Florence Duomo Tickets: Dome Climb, Passes & Prices for 2026

Florence’s cathedral complex — the Duomo, Brunelleschi’s dome, Giotto’s bell tower, the Baptistery, and the Opera del Duomo museum — uses a pass system that confuses almost everyone. The cathedral itself is free; everything worth climbing or seeing up close is not. Here is how it works as of 2026.

The three passes (as of 2026)

Pass	Approx. price	Includes
Brunelleschi Pass	EUR 30	Dome climb (timed), bell tower, Baptistery, museum, Santa Reparata crypt
Giotto Pass	EUR 20	Bell tower, Baptistery, museum, crypt — no dome
Ghiberti Pass	EUR 15	Baptistery, museum, crypt only

All passes are valid for 3 days from first use, with each monument visitable once. Under-7s are free; ages 7–14 pay a reduced rate. The official seller is duomo.firenze.it — buy there and nowhere else unless you want a guided tour bundled in (typically EUR 50–70 with a licensed guide and dome slot included).

The crucial detail: only the Brunelleschi Pass includes the dome, and the dome requires you to choose a timed slot at purchase. In May–September those slots can be fully booked one to two weeks out.

Opening hours (as of 2026)

• Cathedral (free): Mon–Sat roughly 10:15am–3:45pm; closed to tourists Sundays and religious holidays
• Dome climb: Mon–Fri 8:15am–6:45pm, shorter hours weekends
• Bell tower: daily 8:15am–6:45pm
• Baptistery: daily from 8:30am
• Museum: daily 8:30am–7pm, closed first Tuesday of the month

Hours shift with the liturgical calendar more than any other Italian site — check the official calendar for your exact dates.

Dome or bell tower — or both?

• The dome climb (463 steps) is the headline: you walk the interior gallery under Vasari’s Last Judgement fresco, squeeze between the two shells of Brunelleschi’s revolutionary structure, and emerge at the lantern with the best 360° view in Florence. It is also narrow, warm, and one-way.
• Giotto’s bell tower (414 steps) has a near-identical panorama with one decisive advantage: the dome is in your photos. It also has rest platforms and shorter queues.
• Doing both in one day is legal but leg-punishing — 877 steps. If you only climb one and the dome is sold out, the tower is genuinely not a consolation prize.

If dome slots are sold out

A fully booked dome calendar is the default in late spring and summer if you book under a week out. Three real options remain. First, guided tours with a licensed operator include dome slots from their own allocation and typically cost EUR 50–70 — they outlast official availability by days. Second, re-check duomo.firenze.it in the evening: cancelled named reservations are released back in small numbers. Third, take the Giotto Pass and climb the bell tower instead — 414 steps, no timed reservation pressure, and the only Florence panorama that actually contains Brunelleschi’s dome. What does not work is showing up hopeful: there is no walk-up dome queue at all, and the staff at the door cannot sell you anything.

Skip-the-line and timing advice

• Book the dome’s 8:15am slot. Cool air, soft light on the frescoes, and an empty lantern terrace.
• The free cathedral queue is the longest line in Florence — often 45+ minutes for a fairly bare interior. See it early morning, or accept the view from the dome-climb gallery, which is better anyway.
• Don’t skip the museum. Ghiberti’s original Gates of Paradise and Michelangelo’s late Pietà live there, and it is the least-crowded part of the complex.
• Dress code applies: covered shoulders and knees throughout, enforced.

The complex sits 4 minutes from the Uffizi — see our Uffizi tickets guide to plan both bookings together, and our Florence things to do guide for the rest of the centre. For the engineering story of how Brunelleschi built the largest masonry dome on earth without scaffolding, our Renaissance history guide tells it properly.

Our recommendation

Buy the Brunelleschi Pass (~EUR 30) with the 8:15am dome slot as soon as your Florence dates are fixed, climb the dome first, then spread the bell tower, Baptistery, and museum over the pass’s three days. If dome slots are gone, take the Giotto Pass and climb the tower at sunset instead.