Villa Borghese Museum Tickets and Audio headsets

Posted by mishdoyle on 01/28/20 04:50 PM

Hello all,
I'm excited to take by college-age son to Rome over his spring break. I've been before but it's been almost 20 years!
I'm interested in taking him to the Villa Borghese Museum (I did visit 20 years ago). I've been on the museum website and I realize it's too early to book our tickets for March. I see that English Tours are offered at 9:10, 11:10, 13:10 and 15:10...Due to our busy schedule I was hoping to go later in the day.

I see they have a general admittance: "in at 17:00 out at 19:00" that works better for us. I'm fine with an audio headset as opposed to a guide...the question is..I don't see anything online (which is in Italian) about reserving headsets ahead of time. Am I able to purchase two once I'm inside the museum? I don't want to get there and find out they needed to be reserved and paid for or picked up outside the museum before getting there (as I did for the Shanghai Museum...what a fiasco).

Any other tips I should know about the museum? Thanks for any info on the museum or headsets is appreciated. Thank you.

Posted by Laura

01/28/20 05:06 PM

174 posts

I'm pretty sure that you can just buy the audio guide once you check in for your reserved time, though hopefully someone else can confirm this. They didn't open selling the Audio Guides right away, think it was about 15 minutes before, from what I remember. And don't worry about not taking the tour. The audio guide is pretty detailed. Your two hour allotment flies by. Borghese is my favorite art museum in Rome! I hope you enjoy it.

Posted by mishdoyle OP

01/28/20 05:17 PM

3 posts

Thank you for your help!

Posted by mishdoyle OP

01/28/20 06:40 PM

3 posts

Thank you for your reply. Didn't think about lighting...I will take that into consideration. My hotel is 1/2 block from Barberini station. Maps.me says it's .9 miles and 22 minute walk. I think I'll walk instead of bus. Thanks again for the helpful suggestions.

Posted by Patty

Used to be Steilacoom, now it’s Las Vegas

01/29/20 02:19 AM

2267 posts

Which website are you using for ticket purchase? If you google “ Tosc.it” it will show a list of attraction in Italian. On my page the Borghese was at the top. Click the button and it will take you to their page, scroll down bottom and on the right side there is a button to change to English.

When we were there in May we used the audio guides, which were inside near where we lined up to go through security. I think I remember paying for them when we picked them up. They limit the number of people per 2-hr. block, so maybe they don’t have to worry about having enough. In May, we entered in the basement, went through security ( I had to check my small crossbody) and then climbed the stairs. My mistake was climbing all the way to the top floor and starting the audioguide there - the audioguide started on the floor below. We figured it out

Our strategy was to walk from our hotel near Santa Maria Maggiore to the museum, pick up our tickets an hour ahead and then stroll the gardens until time to enter. The closer it got to our entrance time (3:00ish), the busier the ticket pick-up as well as the bag check. They have a small cafe.