Colosseum, the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill tours

Yes, guided tours get preferential treatment. It still takes some time, but not as much.

I always recommend to our visitors to get a private guide. It is so worth the money and they can tailor the tour to your interests and the time you have available. a 3 hour tour is usually sufficient, and a 4 hour tour is very comprehensive. Usual rate or 50-55 Euro per hour. I highly recommend Sonia Tavoletta, [email protected].

I also recommend a tour, the area of the three sites is very large and without a plan it would be easy to wander around and not really see and experience these awesome landmarks. We used the tour company "Walks of Italy", they did get us right to the front of the lines (felt like a VIP walking past lines and lines of people), and with the two tours we took with them (Vatican also) the employees seemed to know them. The groups are small (12 people max) and we learned so much in our 4 hours there. We also had special access to a top tier of the Colosseum, which was really cool, people tried to follow us in and they were told that we are a tour. I cant say enough good things about this company, the guides were fabulous and professional and we met some great fellow travelers.

We booked the inexpensive Colosseum tour offered by the Colosseum itself (rather than a third party company) then used Rick Steves' free downloadable audiotour of the Forum along with a photocopied walking tour of Palatine Hill out of Rick Steves' Rome guidebook (from the library). We also had the "Rome: then and now" book to help us visualize things better. Overall, it wasn't a bad option. I'm sure that it would have been even better/less work to have a paid tour, but if you want to include the underground portion of the Colosseum, those are pretty pricey. So I guess in the end it depends if you are budget travels or have money to spend to enhance your experience.

I had also heard about the horrific lines at the Colosseum, so I was glad that the inexpensive Colosseum tour allowed us a shorter entry time. Yes, guided tours generally get you in faster. Another strategy is to go to the Forum/Palatine Hill first...those tend to have shorter lines.

We used the free RS audio download tours and liked them. You can even enjoy the audio download prior to your trip. I don't think there is one for Palatine hill. The Roman Forum and Colosseum are available for RS. Either that or watch the Russell Crowe movie "Gladiator" before going or get a Great Courses video. If going to Roman forum and Colosseum/Palatine Hill on your own - enter the R. Forum from Via Fori Imperiali side entrance and get a combo. ticket. No line whatsoever! Go to colosseum after 3 pm with your combo. ticket and you can skip the ticket line and head straight for the turnstile to enter the Colosseum. From R. Forum, there is a short cut to Colosseum. When you are ready to leave the forum - go to the basilica of Constantine and use the one-way turnstile out. BRING WATER to this area.

We booked this colosseum after dark tour with dark Rome: https://darkrome.com/rome-tours/colosseum-night-tour It was lovely because the tour guide provided a lot of good information in an interesting way and, even better, there was no line to get into the colosseum and there were very few people inside. It was worth the cost for us.

Thank you all. This is very helpful!!!!

We are not big on tours but we booked the tours in Rome because of the crowds as we will be there in August. This way we can see things less stressful and also get more info as we tour the Colosseum we also booked the one after dark.

Was just in Italy in May for 18 days. Spent 3 nights in Rome and we also used Walks of Italy for the VIP Colosseum tour ( which included Palatine Hill and the Roman Forum) . It was a great 4 1/2 hour tour, I would highly recommend this one for sure. Our guide looked like David Bowie 😃. We also did the Pristine Sistine Tour, our guide for that one was Alisia who was wonderful !! It was an early morning tour, but well worth it because we were in the Sistine Chapel with less than 75 or so people . She took us back through after a couple hours of doing the Vatican and it was so crazy crammed with people. So glad to have seen it that morning. Both tours were great on getting you through the crowds and lines. I loved Rome and everywhere else we went in Italy. Beautiful country!!! Can't wait to return !!

We booked out tickets in advance from COOP for the self tour. Ticket pickup in little portable building behind tree by where line ropes start. Once tickets in hand (no line to pick up will call tickets) we only has to do security line, which was quite long looking but only took about 10 minutes - this was on Saturday June 18th about 3pm.

We took the Walks of Italy "VIP Caesar’s Palace Tour with Colosseum & Roman Forum" two weeks ago at 9:00 AM. We only waited in line for 5-10 minutes to get through security at the Colosseum. We were in a short, expedited line especially for tour groups. The non-tour lines already looked formidable. There is a lot of security at the Colosseum in terms of armed police/military and everyone goes through airport-style security so it takes awhile. The remainder of the tour involved no lines; the lines at the forum at that time were pretty short.

I'm a Roman history enthusiast, so I wanted to see Augustus' 'house', which is on this tour. You can see the original walls of some rooms; the building was on the Palatine. It was pretty cool, but perhaps more so if you are really interested in that period of history. We also visited the Domus Romaine, http://www.palazzovalentini.it/domus-romane/, which is the underground remains of a villa in the core area of Rome. The unique feature of this attraction is that they've used lighting to help reconstruct the villa and make it come to life. For example the villa had a swimming pool, and with light and sound they help you visualize it full of water. There is also a great film at the end of the visit about Trajan's column which reads the column like a storybook; the actual column is just outside the villa. The visit is all indoors and air conditioned, so might be nice mid-afternoon on a hot day. It's very close to the main Forum. I think there are several English tours per day.

I don't have the answers but last time we went which was several years ago we actually found a guide right outside the Colosseum and paid her right there. Wondering if that is still an option.