of space for everyone – even in the busiest periods.
Skip the line with an organized tour
The Colosseum is very popular, and if you don’t book in advance, then you’re likely to be part of the long line of people waiting to buy entry tickets. If you book a tour with a good tour provider, you’ll get access to skip the line tickets, meaning you won’t have to queue or waste time in line. You might also find that the best tour providers have access to restricted areas of the building too, that you wouldn’t get into unless you’re part of the tour.
Visit at the right time to maximize your time
10 am is usually the peak time for tourists to arrive at the Colosseum. It’s around this time that the line/queue is fairly large, so you want to avoid turning up to buy entrance tickets at this point.
However, if you have booked to visit the Colosseum as part of a tour – especially with ourselves at Colosseum and Vatican Tours – lines won’t affect you, and you’ll be able to go right through the entrance with your tour guide. We offer arena access where you’ll enter through a special entrance to one of the restricted areas, the arena stage!
Booking an organized tour of the Colosseum means that you’ll be spending more time seeing it that standing in line.
Take a tour of the Colosseum in the evening
Another way to avoid the busiest periods is to take a tour of the Colosseum in the evening. Not only is it a little quieter, it’s also cooler. At Colosseum and Vatican Tours, we offer sunset and evening tours of the Colosseum, which are a special experience, and you have the added advantage of avoiding the majority of your fellow tourists.
Even if you decide not to take the evening tour, and you visit during the day, I’d definitely recommend you come back to the Colosseum at night just to see it lit up. It’s a beautiful sight.
The Colosseum at night is beautiful. The lighting shows off its imposing structure so very well.
Avoid the first Sunday of the month
On the first Sunday of every month, there’s free access to the Colosseum. This means that the site is busier than usual at this point in the month. If you want to avoid the busiest periods at the Colosseum, then you should definitely consider avoiding these days.
Why tour the Colosseum with us?
Here at Colosseum and Vatican Tours, we know this site like the back of our hand. We offer insider tours of Rome that you can trust. Here’s one of our previous guests, Stephen C, explaining via TripAdvisor why a tour with us made sense for him:
“I took both the skip the line Vatican and Colosseum tours offered by the company in the same day.I was only in the city for the weekend, with a short time frame to see as much as possible. This is where using this tour company paid off! Both excellent and expert tour guides. The advantage of taking a tour with such a guide is the amount of knowledge and information they pass on, you can extract so much more from the experiences of visiting these world-renowned landmarks, learn more in less time. I would highly recommend this friendly and expert Company to anybody. Value for money. Memorable day, thanks again to both our guides.”
You can see full details of our tours of Rome and tours of Italy here at our website: colosseumandvaticantours.com
You can hop over to our TripAdvisor page to find out what our previous guests say about our tours of Rome. You can find more reviews and travel inspiration on our Facebook and Twitter pages, also. Alternatively, get in touch with us direct – details on our website.
