Paris opera house tours new non EU pricing

Neither France nor the US are precedent setting with these dual pricing schemes. They've been in effect in several other countries for a while now.

It costs money to travel; it always has. I find European museums quite a bargain.

25 euros to see that building doesn't seem excessive (see Rick's latest Paris episode for more).

You should see the prices in Istanbul for non Turkish visitors. I was blown away.

€25 seems fairly reasonable to visit the Opera Garnier in comparison.

You can actually see a performance for €50, by the way. Avoid those in the last row of the boxes if you want to see anything, but otherwise, to me this is better value than paying €35 for a tour of the venue.

There are even some cheaper last-minute seats but those are without much of a view, require waiting in line, and are truly dismal.

The Opera Garnier is an amazing building to visit and I highly recommend it. I suggest that if the increase to €25 is a deal breaker for your travel budget (keep in mind it was only an increase, it cost me €16 in 2024), you should rethink your budget. I do like the idea of seeing a show there, but the performances available on the dates I am there never seem to be something I would gravitate towards.

Ruth,
The Opera House is a magnificent and impressive building and worth 25 euros. I was blown away the first time I saw it, not expecting it to be so grand. For comparison here are some other entrance fees:
Louvre 32 euros
Orsay 16 "
Versailles 25 "
Arc de Triomph 22 "
Ste. Chapelle 22 "
Rodin Museum 15 "
Catacombs 31 "

So the Opera is within the cost range of many of the best sights. And it really is worth it. Seeing a performance there would be great as well!

Thanks for the feedback everyone. I will leave the option of visiting the Opera House open for now. It sounds like many of you have enjoyed the visit. In the past we’ve visited the Opera House in Vienna as well as the Parliament building in Budapest. Both amazing interiors…. I’m not positive we need to add to those experiences but will definitely reconsider.

We’ve purchased the Passion Monuments duo pass which covers a number of the other sites we plan to visit. We climbed the Eiffel Tower and visited Versailles and the Louvre when we were last in Paris 12 years ago. We’re skipping all 3 this time around because of the crowds, and are focusing on some of the places that may not be on every tourist’s top 10 bucket list. I’ll put the Opera Garnier back into the “maybe” column.

Ruth, I hope you can get to the visit the Cluny. I saw it for the first time in 2023 (on my 7th visit to Paris). It's recent reno work was excellent. Enjoy your time in Paris!

We very much enjoyed our tour of the Paris Opera House. We did the tour that's loosely themed to Phantom of the Opera. The great hall is really spectacular, rivaling Versailles!

The Louvre and Versailles also implemented higher ticket costs earlier this year for non-EU visitors. (Maybe the Orsay too but I don't remember off.rje top of my head).

It is becoming a more and more prevalent practice.

Does anyone know how one proves residency, or is it the honor system? I suppose we could walk around with our French tax declarations to save a few euros, but let's be realistic. How is residency being determined? I know plenty of non-citizens who are residents and plenty of citizens who aren't because they live overseas.

Does anyone know how one proves residency, or is it the honor system?

From the website, the lower pricing actually applies to both citizens and residents (see below).

A further detail is that it actually applies to EEA (not EU) citizens/residents, which means that non-EU states like Iceland and Norway are included, but that Switzerland (which is not an EU or EEA member) is not.

Visitors who are residents or citizens of the European Economic Area benefit from specific pricing conditions upon presentation of a valid document with name and photograph.

Residents: a valid long-term residence document (student card, visa valid form more than three months, etc.)​

Citizens: a proof of identity (national identity card, passport, driving licence, etc.)

Seeing as the US started all of this with our new National Park
pricing for visitors from outside the USA.

I think that is giving the US too much credit for altering world affairs. Not that many French visiting US Parks.

Here at least, and I suspect it might be what is going on in France, is that the EU does not permit charging more for an EU citizen then they do for a Hungarian citizen (or in your case a French citizen). So, what do you do if you want to keep national landmarks financially accessible for the local population … after all they should be able to afford to see and enjoy their own property … right?

What you do is reduce the price for your citizens and all the EU citizens as required by the EU and make the outsiders carry the weight of the operation and maintenance. Since it’s conceivable that most of the visitors are EU, that means the few that are not EU are going to be paying a lot.

More For comparison:
Ala Scala is 35€ for all
Vienna 15€ for all
Budapest 30€ other than Hungarian and 16€ Hungarian (clever way around the law)
London 30€ and up for all (way too many choices of tour types)
Prague 11€ for all

Mr E,
One NP that the French (and other foreign visitors) do flock to in the US is Death Valley NP, particularly in the summer! When we take our visiting French friends and family members there (always a must for them), we seldom see any US visitors. Once, out of twelve cars and about 30 people that were at Zabriskie Point, there were 2 Germans, 4 Japanese, and everyone else was French (and not all the same group together). I guess watching the sun come up (or go down) in one of the hottest places on earth is a thing. (Often up to 128-130 degrees Fahrenheit at 1:00 p.m. in the summer.)

(Not a NP, but Hwy 101 along the Pacific coast is very popular with European visitors who rent Harleys and enjoy the great scenery from astride their hogs. I can hear "Born to Be Wild" as I think about this! I guess it is another "thing".)

A lot of art house film buffs who remember Antonioni’s film.

... and make the outsiders carry the weight of the operation and
maintenance.

National museums in France are 30% to 40% funded by French taxpayers. Ticket sales account for about 45% of revenue, with the remainder coming from sponsorship.

As a supporter of many small local musical and arts groups in my hometown, I confess to not objecting to prices usually charged to visit or tour a museum or concert hall if it is helping to keep it alive. Here in Long Beach we have a really good, decent-sized symphony orchestra that performs at our large and lovely Terrace Theater. Their professionalism and prices are consistent with other local orchestras in the US (not the NY Met of course), so we attend less often. But we also have some terrifically talented folks in our Camerata Singers, the a capella group "Catalyst", our Chorale and Chamber Orchestra, our "Up Close and Classical" string quartet (these four groups perform at local churches that have some great acoustics), a store-front-sized Shakespeare Theater (It performs other than Shakespeare also), the Long Beach Playhouse (a theater "in the round"), Musical Theater West which performs at the university's Carpenter Center for the Performing Arts, plus excellent performances from the university Performing Arts dept. I donate to them all, in my own small way, but am happy to give support to their efforts, even if they don't have their own venues. Most perform without pay, bless them, and give so much joy that were they to have their own venues, I would happily donate for that as well.

Judy is right, America's national parks esp. out west are a huge draw for international tourists. To a certain extent, they might even be helping to subsidize them.