Florence tour operators and ticket sellers reviewed: where to buy museum tickets

This page is the index of our reviews: twenty-four write-ups on the Florence ticket sellers and tour operators, what they charge against the official price list, and what happens when something goes wrong. You will find the big international platforms, the five official channels, the city’s tour operators and two comparison sites.

The yardstick never changes: the price you pay at the institution’s own ticket desk. Uffizi Gallery €25 on the day and €29 bought in advance, Accademia Gallery €20 plus €4 booking, Brunelleschi Pass €30, Firenzecard €85. Anything above that is a reseller, and sometimes the difference is worth it.

What we check in every review

Seven checks, always in the same order.

• Who the company is. Registered name, address, VAT or company registration number, current ownership. A site with no legal identity is already telling you something.
• Official channel or reseller. Only five bodies sell their own tickets: anyone who is not on that list is reselling, and we say so.
• Price against the official list. We compare the same entry, on the same day, with the institution’s price and with the partner feeds.
• Cancellation and refunds. We read the terms, not the badges on the listing: it happens that a page promises “free cancellation” and the product turns out to be non-refundable.
• Customer support. Phone number, email address, hours, language. An anonymous contact form is not support.
• Independent ratings with a date. Trustpilot, TripAdvisor, app stores: we give the score, the number of reviews and the wording “at the time of checking”. Self-declared ratings on a company’s own site are flagged as such.
• Site consistency. Old prices left on pages, expired structured data, reviews borrowed from somebody else’s product.

How we make money. We receive a commission on bookings made through our links to Tiqets and GetYourGuide; the price does not change for the person booking. With the other twenty-two companies reviewed here we have no agreement of any kind: we are not paid by the ones we recommend or by the ones we criticise, and no review is sponsored.

Booking platforms

Tiqets is owned by Expedia and for the Uffizi and the Accademia it is a reseller, not the ticket office: entry plus audio guide from €25, basic ticket €36 against the €29 official, both non-refundable. Trustpilot 4.3/5 on 61,124 reviews and an app at 4.8, the best numbers in the group: review of Tiqets.

GetYourGuide is a Berlin marketplace with over five hundred Florence activities and the most concrete advantage on this whole list, free cancellation up to 24 hours. In exchange, quality depends on the local supplier, and the Firenzecard is resold at €94 against €85: GetYourGuide.

Headout is a US reseller with the lowest Uffizi prices among the platforms (from €19.60 to €28) but non-cancellable timed tickets. Trustpilot 4.4 on 63,486 reviews, a BBB rating of D-, Brunelleschi Pass at €51.92 against €30: Headout.

Tickitaly is a real travel agency, based in Empoli with twenty years behind it, but it has two heavy limits: it states that it no longer supplies Uffizi tickets, and it applies a no-refund policy once the order has been sent. The only reviews are on its own internal system: Tickitaly.

Florence.net writes on its own pages that it is not the museum’s official site, then has orders fulfilled by a third company. At checkout the Uffizi ticket reaches €34 against €29, and the refund is 80% with twenty days’ notice: Florence.net.

Turbopass is a German company selling the Florence City Pass: twenty-two attractions, the Uffizi and the Accademia booked on your behalf, but the Duomo is not included. From €93.90 for one day, with a €40 penalty per pass if you cancel: Turbopass.

florenceduomo.com is not the Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore: it is the site of a private German individual earning commission on links. It correctly advises buying the Brunelleschi Pass at €30 through the official channel, but the resellers it points to charge €56–69: florenceduomo.com.

Viator belongs to Tripadvisor and brings the largest review sample of all, 4.5/5 on 332,229. It has over a thousand Florence products and an Uffizi ticket between €37 and €49, with cancellation policies that change from listing to listing: Viator.

Civitatis is Spanish, has the smallest catalogue (seventy-eight experiences) and the best ratio of positive to negative reviews, 4.5/5 on 194,072 with only 5% at one star. Strong on Spanish-language tours and on the city’s free tour: Civitatis.

Musement is part of the TUI group and is a licensed agency with phone support in Italian. The sore point is the Uffizi tickets at €31 or €44 marked “free cancellation” but in fact non-refundable: Musement.

Official channels and local operators

Uffizi ticket office. Sales have moved to CoopCulture: you buy on tickets.uffizi.it with a call centre on 800 615 615, and any page still pointing to B-ticket for the Uffizi is out of date. Name-bound ticket, non-refundable, five-day PassePartout at €40: Uffizi ticket office.

Accademia ticket office. It is the last major Florentine state museum still on the B-ticket circuit run by Firenze Musei: €20 plus €4 booking, no refunds and no date changes except for a forced closure. TripAdvisor 4.6/5 on 32,479 reviews: Accademia ticket office.

Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore. It sells directly, with no concessionaire: Brunelleschi €30, Giotto €20, Ghiberti €15, valid three days. It states in writing that no official skip-the-line exists and refunds nothing, not even for bad weather: Duomo ticket office.

Firenzecard. The only public pass, issued by the city council’s in-house company: €85 for 72 hours, Restart €28. It does not include the Duomo or city transport, and it does not spare you from booking the Uffizi and the Accademia: Firenze Card.

Musei Civici and MUS.E. The legal seller is the city council, while reception and guided visits are run by the MUS.E foundation. Palazzo Vecchio costs €18 plus €1 online booking fee against the €30–32 charged by the platforms, and the right of withdrawal does not apply: Musei Civici.

Walkabout Florence. The old walkaboutflorence.com address now redirects to walkabouttours.com: same Florentine limited company, new brand. Tuscany day trips from €75 and a full refund up to 24 hours, but big coaches: 34,166 reviews at 4.9 on TripAdvisor: Walkabout Florence.

Florencetown trades as Towns of Italy S.r.l., a tour operator listed on the Tuscan regional register, with 11,982 reviews at 4.8. Walking tour with the Accademia at €82; watch the terms, which say 24 hours on the listings and 48 in the conditions: Florencetown.

Walks of Italy is now a brand of the American group City Experiences, with terms governed by US law. Florence in a Day costs €127 per person with groups of fifteen to eighteen, and some tours are non-refundable: Walks of Italy.

LivTours works semi-private with a real maximum of six participants and has the highest rating in the group, 5.0 on 1,044 reviews. You pay for it: the Uffizi Express costs €119 per person, roughly four times the official ticket: LivTours.

Context Travel builds its offer on guides with academic credentials and prices in dollars (small-group Uffizi at $231). Its cancellation policy is the harshest on this list: half withheld from twenty-nine days before, no refund inside 48 hours: Context Travel.

Free tours. They are not free: GuruWalk itself suggests a tip of between €15 and €50 per participant. The serious issue is the guide’s licence, because the city council penalises practising the profession without one; the long-standing florencefreetour.com domain is unreachable: Free tours.

City Sightseeing Firenze. The hop-on hop-off has passed to Busitalia, part of the FS group. From €29 for 24 hours, but the buses do not enter the city-centre ZTL and the TripAdvisor score is 3.5 on 569 reviews, the lowest among the operators we analysed: City Sightseeing.

Comparison sites and media

florencepasses.com is an affiliate comparison site, run by the same person who publishes florenceduomo.com. It declares its commissions and flags the limits of the passes, but it sends anyone looking for the Firenzecard to a reseller at €94 instead of the official channel at €85: florencepasses.com.

Audiala is an audio-guide app from a Swiss company: a $4.99 monthly subscription plus commission on tickets. It states openly that its content is generated with the help of artificial intelligence, and its own Florence page carries figures that contradict each other: Audiala.

Where to start

If you are short of time: check the official price on the page of the museum you care about — Uffizi, Duomo, Passes — and use a platform only when the official slot is sold out or you need to be able to cancel. The overview of all prices is in Tickets, the discounted packages in Combos.

These reviews remain the quickest way to work out which Florence ticket sellers charge the full official price and which ones add thirty euros of middleman on top.