Skip the line905 reviews
1–1.25 hDoge's Palace Skip-the-Line Guided Tour
★ 4.4 · 905 reviews
- 1 hour - 75 minutes
- Guided tour
- Mobile voucher accepted
- Free cancellation
$75$66.18 / hour
Check availability→ The palace
The Doge’s Palace: what the ticket covers, and the route through it
The Doge’s Palace is not a palace in the ordinary sense. It was the seat of government, the supreme court and the state prison of a republic that ran for a thousand years, and the route through it goes from gilded council chambers to bare cells without ever stepping outside. This page is what the ticket opens, what the tour covers, and what it leaves out.
Quick answer
The Doge’s Palace ticket is a combined one: it also opens the Correr Museum, the archaeological museum and the monumental rooms of the Marciana Library on the same square. Most visitors never use the other three. A guided tour with the ticket included starts at $75 for about an hour, and $97 buys the palace, the New Prisons and St Mark’s Basilica together. The Secret Itineraries are a separate guided route that no ordinary ticket admits you to.
The Doge’s Palace, at a glance
- What the ticket is
- Combinedpalace, Correr, archaeological museum, library rooms
- Guided, skip the line
- From $75905 reviews at 4.4
- The short version
- $75one hour inside, if time is tight
- With the prisons and Basilica
- $97950 reviews at 4.7
- Both monuments, our top pick
- $793,913 reviews at 4.7
- Secret Itineraries
- Guided onlythe offices and the lead cells under the roof
- Typical time inside
- 1–2 hourslonger if you walk the Correr too
- The Bridge of Sighs
- Crossed insideon the route between the palace and the prisons
- The staircase
- Scala d’Orothe golden stair up to the state rooms
- Cancellation
- Freeon every tour here
What the palace actually was
A government building that happened to be magnificent
Council chambers and cells in one building, connected by a covered bridge.
The word palace is misleading. The building on the waterfront was the seat of the Venetian Republic: the doge lived in part of it, but the rest was offices, council chambers, courts and cells, all under one roof, which was itself a political statement about how the state worked.
The route follows that logic. You come in through the courtyard, where the scale registers, and up the Scala d’Oro — the golden staircase, which is exactly what it sounds like and was designed to impress ambassadors on their way in.
Upstairs are the institutional rooms, and they get progressively more serious: the antechambers where you waited, the rooms of the Council of Ten, and finally the enormous hall of the Great Council — one of the largest rooms in Europe when it was built, with a wall painting by Tintoretto at the end of it and the portraits of seventy-six doges running round the top of the walls. One of them is painted out with a black cloth. A guide will tell you why, and it is the best story in the building.
Then the route descends, crosses the Bridge of Sighs, and puts you in the New Prisons. Going from the Great Council hall to a cell in ten minutes is the whole point of the visit, and it is why the palace is more interesting than its reputation suggests.
The route
What you see, in order
The standard visit, which every guided tour on this page follows.
- The courtyard
Entered from the waterfront side. The Giants’ Staircase with its two statues is here, and it is where the doge was crowned.
- The Scala d’Oro
The golden staircase, stuccoed and gilded, built to be walked up by people who were meant to be intimidated by the time they reached the top.
- The institutional rooms
The antechambers, the map room, the rooms of the Council of Ten. This is where the state actually operated, and it is the part a guide adds most to.
- The Great Council hall
Fifty-three metres long, with the Tintoretto behind the dais and the doges’ portraits above. The blacked-out one is Marino Faliero, and the story is worth waiting for.
- The armoury
Four rooms of it, and better than it sounds — parade armour, crossbows, and a great deal of evidence about how the Republic thought about defence.
- The Bridge of Sighs
Crossed from the inside, which is the opposite of how everyone photographs it. The stone lattice means you see almost nothing, and that is the point.
- The New Prisons
Cells across the canal, colder and plainer than anything else on the route, with graffiti still on the walls.
The palace ticket also opens three other buildings on the Piazza. Most visitors never use them, and nobody tells you at the door.
What the Piazza tickets actually cover→Book direct
Four ways into the palace
The skip-the-line tour, the one-hour version, the tour with the prisons, and our top pick with the Basilica.
One hourPalace only
1 hVenice: 1-Hour The Doge's Palace Tour
★ 4.4 · 98 reviews
- One hour
- Guided tour
- Mobile voucher accepted
- Free cancellation
$75$75.00 / hour
Check availability→ 
Both monumentsThe prisons
2–3 hDoge’s Palace, New Prisons & St. Mark’s Basilica Guided Tour
★ 4.7 · 950 reviews
- 2 to 3 hours
- New Prisons & St. Mark’s Basilica
- Guided tour
- Free cancellation
$97$38.80 / hour
Check availability→ 
Our top pick3,913 reviews
3 hVenice: St. Mark's Basilica & Doge's Palace Tour with Ticket
★ 4.7 · 3,913 reviews
- Three hours
- Guided tour
- Likely to sell out
- Free cancellation
$79$26.33 / hour
Check availability→ The Secret Itineraries
The rooms the ordinary ticket does not reach
Offices, the chancellery and the lead cells. Guided-only, and the best hour in the building.
Behind the public rooms is a second building: the administrative apparatus of the Republic, in a warren of small wooden-panelled offices squeezed between the grand chambers and the roof.
The Secret Itineraries tour goes through them. The chancellery, where the state’s papers were kept. The torture chamber, which is small and cold and less theatrical than it sounds. And the Piombi — the cells under the lead roof, hot in summer and freezing in winter, from which Casanova escaped in 1756 by going up through the ceiling and out across the tiles.
It runs as a separate guided tour on a fixed route with limited numbers, and there is no version of the ordinary ticket that admits you. If that part of the palace is what interests you, a guide is not the expensive option — it is the only one.
Which palace ticket
Short visit, full route or private
Three ways into the same building, ranked for a first visit.
$79
With the Basilica
Three hours, both monuments, both tickets. The booking that solves the two longest queues on the Piazza at once, and the most reviewed thing on this site.
$97
With the New Prisons
Two to three hours covering the palace, the cells across the Bridge of Sighs and the Basilica. 950 reviews at 4.7, and the fullest version of the palace on this page.
$75
One hour
The state rooms and the bridge at pace. Not the visit we would choose, but an honest hour inside beats another hour on the square.
Common questions
The Doge’s Palace, answered
Can you visit the Doge’s Palace without a tour?
Yes. The courtyard, the state rooms, the Great Council hall, the Bridge of Sighs and the New Prisons are all on the standard ticketed route. The exception is the Secret Itineraries, which are guided-only.
How long does it take to tour the Doge’s Palace?
An hour on a short guided visit like the one at $75, and two to three hours on a tour that includes the New Prisons and the Basilica. On your own you could comfortably spend half a morning.
Can you visit the Doge’s Palace for free?
Not on an ordinary day. Entry is ticketed, and the ticket is a combined one covering several museums on the Piazza. Occasional free-admission days exist at Italian state and civic museums, but they are dated, crowded, and not something to build a trip around.
Is the Secret Itineraries tour worth it?
If the way the Republic actually ran interests you, yes — it opens the offices, the chancellery and the lead-roofed cells, none of which are on the ordinary route. It also cannot be walked without a guide, which settles the question for anyone who wants to see them.
What does the palace ticket include?
It is a combined Piazza San Marco museums ticket: the Doge’s Palace, the Correr Museum, the National Archaeological Museum and the monumental rooms of the Marciana Library. Most visitors use only the first.
Do you walk across the Bridge of Sighs?
Yes, from the inside, on the route between the palace and the New Prisons. You see very little through the stone lattice, which was the intention when it was built.
Which tour should I book?
For most people the tour at $79, which covers the palace and St Mark’s Basilica with both tickets. If you want the prisons in detail, $97.
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