Frequently asked questions

Your place on one of three visits: the weekday Historical tour, the weekend Palazzo Bo & Gio Ponti tour, or the weekend self-guided entrance. All three take in the Cortile Antico, the Aula Magna, Galileo's lectern in the Sala dei Quaranta and the Anatomical Theatre of 1595. We book your chosen date and departure and email you the e-ticket.

On weekdays, Palazzo Bo is seen only on a guided tour — there is no independent walk-in access. On Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays you can choose the self-guided entrance instead: a timed entry with on-site audio points, at your own pace, alongside the guided departures.

Guided departures run in both Italian and English, and you choose the language when you pick your time. English departures currently run three times a day — on weekdays at 11:30, 13:30 and 16:30, and on Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays at 11:30, 14:30 and 16:30. The self-guided entrance has no language: its audio points are available in English.

The Historical tour lasts about 45 minutes. It moves at a steady pace through the Cortile Antico, the Aula Magna, the Sala dei Quaranta and the Anatomical Theatre, so you won't be standing around waiting between rooms.

No. Access to the tiers has never been permitted, for any visitor. You view the theatre from the original floor at the centre, the same vantage the professor once used, and look up into the wooden rings above you.

The youth ticket covers visitors aged 6 to 25 and the senior ticket those aged 65 and over, on every route. Carry valid photo ID that shows your age, as it's checked at the entrance.

No. Very young children are admitted free by the university, so you don't need to buy a ticket from us for them — just bring proof of age and keep them with an accompanying adult throughout the guided visit.

The weekday Historical tour covers the Renaissance core: the Cortile Antico, the Aula Magna, the Sala dei Quaranta and the Anatomical Theatre. The weekend route, Palazzo Bo and the Twentieth Century of Gio Ponti, adds the palace's 1930s–40s interiors — designer Gio Ponti's furnished Rectorate and graduation halls — on top of the same historic rooms.

After you book, our team arranges your dated entry and departure and emails you the e-ticket. You show it on your phone or a printout at the meeting point on the day.

Yes. It remains the historic seat of the University of Padua and houses the Rectorate and the School of Law. Visits are timed and guided in part because it is a functioning academic building, not only a museum.

The ticket office and meeting point sit in the passage between the palace's two internal courtyards, reached from the Via VIII Febbraio entrance. Your e-ticket confirms the exact meeting instructions for your date.

Older children with an interest in history or science tend to enjoy it, particularly the Anatomical Theatre. The tour is a standing, walking visit with stairs between rooms, which can be a lot for very young children over 45 minutes.

Palazzo Bo is a Renaissance building with staircases between several of the rooms on the guided route, including the approach to the Anatomical Theatre. If you have specific access needs, tell us when you book and we'll share the current guidance.

Direct trains from Venice to Padova run every 15 to 20 minutes and take as little as 26 minutes. From Padova station it's about a 20-minute walk to Palazzo Bo, or a short tram ride on line SIR1 to the Ponti Romani stop nearby.

Photography without flash is generally allowed in the courtyards and halls. Flash, tripods and filming are restricted inside the Anatomical Theatre and the graduation halls, out of respect for the rooms and other visitors on the tour.

All sales are final, in line with the university's own conditions. If the operator cancels a departure or cannot honour your entry, we contact you with an alternative departure or arrange a refund; refunds apply only where entry cannot be honoured on the operator's side.

Not itself, though Padua holds two separate UNESCO listings nearby: the Orto Botanico (1997) and the city's fourteenth-century fresco cycles, including the Scrovegni Chapel (2021). Palazzo Bo's own standing rests on eight centuries as the university's living seat, and on the Anatomical Theatre's place in the history of medicine.

Members of the University of Padua community enter free, on presentation of their university credentials at the door. This concession is administered by the university itself and doesn't apply to visiting tourists, who book one of the tickets above.

Yes. The family ticket covers two adults and one, two or three children aged under 18 on a single booking, and it exists for all three routes — the Historical tour, the Gio Ponti tour and the self-guided entrance. Tell us how many children are coming when you book; children under 6 enter free and don't need to be counted.