How To Visit Rome’s Colosseum For The First Time (And Mistakes To Avoid)

We made a crucial mistake at the Colosseum in Rome – not once but twice. And although we have reasonable explanations both times, it still annoys us to this day. What was our mistake? We got basic entry tickets and self guided audio tour headsets.

So what should we have done differently? Well, at a minimum we should have paid extra to get upgraded tickets with access to more areas of the Colosseum. Better yet, we should have paid for an expert guided tour of the Colosseum, Roman Forum and Palatine Hill.

If we’re being totally honest, we made a few more mistakes the first time we visited back in July 2018. The month might be a bit of a giveaway for one of them – it was so hot, ridiculously busy and the line to get in was enormous. Read more about us.

Look, the Colosseum is awesome but there are lots of different ways you can do it – and some are going to give you a better experience than others. In this guide we explain the various ticket options, guided tours, what we did wrong and what you should do to get the most out of your visit. Okay, let’s begin!

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Our Two Visits

Ever since watching the timeless classic movie Gladiator, we’d always wanted to stand inside the Colosseum (aka Flavian Amphitheater) – jump on a horse, hold a sword up and yell “single column, single column”, before taking down warriors riding chariots.

But it’s been 1,850 years since the days of Maximus Decimus Meridius, and Rome’s Colosseum is a very different place. Today, it’s a bustling tourist attraction with a wide range of ticket types and visiting options. And the ticket you buy will impact on your experience.

We’ve been traveling the world for a living since 2018 and we do a damn good job of exploring new places. But naturally (like any job) there’s a handful of things we wished we’d done differently. And our two visits to the immense Colosseum are among that handful.

Here’s what happened:

July 2018 – We were traveling on a super tight budget because Italy was just one stop on our 18 month honeymoon around the world, so we could only afford to book the cheapest and most basic ticket possible. It was also scorching hot and horribly busy, so we walked away with barely any photos and a pretty underwhelmed feeling.

May 2022 – We should have paid for a guided tour, but as travel photographers we also wanted to take our time snapping awesome photos of the ruins (which you’ll see in this guide) and it would’ve been hard to get the photos we wanted if we were on a tour. Plus, we had a Go City Rome Pass and we used it for the Colosseum, but it only included the most basic entry tickets.

Next time we definitely wouldn’t use a Go City Pass for entry, and now that we have amazing photos we would one million percent pay for an expert guided tour of the Colosseum, Roman Forum and Palatine Hill – with bonus areas included (which we’ll explain next in ticket options).

Colosseum Tickets

The most important thing you need to know about your visit to the Colosseum is what each of the 5 official entry ticket options includes.

We’re going to explain each ticket in order of how you’ll find them listed on the official site (they haven’t listed in a logical order which we find frustrating):

Full experience ticket with entry to the Arena of the Colosseum (€24): This ticket includes a loop walk around two-thirds of the way up the Colosseum, along with the Arena which allows you to stand where the gladiators once did looking up at the ancient amphitheater that once housed 50,000 spectators. It’s the second best ticket to buy, but availability is limited so get in early. See ticket information.

24H – Colosseum, Roman Forum, Palatine (€18): This is the most basic entry ticket that only includes a loop walk around two-thirds of the way up the Colosseum. It’s the worst ticket to buy because it has the least amount of areas, but it has lots of availability each day for pre-booking and it’s also what you’d get if you turned up on the day without pre-booking a ticket. See ticket information.

Full experience – Underground levels and Arena (€24): This ticket includes a loop walk around two-thirds of the way up the Colosseum, along with the Arena and the Underground levels which allows you to see the intimidating tunnels and passages where the gladiators emerged. This is the best ticket to buy but tickets are very limited and sell out very early. See ticket information.

Full experience ticket with entry to the Attic of the Colosseum (€24): This ticket includes a loop walk around two-thirds of the way up the Colosseum, along with the Attic which is basically an observation deck accessed by a glass elevator. We think this is the third best ticket because it at least has one extra area, but we’d much rather do the Arena or Underground. See ticket information.

24H only Arena (€18): This ticket only includes a limited time access to the Arena (20-30 minutes). It does not include the loop walk or any other area of the Colosseum, but it has more availability than the other tickets because it’s less desirable. This would be a good choice if you want to quickly see inside the Colosseum without dealing with crowds on the loop walk. See ticket information.

Other Ticket Extras

It’s important to know that audio guide headsets are not included with any Colosseum ticket, you must pay for them separately once inside at a cost of €6 per person.

Another thing you need to be aware of is something called SUPER sites – which effectively gives you special access into some of the lesser known areas scattered across the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill.

The SUPER sites are not something we’d prioritize, but we would take advantage of them if they were included in our ticket price. Now, the only entry ticket that doesn’t include these SUPER sites is the basic 24H – Colosseum, Roman Forum, Palatine (€18).

There’s a specific Forum Pass SUPER ticket you can buy for €18 that only gets you into the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill with SUPER sites included, but this does not include any area of the Colosseum. And you also can pay €4 to upgrade the basic 24H ticket to include SUPER sites.

Finally, the only other ticket option is called Domus Aurea, which is the remains of Emperor Nero’s villa complex and is now an archaeological museum. You have to buy tickets separately for it (€18) – and we’ll probably do it next time we’re in Rome.

Do It Yourself Or Book A Guided Tour?

Okay, let’s talk about the age old dilemma of doing it yourself vs paying for a guided tour. Nobody wants to waste money, and it’s hard to know the right time to splash the cash or play it more conservatively if you’ve never been to a place before.

But take it from us, there are two places in Rome that are worth splurging on an expert led guided tour – the Vatican Museums and the Colosseum. We did this early entry guided tour with Take Walks at the Vatican and it was amazing.

How do we know it’s worth doing a tour at the Colosseum if we haven’t done one yet? Because we have done the basic entry with audio guide (twice!), and we know that we should have done a guided tour instead.

This is the Colosseum and Roman Forum, not some random throw-away attraction.

Do It Yourself

Booking any of the ticket options we listed above will get you into the Colosseum, Roman Forum and Palatine Hill. You can then choose to pay an extra €6 per person for an audio guide headset, which will explain the different areas as you explore.

We thought the audio guide explanations were pretty good but they were also very generic – and more importantly we couldn’t ask any questions. Without paying extra for an audio guide, we’d have ended up walking around aimlessly.

We recommend doing it yourself if you’re visiting Rome on a budget and want to keep costs down. Try to book this full experience ticket with underground and arena. If tickets are sold out, try this ticket with arena. And as a last resort, buy this basic ticket like we did.

Book A Guided Tour

Your alternative is to pay for an expert-led guided tour of the Colosseum, Roman Forum and Palatine Hill. The guide will take you to all the major historical sites, explain things in far greater detail and basically take the stress out of your visit.

And because this is the Colosseum – one of the most famous attractions in the world – there’s tons of great tour options spanning the price range. Here are the top rated tours we’d consider from cheapest to most expensive:

Premium Colosseum (Take Walks) – Maximum group size of 15, costs US $90 per person and includes entry ticket.

Gladiator’s Gate (Take Walks) – Maximum group size of 16, costs US $159 per person, includes entry ticket plus Area access.

Semi Private (Viator) – Maximum group size of 6, costs US $219 per person because of the intimate group size, includes entry ticket plus Arena access. This one sells out fast so book it well in advance.

Rome In A Day (Take Walks) – This all encompassing Rome walking tour is perfect if you’re short on time and want to see the Colosseum, Vatican, Pantheon, Trevi Fountain and more. It costs US $227 but it includes entry into everything and transport to the Vatican.

For us, it wasn’t until we were walking around the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill that we wished we’d booked a guided tour.

We’re sure a tour guide would be able to give us a ton more information in the Colosseum too, but it’s easy enough to look around and imagine what it would have been – whereas the Roman Forum is just a bunch of ruins and we had no idea what was what 2,000 years ago!

Other Mistakes To Avoid

Okay, so other than ticket type and not booking a guided tour, what else have we done that you should avoid?

Book in advance – If you turn up to the Colosseum on the day and expect to get straight in during peak tourist months, you’ve got another thing coming. We were so new to travel back in 2018 that we thought by going at 8:30am when it opened, the line wouldn’t be so bad. Oh, how wrong we were. It took at least an hour to get in, and things like this bring out the worst in people. Book your tickets in advance!

Weather – Our first visit was on a blazing hot, sunny and sweaty day in July. We did the Colosseum from around 9:30am-10:30am, before walking around the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill until around 12:00pm – it was tough going with the heat. The second time we did the Colosseum during our visit to Rome in May and it was a much better experience from a comfort perspective because it wasn’t as hot.

Order – Most people beeline for the Colosseum or think that’s where they have to start, including us first time around. But you can visit the three areas in any order you like. In May 2022, we started with the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill at 9:00am because it’s way more exposed than the Colosseum and we wanted to avoid the worst of the heat. Plus, all the crowds were in the Colosseum, so consider switching your route.

Passes – The Roma Pass, Go City Rome Pass (read our review) and Turbopass only give you entry to the basic areas of the Colosseum, Roman Forum and Palatine Hill. We used a Go City Pass the second time we visited, which is part of the reason we didn’t get to see the Underground or Arena.

Travel tip: The Colosseum (along with many other museums and ruins in Rome) can be visited free of charge the first Sunday of every month. But while that sounds like a great deal, it doesn’t include any of the special areas and the lines are always very long so personally we’d avoid it.

Don’t Skip The Roman Forum

One thing we definitely did right both times was allocate enough time to fully explore the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill. For us, these two areas are just as interesting as the Colosseum. Less dramatic and iconic maybe, but no less important historically.

We really enjoyed walking around the remains of temples, arches and statues in the Forum, and trying to imagine what it would have once looked like from the elevated Palatine Hill. They’re both included in your ticket price, so don’t skip them.

Like we mentioned earlier, we found these areas more difficult to follow along with the audio guide because the remains are nowhere near as in tact as the Colosseum. So this where we’d have much rather had a tour guide explain things to us.

Colosseum At Night

Travel photography is one of our major passions in life, so we naturally love iconic structures like the Colosseum – and it really comes to life at night when orange light gently illuminates its many arches and contrasts against the dark night sky.

The first time we only went during the day, but the second time we made sure to go back at twilight and take photos of the giant amphitheater until it was completely dark outside.

We walked all around the north and west sides of the structure and ended up at a semi-hidden spot called the Balcony of the Colosseum (here’s the map location).

So the final mistake you should avoid when visiting the Colosseum is not going back to see it lit up at night. The best way to do it is go out for a delicious pizza with a bottle of wine, then grab a milky gelato and take a gentle stroll down to see the ancient amphitheater on a warm evening. Bliss!

Is The Colosseum Worth Visiting?

Let’s finish with the most important question of all, is it even worth visiting the Colosseum when you go to Rome? Listen, we won’t say it depends because that’s the most annoying answer of all time. But the truth is, some people will love it and others will think it’s just okay.

If you have any interest in history, architecture, art, the Romans – even the movie Gladiator – then yes you should absolutely pay to see the Colosseum and Roman Forum. But if you’re not overly interested in those things, you might just get frustrated by how busy it is.

Personally, we think it’s a superb tourist attraction that shouldn’t be missed. But that’s because we’re huge fans of ancient sites with historical significance, and this is one of the best remaining examples still standing in the world.

Next Steps

We hope our guide on how to visit the Colosseum helps with planning your trip to Rome, but please let us know if you have any questions in the comments box a little further below.

Still figuring out your plans?

• Here’s our 4 days in Rome itinerary, tried and tested by us.
• These five neighborhoods are where to stay in Rome.
• Here are the top things to do in Rome.
• And here’s how to visit the Vatican Museums.

Finally, if you’re planning to visit more places on the same trip, we recommend reading our Italy travel guide for helpful tips and advice.

Happy Travels,

Mark and Kristen

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