Vasari Corridor Tickets 2026

The Medici built a private road across Florence so they would never have to meet anyone on it. Four and a half centuries later you can walk it too, in a group of twenty-five, for forty-five minutes, and only if you have spent the two hours before it in the Uffizi. That last part is the one most people find out at the checkout.

This guide covers the two ways to buy the corridor, the two-hour rule that decides your whole morning, what is on the walls now that the famous self-portraits have gone, and when the ticket is worth the money.

In 3 minutes you'll know:

• By day the corridor is an Uffizi supplement: €47 online, €43 on the day, corridor slot at least two hours after your Uffizi slot
• On Friday evenings until 20 November 2026 it is sold on its own, €24 online, which is the cheapest way in
• The corridor ends in the Boboli Garden and you cannot walk back, so plan the afternoon on the other side of the river

How much are Vasari Corridor tickets in 2026?

There is no stand-alone daytime ticket. On the official site the corridor is sold as a supplement to the Uffizi: €47 if you buy before the day of your visit, €43 on the day. The online Uffizi ticket alone is €29, so the corridor costs you €18 more. With the 5-day pass that adds Pitti and Boboli it is €58, and anyone already holding a pass can add the corridor for €20.

The rule that shapes everything: your corridor slot must be at least two hours after your Uffizi slot. The corridor starts inside the gallery, and the museum wants you to see the Uffizi first. Book the two together, and think of it as a three-hour block.

The exception is the Friday evening opening: every Friday from 3 July to 20 November 2026, 19:00 to 23:00, a corridor-only ticket at €24 online or €20 on the day (€2 reduced). You enter from Piazzale degli Uffizi next to the Loggia dei Lanzi, walk through Uffizi rooms without stopping in them, and come out into Piazza Pitti by the Rondò di Bacco gate. It is capped at five tickets per purchase and cannot be changed once bought.

What is inside the corridor now

It is not the corridor you have read about. Until it closed in 2016 the walls held the Uffizi's self-portrait collection, hundreds of artists painting themselves. That collection has moved into new rooms on the Uffizi's first floor, and the corridor reopened on 21 December 2024 as what it was built to be: a passage.

On 7 July 2025 the Uffizi added more than fifty Roman portrait busts along the stretch over the Ponte Vecchio: Cicero, Augustus, Antoninus Pius, Commodus, and the empresses Sabina and Faustina. They had been in storage since 1993, when they came off the gallery's second-floor corridors. The rest of the route is bare walls, a restored floor and windows.

The windows are the reason to go. Over the bridge, three larger openings look straight up and down the Arno. The story you will hear is that they were cut for Hitler's visit in 1938; the Italian Wikipedia entry, citing the historical record, dates them to 1860, when they were opened so that the king could watch the San Giovanni fireworks on the river. Further on, the corridor bends around the Mannelli tower on stone brackets, because the Mannelli family refused to let the Medici demolish it, and then passes a balcony that looks down into the church of Santa Felicita, from which the family could follow Mass without going down into the church.

The two-hour rule, and how to plan the day around it

Treat the ticket as a morning. If your Uffizi slot is 9:00, your corridor slot is 11:00 at the earliest. The first corridor group of the day enters at 10:15 and the last leaves at 16:45, so the latest workable Uffizi slot is around 14:00.

The corridor takes about 45 minutes, in groups of 25 with two museum staff. It is one-way: you leave through a door by the Buontalenti Grotto in the Boboli Garden, and the rules say you cannot walk back. Plan lunch on the Oltrarno side, or Palazzo Pitti straight after (a separate ticket, see our Pitti guide).

No backpacks. Suitcases of any size, backpacks, rucksacks and large umbrellas are banned. Photos are allowed; video is not.

What most visitors get wrong

They expect the self-portraits. Most guidebooks and a good share of the web still describe a gallery of artists' faces. If that is what you want, it is on the Uffizi's first floor now, included in the ticket you already have.

They book the corridor as a first visit to Florence. You spend two hours in the Uffizi first and then walk for 45 minutes. After three hours on your feet, the corridor lands as a walk rather than an event. On a first trip with one day, spend the €18 on nothing and give the Uffizi your full attention.

They skip the Friday. The evening ticket is half the price, it does not require the Uffizi, and the Arno at dusk from the Ponte Vecchio windows is the best version of the view. The season ends on 20 November 2026.

They bring a day bag. The rules ban backpacks and rucksacks outright, and you reach the corridor after two hours in the Uffizi, not from the street. Leave it at the hotel if you can: a bag checked at the Uffizi cloakroom means a fifteen-minute walk back across the river once you come out in Boboli.

Is the Vasari Corridor worth it?

For a second visit to Florence, yes. For a first, only on a Friday night.

What you are paying for is not a collection. It is the route: 1565, five months of building, a duke who wanted to cross his city without being seen, and the one position in Florence from which you look down the Arno through the middle of the Ponte Vecchio. The Roman busts give the bridge stretch a reason to slow down, and the Santa Felicita balcony is a detail no other ticket in the city gives you. By day that costs €18 on top of an Uffizi visit you were making anyway. On a Friday evening it costs €24 and a sunset, which is the better deal.

If you want it explained rather than walked, the guided tour is the honest upgrade: the corridor is close to bare, and the stories are the content. If you want it for the view, go on your own.

Frequently asked questions

How much does the Vasari Corridor cost in 2026?

By day it is sold only with the Uffizi: €47 if you buy before the day of your visit, €43 on the day. With the 5-day Uffizi, Pitti and Boboli pass it is €58, and pass holders can add the corridor as a €20 supplement. On Friday evenings from 3 July to 20 November 2026, 19:00 to 23:00, a corridor-only ticket costs €24 online or €20 on the day.

Can you visit the Vasari Corridor without the Uffizi?

Only on the Friday evening openings, which run from 3 July to 20 November 2026. That ticket admits you to the corridor alone: you pass through Uffizi rooms to reach it but cannot stop in the gallery. On every other day the corridor is a supplement to an Uffizi ticket.

What is the two-hour rule for the Vasari Corridor?

Your corridor slot must be at least two hours after your Uffizi slot, because the corridor starts inside the gallery and the museum wants you to see the Uffizi first. In practice you are booking a three-hour block: two hours in the Uffizi, then about 45 minutes in the corridor.

Are the self-portraits still in the Vasari Corridor?

No. The self-portrait collection that hung in the corridor until it closed in 2016 has moved to new rooms on the Uffizi's first floor. Since 7 July 2025 the Ponte Vecchio stretch holds more than fifty Roman portrait busts, including Cicero, Augustus and the empress Sabina, brought out of storage. The rest of the corridor is bare architecture and windows.

Where does the Vasari Corridor end?

In the Boboli Garden, through a door by the Buontalenti Grotto. The museum's rules say you cannot walk back through the corridor, and the Friday evening route exits into Piazza Pitti by the Rondò di Bacco gate. Palazzo Pitti itself is a separate ticket.

Can you bring a backpack into the Vasari Corridor?

No. The access rules ban suitcases of any size, backpacks, rucksacks and large umbrellas, and groups are capped at 25 people. Leave the bag at the hotel: if you check it at the Uffizi cloakroom, you will have to walk back across the river to collect it, because the corridor ends in the Boboli Garden.

The corridor was built so that nobody would see the Medici cross the river. Go on a Friday evening, stop at the three windows over the bridge, and you get the one view they built it for.