We are traveling to Rome in the middle of October. I am trying to purchase Colosseum Underground tickets thru the official site. Is there a time, like 3:00 in the morning, when I can go online and buy the tickets 30 days in advance? Every day that I go on the site, anything 30 days or more out is not available. And anything 29 days in, is not available online. Not sure what to do.
Posted by
Minnesota 🎒
16634 posts
The fastest way for me to get an answer to you is to point you to this very good overview on ticketing by someone over on Trip Advisor (with thanks to Spanish Steps Apt.):
Scroll down past the info for the Vatican to the section for the Colosseum. I'll highlight this information specifically, and not that if your trip is in mid Oct, that's still pretty much high season in Rome:
"First and foremost, tickets to the Colosseum underground area are very limited since the space is quite small, so tickets are EXTREMELY difficult to get. There are only about 200 spots for English-language guided tour spots each day (the average number of daily visitors to the Colosseum in the summer is about 25,000, so less than 1% of Colosseum visitors are able to book the underground tour). Now, if you can’t get underground tickets, it’s really NOT a big deal. The underground area has been significantly over-hyped, not helped by some intellectually dishonest companies referring to it as the “dungeons.” Moreover, you can still see the underground area when you are inside the Colosseum -- all you need to do is, well, look down!"
(I'll agree with the opinion above that it's not worth stressing over underground tickets for the reason provided. Sometimes tickets for a previously sold-out date will pop up again so you might check back now and again but otherwise book whatever is available for the date/time that is preferable for you.)
"Most tickets go on sale 30 days in advance and sell out quickly (underground tickets sell out almost instantly). The tickets are released 30 days in advance at the specific time of the visit to the Colosseum and roll out throughout the day. So, if you want a 10:00 a.m. entrance or tour, that is the time – Rome time – those tickets will be released (which could mean being up in the wee hours of the morning in the U.S.). In other words, the release time corresponds to the entry time/tour start time. The time slots will actually appear before the tickets are released so there will be a period of time where the time slot will show with no tickets available (it won't say no tickets available until you try to add them to your cart, however). Usually that period is a few minutes... although sometimes it is much longer."
(The exception to the above are tickets for Full Experience Arena Floor: those are released 7 days in advance.)
Posted by
OP
4 posts
Thank you for the great information. Very helpful. Much appreciated.