Doge's Palace
Tickets 2026

Official site or reseller?

The official seller of Doge’s Palace tickets is the Venice civic museums foundation (Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia), on palazzoducale.visitmuve.it. It sells timed tickets for the St. Mark’s Square museums and the Secret Itineraries tour. Resellers mostly sell guided tours, often combined with St. Mark’s Basilica or a gondola ride.

How to spot the official site

The official pages are on visitmuve.it, the website of the Venice civic museums. Other sites with “doge’s palace” in their address are resellers — which is fine, as long as you know what you are paying for. Day visitors should also check whether the Venice access fee applies on their date. Whichever ticket you choose, check the date, the time slot and what is included before you pay.

What You Will Actually See

A thousand years of Venetian power

The Doge’s Palace (Palazzo Ducale) was the seat of government of the Venetian Republic for nearly a thousand years: the residence of the Doge, the chambers of the Great Council, the law courts and the prisons, all in one building beside St. Mark’s Basilica. The Gothic palace you see today took shape from the 14th century, its pink-and-white façade facing the lagoon.

What you will see inside

The route climbs the Golden Staircase into vast council chambers decorated by Tintoretto and Veronese. The Hall of the Great Council holds Tintoretto’s Paradise, one of the largest oil paintings in the world. From there you cross the Bridge of Sighs, named after the prisoners’ last view of Venice, into the New Prisons.

What the standard ticket misses

The Secret Itineraries tour opens the parts of the Doge’s Palace where the Republic actually worked: the chancellery offices, the torture chamber and the Piombi cells under the lead roof, from which Casanova escaped in 1756. It is the best way to understand how Venice was governed.

Which Ticket, How Long, How to Get There