Rome raises museum costs for visitors, expands free access for residents

Rome’s city government has approved a new tariff system governing admission to its municipal museums and monuments, officials announced Friday.

The measure, approved by Roma Capitale, makes all civic museums and monuments under city jurisdiction free to residents of Rome, while introducing new charges for non-residents at select high-traffic sites.

City officials said in a news release that the changes, which take effect February 1, are intended to expand resident access while strengthening safeguards for some of the Italian capital’s most heavily visited landmarks.

The five museums that were previously free but will become paid for non-residents include the Giovanni Barracco Museum of Ancient Sculpture, Carlo Bilotti Museum – Villa Borghese Orangery, Pietro Canonica Museum Villa Borghese, Napoleonic Museum and Villa of Maxentius. Officials did not publish prices for the newly paid sites in the announcement.

Meanwhile, major institutions like the Capitoline Museums, Trajan’s Markets and the Ara Pacis Museum will become free for residents.

Though resident access to civic museums will now be broadly free, the city said several categories are excluded from the new policy, including special events and temporary exhibitions at certain venues, planetarium shows, visits to the Villa Torlonia bunker, and ticketed experiences such as the Circo Massimo immersive program.

City officials said revenue generated through the new fees will be reinvested in maintenance, conservation and visitor-management infrastructure, positioning the system as a more sustainable model for managing cultural heritage sites that collectively draw millions of visitors each year.

Also under the new system, non-residents will also pay a €2 entrance fee to access the inner perimeter of the Trevi Fountain.

City officials said the fee formalizes a pilot program tested during restoration and maintenance work completed in December 2024, when access controls were introduced to study visitor flows and test new crowd-management measures. Data collected during the trial informed the decision to make the fee permanent, the city said.

Officials framed the Trevi Fountain charge as a crowd-management and preservation measure, citing daily visitor volumes that average about 30,000 people and can reach as many as 70,000 on peak days.

Access to the fountain has already been limited for about a year, with a maximum of 400 people allowed inside the inner perimeter at any one time, according to Italy’s public broadcaster RAI.

Visiting the fountain will remain free for residents, children under five, people with disabilities and their companions, and holders of the city’s MIC Card.

The move follows years of concern in Italy over the impact of mass tourism on historic sites, including repeated incidents of vandalism and disorderly behavior by visitors at monuments in Rome, Florence and Venice.

While city officials did not cite specific incidents in announcing the new tariff system, the Trevi Fountain fee is explicitly presented as a measure to safeguard the monument and regulate use rather than as a general revenue tool.

Rome Mayor Roberto Gualtieri framed the policy shift as a matter of civic access during a news conference Friday.

“We believe that culture is a fundamental right of citizenship,” he said, according to Associated Press. “We think it’s correct and positive that the citizens of Rome can enjoy our museums free of charge.”