Money

Most transactions are card I find but you carry some cash in small bills for small transactions and for street vendors or street performers that you may like to give money to; you may find that some toilets require euro coins to enter and no cards.

Cashless? No, not entirely. Places and vendors accept credit cards, and we’ve mostly used credit cards on our trips the past 2 years, but cash wasn’t refused.

We pulled out cash from ATMs at least a couple times each trip.

^^^ This.

Many public restrooms in Italy require a coin for entry (one euro or 50 euro cents. Sometimes there is an attendant who can make change, ut only from a small bill, like 5 euros. And the bathroom in the deep underground section of the Bologna train station would accept a tap and pay credit card, but that is the only like that I recall.

So we needed a constant supply of small coins, which we would acquire as change back from his morning cappuccino—-he would pay with a 5- or 10- euro note. But since an ATM only dispenses 20’s (or 50’s), we had to first break those with a small purchase at the grocery store.

I agree with all of the above. And … I can’t bring myself to charge, say, €2.50 for a gelato. It’s always good to have some cash.

Many hotels offer a cash discount.

I think every Italian hotel I've stayed in (16 since 2015) has wanted the city tax paid in cash. That's a few euros per day, per person; the exact amount depends on the city and the class/type of lodging.

Many churches without entry fees are somewhat dark and have a coin-operated light system to illuminate mosaics or frescoes. The usual charge is 1 euro; I haven't seen any light boxes that take credit cards yet.

If you buy transit tickets from a newsstand or tobacco shop, you'll almost certainly be required to pay cash.

The people I saw buying single servings of gelato (I don't know about families buying for 3 or more people) were generally paying cash, so I did the same thing. I also doubt the cashier at a little corner store would be happy if you charged the cost of a banana, an apple, or a cold can of soda.

We used quite a lot of cash when we were there, and never had anyone ask for a card. We were staying in smaller RS type accommodations. All the hotels asked for the city tax in cash, ( other than maybe Rome).

We used cash for almost all meals. We did use credit card for trains.

I just got back yesterday from Catania. Over ten days, we used about 50 euros in cash (produce vendors, a few small bakeries). Everyone else took/preferred credit. About half accepted Amex.

Except for bathrooms, I used ApplePay for everything last Fall in Italy including 3€ gelato. Staff, who were mostly young, didn’t blink when I held up my phone and asked “Apple Pay”?

On our trip last September/October, a five-week driving trip, we kept having to buy little things just to get some coins to put in the parking lot machines --- a fair number of these either were not set up to take credit cards or there was a sign saying the credit card function was busted. Maybe just a random clumping of happenstances, but I thought I'd mention it since nobody else mentioned paying for parking with cash.

I am wrapping up a trip in Italy right now. Although I used credit/debit cards for many things, I also used quite a bit of cash for toilets, purchases under 5 euros, etc.

When going out to eat with several other people splitting the check, we often found it easier to collect cash from everyone than to use credit cards since restaurants seemed reluctant to run several cards (as is common in the US). Sometimes one person who wanted more cash would use their credit card to pay the entire bill and collect cash from the rest of us.

Our first hotel offered an 8% discount for paying the bill in cash. That made it worth a trip to an ATM since the discount more than covered the 2-3 euro fee at the ATM.

Nobody ever refused cash or expressed a preference for a card.