Advance tickets and skip the line?

I discovered this last year and it's going to be on my annual must-do list. On Friday evenings (Spring - Autumn), the museum and Chapel have special hours and events. Things open at 7 o'clock. You can enjoy a happy hour with a cold supper buffet and a concert (music organizations from around Rome). Then the museum and Sistine are open to you until 11 o'clock. Much less crowded. Much more comfortable since the windows are open and fresh air keeps the heat down. If you're going to be in Rome on a Friday, I highly recommend this! It costs 38 euro and reservations (a must) can be made on line at museivaticani.va .

Each of those sites has different rules. An advance ticket allows you to skip the ticket-buying line, which can save significant time at both the Vatican Museum and the Colosseum/Forum. There will still be a line for security.

If you want to also visit St. Peter's Basilica, it's free, but the security lines get quite long. A tour would help in this regard, and options include simply downloading an audio tour for 20 euros from www.voxmundi.eu, which has their own, much shorter security line.

The Borghese Gallery sets realistic limits on the number of tickets sold to avoid overcrowding, so lines are not an issue but you may not get in at all without advance reservation.

Buy tickets on the official sites to skip the ticket lines.

Nobody skips the security lines.

I don't know in your city, but except for Saint Peter's Church in Rome there isn't a third type of line to skip booking a tour.

And when you buy those skiptbe love tix for ANY destination just remember that you may skip the line but you may not skip the people in live who also have the skip tix. At popular places many many people buy this skip tix and end up in long lines anyway. Versailles is a good example. Just be prepared.

We bought our tickets from the main website, no third party or tour. We skipped the line to purchase tickets WHICH WAS HOURS LONG, and headed straight to security. No problems and no hassle.

AND IT WAS EASTER WEEKEND!

Each of those sites has different rules. An advance ticket allows you
to skip the ticket-buying line, which can save significant time at
both the Vatican Museum and the Colosseum/Forum. There will still be a
line for security.

Best advice! Individual attractions have individual ticketing and entry rules. Advance tickets allow you to skip TICKET lines but no ticket/tour allows you to skip security queues. Still, buying in advance for the Colosseum/Forum/Palatine (reserving a timed entry to the Colosseum is pretty much mandatory these days), the Vatican Museums and the Borghese (advance reservations are mandatory for that one) will save you time. These are the ticketing sites you should use:

Colloseum/Forum/Palatine:
https://www.coopculture.it/en/colosseo-e-shop.cfm

Galleria Borghese:
https://www.tosc.it/tickets.htm?affiliate=T2C&sort_by=event_datum&sort_direction=asc&fun=erdetail&doc=erdetaila&erid=912678

Vatican Museums:
http://www.museivaticani.va/content/museivaticani/en.html

Tours can ensure direct entry from the museums into St Peter's. While sometimes the guards allow non-tour folks to access to the church via the back entry from the Sistine, you shouldn't count on it.

Borghese Gallery allows only a max of 360 people at anytime, hence advace ticket reservation is mandatory (even if you have Roma Pass)! I will be visiting it in mid May too and just bought my ticket.
You are allowed only 2-hour visits schedule: 9-11 am / 11am-1pm / 1-3pm / 3-5pm / 5-7pm
Keep in mind this purchase (online or call in) is just an order, you will need to show up probably 50 minutes before your time slot to collect your ticket at the museum ticket office.
If you start at the Borghese website to buy ticket, at some point it will first re-route you to this website 'www.gebart.it' which unfortunately has no English display option (as far as I can tell, I was busy using Google Translator to understand what's on the website).
Then you will again be re-routed eventually to this webiste 'www.ticketone.com.it', which fortunately has English option.
To save you the hassle I have the link for you here and it's for late May. It does not have a calender format, so you will have to click and scroll around to select the specific date you want:
https://www.ticketone.it/biglietti.html?affiliate=ITT&doc=venuePage&fun=venue&action=overview&includeOnlybookable=false&index_ytix=60&jumpIn=yTix&show_ytix=5&venueGroupId=17529&scrollToAnchor=ticketTable

The link for Borghese tickets I provided above:
It is the official vendor (ticketone), is in calendar form, and if it doesn't just come up in English there is a "Selezione lingua" tab in the "menu" box to the lower right of the calendar for changing from Italian.

That link will shortcut the clicks it would otherwise take to get to it from the Borghese's website. (http://galleriaborghese.beniculturali.it/en/visita/visit-the-galleria-borghese)

Clicking this text on the ticketone page....
"For detailed information about the visit of the Museum and Borghese Gallery click here"
....will provide some useful visitor's information.

Thanks so much to all who replied. Your information is incredibly helpful and I am so appreciative of the efforts that you have gone to in order to supply it! Any additional thoughts on best time of day to attend these sites? I understand early morning may be the most crowded?

@akking519:
Kathy is right about the "Selezione lingua" tab at the bottom right corner. The language tab usually is at the upper right corner, I thing that's why I missed it and had to resort to Google Translator ... haha.
Some additional information about Borghese:
* closed on Monday
* since they limit the visitors to 360 at anytime, it likely won't matter what time of the day you choose to visit
* I read this tip somewhere: "As most people start on the ground floor; to avoid the crowd go upstair first, then downstair where the amazing collection of Bernini statues are located."