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Navigating Rome FCO Airport

Posted by (Seattle, WA, USA ☔️) on

We are headed for Puglia next week, and I'm looking for tips and some practical guidance for navigating Rome FCO Airport.

Our inbound flight from the US will arrive in FCO (I believe T3), scheduled arrival time is 8:50 am next Tuesday. Inbound flight is in business class on United, from Dulles IAD. We will have checked bags.

Our onward flight is on a separate ticket, from FCO to BRI. That flight is on ITA, in coach (and departs from T1, I believe), early afternoon.

We have roughly 5 hours to make that connection. Of course, as we are on separate tickets, we will need to go through all the formalities of entering Italy/EU/Schengen: claim our bags, go through passport control and customs, exit the secure area, change terminals, check in for our onward flight, check bags, clear security, etc.). With 5 hours, I'm pretty comfortable we will have no trouble making our onward flight (and worst case, if we arrive so late we miss that flight to Bari, there's a later flight we could catch).

As we will have some time to kill there (something less than 5 hours, probably more like 2-3), I have a short agenda for our time in FCO:

  1. I need to find a shop to buy SIMs for our devices (we will be getting physical SIMs, not E-sims; please don't lecture me on why I should get E-SIMs instead).
  2. Relax, stretch out, maybe take a shower if available (I have a Priority pass for lounges, there are at least a couple we can pick from).

It's been many years since I went through this airport. Can anyone provide guidance on anything unusual we should be watching out for there? Got a favorite lounge there to recommend? Pitfalls to avoid?

Thanks for sharing your insights.

Posted by
89 posts

There are TIM and Vodafone kiosks along with manned sales points after passport control in T3. The manned locations will assist in installing and registration of the SIM. Lines to purchase SIMs at the manned sales points could be long at times. I have only arrived and departed at T3 so do not know of T1 availability.

Posted by
805 posts

I'm looking forward to reading the answers you receive. I'm taking United from IAD to FCO for my trip to Puglia next year as well, arriving at 8:30am. I've debated catching a flight on ITA to Bari vs just taking the train into Roma Termini and from there to Bari. Either way leaves you with a few hours to get some food and exercise.

Posted by
65 posts

Thanks for your post David. My husband and I are getting to FCO this Saturday, the 13th, three hours ahead of the rest of our group and we are hoping to get good recon on the airport. We will not be able to avail ourselves of the lounges as we do not have further flights, so not sure what our options are and I'm looking forward to what advice you get.

Posted by
1916 posts

We did what you are planning to do, but 7 years ago, so I don't want to give you outdated advice. But it worked out just fine for us then, including (at the time) walking outside from one terminal to the other. I think we had 3 or 4 hours between flights. There was no extra time to do anything except get sim cards.

No lecture from me about sim card vs esim --- my husband gets the card so he can make phone calls and I get an airalo esim since I would never make a phone call in Italy.

We may be flying Minneapolis to Rome to Brindisi in a few weeks --- we are waiting to land at FCO to decide whether to fly to Puglia or take the train. We've done both before and each has pros and cons. So I hope you will post how your trip went!

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