Notre Dame Inside Tour

You can not purchase tickets for Notre Dame. It is a Cathedral and entrance is free for everyone. No one is authorized to sell tickets for Notre Dame.

While a limited number of timed entry tickets are available here,
Reserve free tickets, up to 2 days in advance, you probably won't have more than a 15-20 minute wait without a timed entry. I would recommend an early arrival, before 9 am for shortest wait and a less crowded Cathedral.

You can also attend one of the daily services and then explore the Cathedral afterwards.

If you want to climb the Towers of Notre Dame, you must purchase a timed ticket.

Thanks but there appears to be various guided tours (inside and outside) we can hire to reserve a slot ? I found a bunch on Get Your Guide website. are they legitimate ? i read since June 2025 these guides are allowed to bring tours into N.D. ?

Please do not hire these tour guides. The cathedral does not authorize any tour companies. They are not supposed to be charging anything for going inside the cathedral. It is a house of worship, with services being conducted at times. It is disrespectful for someone to be making money off of a place of worship. Rent an audio guide with earphones.

If a service is happening while one is there one should be respectful of the worshippers and service and keep one's voice down, please.

To add, Even though tours may go through, some do not use their voices in a respectful manner and disturb those who are there for prayer. Sorry to sound so cranky about this. I have seen more disrespect in churches, synagogues and mosques than I care to and I just want everyone to remember where they are. I am sure you are not going to be one of the disrespectful ones.

You can reserve your own slot 2 days before, but the lines seem to go fairly quickly if you don't have a reservation. You don't need to pay someone to get a reserved time.

If you feel you need a live guide, go ahead and book one. But, as Judy and I have said, they can not sell you a ticket to enter the Cathedral. That is a violation of the Cathedral rules. Please look at the website for the times of services on the day you plan to visit. NO guided tours are allowed during any service.

Here is what the official website of Notre Dame says

Entry is free and open only via our official website. No tickets may be sold or distributed by a guide or agency.

I found the walking tour in the Rick Steves' Paris guidebook to be fine for describing the chapels, artwork, etc ... You can also rent an audio guide from the Notre Dame gift shop.

If you're concern is waiting in line, arrive early - before 9 am. By 10 am the Cathedral will become crowded with or without a tour guide.

Hi! CASA (Communautés d'Accueil dans les Sites Artistiques/Welcome Communities in Artistic Sites) offers free guided tours.

CASA is a volunteer organization who are the "official partners" with the cathedral and the Diocèse, and the guides do a training program in partnership with the Diocèse. Their tours focus more on the religious and spiritual topics of Notre Dame, and less on the architectural and "technical" topics, such as the restoration techniques, etc. I'm not saying this in a negative way, only so that you know what to expect.

On weekdays, they offer a combined tour of the interior and of the exterior. On weekends, they offer a tour of the exterior only.

The link to their tour schedule is here: https://www.acck.fr/GuidesCasa-calendrierCasa/ (scroll about 1/3 down the page for English). Advanced reservations are not required for individuals, tours have up to 20 people in a group. The meeting point is at the base of the north bell tower, which is on the left side of Notre Dame (if you're facing towards it).

A few really important things to note about (all) Notre Dame tours:

• Do not purchase tickets/time slots/reservations from tour guides/tour operators/travel agencies, or any 3rd party. It's always free to visit the main floor of Notre Dame and/or to attend Mass/liturgical services.
• Tour guides/tour operators/travel agencies are not allowed to sell time slots/reservations to visit the main floor, and payment for the tour itself can't be a condition to enter (ie. tour guides can't say that you have to pay for their tour to be allowed to enter the cathedral).
• Be very cautious of any tours that are sold through 3rd party sites like TripAdvisor, Viator, GetYourGuide, Headout etc. They're often very misleading, very overpriced, and they're are usually more scammy than not. If you do book a tour through a 3rd party site, make sure to read the fine print about what they do/don't include.
• There are no advanced reservations/time slots specifically for tours under 6 people. The group will need to wait in the "Access without reservations" queue. The wait time varies, depending on the combination of: the season, the day of the week, the time of day, if there's any liturgical services happening at that time, if there's any special events happening at that time, etc.

Time slots for independent/individual visits of the main floor of the cathedral are generally released at midnight (Paris time), for the date 2 days ahead. For example: At midnight (Paris time) on April 1st, time slots are released for April 3rd. https://resa.notredamedeparis.fr/fr/reservationindividuelle/tickets

FYI, "Tours de Notre Dame", means "Towers of Notre Dame". If you see "Tours de Notre Dame", it's referring to visiting the (bell) towers of Notre Dame, not a guided tour of Notre Dame. Guided tours/tour groups, regardless of size, are not allowed inside the bell towers.

You can visit the bell towers independently, but you must buy tickets/reserve a time slot in advance (they have an admission fee since they're considered a tourist site). Tickets/time slots are not available onsite, and there is no standby queue. Due to the limited number of time slots available, I recommend buying tickets at least 3-4 weeks in advance (5-6 weeks in advance during peak season, and/or if you have a specific date/time of when you want to visit). The bell towers are managed by a different organization than the main floor and they each have different staff, different opening hours, their own reservation/ticketing system, and their own queues/entrances/exits. https://tickets.monuments-nationaux.fr/fr-FR/familles?site=2402263094200400187

I second Emily about the word "tours". It does confuse us Americans, alas.