The Colosseum is an elliptical amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy, just east of the Roman Forum. It is the largest ancient amphitheatre ever built, and is still the largest standing amphitheatre in the world, despite its age.
The Forum was the centre of day-to-day life in Rome: the site of triumphal processions and elections; the venue for public speeches, criminal trials and gladiatorial matches and the nucleus of commercial affairs.
The Palatine Hill, which relative to the seven hills of Rome is the centremost, is one of the most ancient parts of the city; it has been called "the first nucleus of the Roman Empire".
The tickets for the Colosseum and Arena floor were incredible. Such a great experience, even though it was crowded. The audio tour didn’t work for us, but we still enjoyed the trip. We had a hard time getting a signal in the Colosseum.
The ticketing process was pretty messy. It’s better if everything can just be on the app. The audio tour was difficult to download.
Our booking was 10am they asked us evening before to change to 4pm said ok and when we got there the site had followed at 3.30pm for winter hours , emailed asking to go the following day no response asked for a refund again no response , extremely frustrating and disappointing .still No refund received or communication a week later
All the explanations and details are good for my experience I hope to have a turkish story teller ( voice guide) as soon as possible
We booked a 10:00am tour with the coliseum floor. 5 days before the tour, we received a what’s app message that our tour was changed to 1:30pm without the coliseum floor. They said they would give us back 30% back but we have yet to see that. All that being said, the coliseum was awesome
Coloseum was fantastic. Really quick queue to get in . Definitely buy tickets in advance. Got ours through Viator. Was a mix up at first but they rebooked them and sorted everything out for our trip.
Everything was perfect! My ticket came right on time and the Audio App worked well. The guide was also very communicative and made sure i received the ticket plus gave me an instruction where to enter.
All went very smoothly - received the tickets 1-2 days in advance via email and WhatsApp for the chosen time. Tickets worked fine on the gate. Didn’t use the audio guide which some other reviews have criticised - plenty of signage around the sites to state what things were, plus I had my own guide book.
Worth the money. Skipped the huge queues that were there. Very efficient. Lovely place and lots of history
Easy process, we booked for early in the morning so we hopefully didnt have to queue for long. Which we didnt. Our visit was booked for 8.30/8.45 . We got there at 8.25 and was in the building by 8.40. Tickets arrived via email a few days before. Very easy process will use this company again for other trips.
Don't trust them... they cancelled within 72 hours of the Colosseum visit citing bogus reasons. No responsibility taken.
Experience was great but workers from Viator cancelled the floor access portion and have not given me my refund . Activity happened over a week ago!
Do not book this if you have no flexibility on the dates/times. Changed my reservation from the 27th to the 28th and then couldn't make up their mind about what time slot to offer me. The audio guide is literally the official colosseum app, so they add 0 value to the standard colosseum tickets. Scalpers, reselling the tickets. Shame they exist.
Had amazing time. Directions were simple and easy to use. No complaints and no waiting. Thank you it’s a must do.
Got WhatsApp message from operator (instead of through Viator) 2 days before saying they can't get my tickets and had to negotiate for 2 days to finally get my tickets. The timing was not ideal and my child was too tired to enjoy our visit to the Colosseum which was their favourite thing.
My tour got cancelled the day before. Very disappointing. Booked ahead so this wouldn't happen. Apparently online technical difficulties
Very disappointing. The operator changed our Colosseum booking, we accepted the new date immediately, but never received a confirmed time or the tickets despite repeated follow-ups. We missed the visit and had to reorganize our day. Completely unacceptable.
Don’t book with these guys - they cancelled our booking twice just days before we were due to visit, at which point no other tickets were available. The result was, we didn’t get to visit the Colosseum. We booked with them to attend the Colosseum etc on Monday 26 October 2026. On the 24 October, they messaged me saying they didn’t have the tickets, but could definitely get tickets for a day later, on Tuesday 27 October. Not ideal, but we changed things round and reluctantly agreed. A day later, it was the same story again - nothing available for Tuesday 27 October, but they could get tickets for 28 October. We couldn’t do that date, but frankly I had also lost any faith in them by that time. I don’t know if they’re dishonest or just inept, but either way it is not acceptable. I am also STILL waiting for my refund. So they took my money, didn’t get the tickets (which they told me when it was too late to book elsewhere as they had completely sold out) and still haven’t given me my money back. Absolute amateurs, thanks for ruining my family’s visit! Can I have my money back now?!
Totally rubbish. On the website it plainly states that you cannot enter 15 mins before your entry time (which indicates you can enter at least 15 mins beforehand). Our entry time was 2pm we tried to enter at 13:45 and was refused. Due to no queuing system it was very hard to estimate when you would actually ‘hit’ the gate. We arrived at 13:55 and was refused again !. Had to go back to the chaos again. Eventually got in and then found the app supplied does not work in the colossus (three of us and I work on IT ! For gods sake). After we have walked around. We went to the forum (included in the price) to find that it is closed from from 15:30. The website specifically states that the tour of the colosseum takes at least 2.5 hours so it is impossible to then make the tour of the forum after the colosseum. This was not mentioned on the website. You have charged us for something you have not delivered. I want a refund please or otherwise I feel no option to take legal action
When we got there we were told our tickets were invalid. I booked Colisseum for 12. You changed to 4.45. It shuts at 3.30. So we tried to be organised. You messed up for us.
Great experience. Everything worked perfectly. Colosseum is amazing. Shouldn't be missed. Would definitely recommend it.
Everything was perfect. We didn’t wait at all in line and we entranced easy. Colosseum is very beautiful and worth visiting
Worth a visit, the audio guide definitely needed. The organizers kept us notified as the booking was approaching and were very helpful when I had inquiries about the reservation.
difficult and expensive process….like always when buying from a scalper. the experience was great, once we were able to finally get our very basic tickets and move on. next time we just get our tickets early is what we learned: much cheaper, no 100 emails, no wasting time and energy!
The direction for entry to the colosseum were very good, but there no directions for entry to the forum. Once we found the the entry point the line was ridiculously long. We were never able to download the audio tour for the colosseum. All in all we were not impressed with this tour. Definitely recommend getting a tour with an actual guide. Over all our experiences with Viator have been awesome, but this one was not great.
The tickets arrived two days in advance and they worked well for our tours. The main floor arena ticket was well worth the price as it gave us a nice viewing area of the Colosseum and additional access in the Roman Forum. You can visit the Roman Forum the day before, the day of, or the day after your Colosseum ticket. I’d recommend splitting up the days if you’re traveling with kids so you can enjoy everything. We used the free app (that’s free to anyone, not just ticket holders) but also enjoyed Rick Steve’s app (he’s quite funny and enjoyable - our children also found it more enjoyable by listening). Be sure to have your passport or ID with you for both places for adults. They didn’t check the children’s. A good experience!
This is the first bad review I ever had to write on Viator. I booked the tour 3 months in advance. The day of the tour the cab driver told us that Rome is madhouse that day, because there is a marathon in town ending at the Colosseum. The tour company never mentioned this. Traffic was terrible, thousands of people and barricades everywhere blocked the access. It was a nightmare. And I did add extra time to get there because it is Rome. Long story short, we arrived late and missed our entry window. We missed the tour. Had we known, I would have planned this very differently. The company does not communicate well and I found them rude. I will not recommend the tour because of the tour company. Biggest tip: check what is going on in Rome before booking.
This was fairly simple to organise and the tickets were delivered and, in my WhatsApp, before I got there. I liked that it was easy and no hassle as I was stressed out about it. The audio guide was good, and my kids and I listened to it as we walked about and learned more about the colosseum. So, thank you.
Viator is a good company to book through. Good communication email and text. Text the night before with the tickets and where we needed to meet etc. it would have been nice to be pre informed about the rome marathon which finished next to the coliseum and made it harder to get to with my ten year old son but I should have checked myself for any issues luckily we are always early for everything so had the extra 30 mins to play with to be rerouted. Other than that good experience. It was a very busy day so glad we only booked to walk round tickets ourselves instead of expensive ones with a tour guide.
The app guide was ok, but it’s all a bit of a waste of money. Official tickets - at a fraction of the price - are released 30 days in advance, if we were better organised we’d have just got those because this was very expensive. To be fair, it was cheaper than others!
Instructions on where to go were very clear, the Colosseum itself was amazing! And the audio guide was easy to use.
U always discover that your tickects are basic and u need to by other tickect or upgrade to have acess to the catacombs for example ....my tickect say visit the Colesseum so I expect ALL THE AREAS...we do not discuss the price... The Hill was great and no issues...good value for the price... But we find a very disorganised tourist services in general in Rome... Is really let's profiter the maximum of tourists...your are ripped of all the time,taxis, tickets,restaurants ...they try to charge us 40 euros more...monuments nice,but 2 crowded, very bad service...disorganised...
It was super easy to book. There was always an agent (an actual person!) either via the booking website or What's App. I was a bit sceptical but would definitely recommend it. Audio guide also worked super.
We were glad to see the coliseum but it was a bit challenging to find and understand the gate to use. We also couldn’t really understand the audio tour well. The woman’s accent was difficult.
Audio app didn’t work on phone very well as no internet connection. Thought we would of been given head sets to wear
Great experience. Good follow up to make sure we received the tickets. If you miss out on buying official tickets this is a good and reliable alternative.
One thing they don’t tell you is that you cannot change travelers names the tickets which then result in not being able to get in colosseum. Your ticket MUST match your ID name. Thank God i was able to skip a MASSIVE queue to get a other ticket! No refund available . The Colosseum, Roman Gorum and Palatine Hill all worth seeing . Beautiful
From start to finish this was a really great day. We have been before (with another company)however due to partnere medical issues had to leave early and not finish the day. From booking to getting tickets sent and accessing both sites we had no issues. We were updated through viator and WhatsApp which was in my opinion an excellent service. We slept soundly after our day. Couldn't recommend the company enough. Instructions were easy to follow aswell.
It was a bit confusing finding the gate, but once we did it was fine. An audioguide is available, but we didn't really use it. An audioguide would have been better for the Roman Forum and Palantine Hill, but they were still impressive.
Was expecting more than an arrow on photo. The Colloseum was incredible. They won’t let you say no to recommend a friend
I received the tickets for the Colosseum, forum and palatine but these were for a different time to the one I had booked. Overall seems an easier way to get tickets than through the official site but undoubtedly this kind of "tour" is what makes it so hard for people to get tickets. We had no interest in the audio guide and didn't use it, so can't comment on the quality.
It was an audio guided tour without clear markings of which chapter to listen to, but it got me into the coliseum when I couldn’t buy tickets online.
Audio app worked well. Just be careful not to have to restart it as you will need to walk back to the starting point. You can manually play each location in the app, but you will need to keep the screen on.
Received instructions for entrance and e-ticket via email. Very straight forward. Seamless entry to both the Colosseum and Roman forum/Palatine hill sections.
The self guided tour was ok for someone who has been to the colosseum before, but for your first time, I recommend a guided tour.
Buyer beware. We purchased a tour of Colossel in Rome. Your guide set alarm didn’t bring us to whole tour. More worried about going to the next gig.
The colosseum tour itself was good. Just wish Viator could send fewer emails with all the information we needed in maybe one or two emails. It was difficult finding our tour details like meeting places and tickets when we needed them.
Audio guide very poor quality. We learned close to nothing. No audio available for Roman Forum. Waste of money.
They got my entrance to the colosseum at the wrong time. One hour after my scheduled appointment. Pushed back all my plans. I notified them when I received the tickets. They just looked at my message and no apology or explanation on why it was pushed back
Not a great experience. Audio location tracking was poor. Commentary also not hugely engaging. We did a guided Vatican tour the day before which was much more enjoyable and almost half the price. Overall, it’s great to see the sites but this audio tour was disappointing and not worth the money.
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