Rome: Always Free

Sights and monuments in Rome, Italy, that are always admission-free

Sights By Category
• Top Sights
• Museums
• Ancient sites / ruins
• Churches
• Reid's list
• Free sights
• Michelangelo's Rome
• Bernini's Rome
• Caravaggio's Rome

The Pantheon - The only ancient Roman temple to survive the millennia intact is also one of the most amazing architectural spaces in Rome, an expansive cylinder swaddled in precious marbles, topped by a vast concrete hemisphere, and pierced by a wide shaft of sunlight from the oculus at the center... .» Full Story

Imperial Fori/Trajan's Markets - The grandeur of Imperial Rome, laid out in a series of public spaces, markets, and triumphal columns by successive emperors, you can admire with a quick troll of bike ride down Via dei Fori Imperiali.... » Full Story

Rome for Free
Always Free
Sometimes Free
Churches
Markets
Parks
Experiences
Discounts

The Spanish Steps - A graceful arc of stairs—set off by azaleas in spring and always overflowing with chattering Romans and tourists—is tied in an off-center double bow to an elegant hillside at the very eart of Rome's trendiest shopping district.... » Full Story

The Trevi Fountain

- The world's most famous wishing well is a riot of sculpture and favorite late-night gathering place in Rome.... » Full Story

Largo Argentina - A few steps from one of Rome's main city bus stops lies a trio of ancient temples crawling with stray cats and overflowing with weeds, and the crumbling set of steps upon which Julius Caesar was assassinated on the Ides of March.... » Full Story

The Mouth of Truth - An ancient Roman sewer covering carved into a grotesque face with a gaping mouth that legend holds will bite off the fingers of anyone who dares stick in his hand and tell a lie.... » Full Story

Teatro di Marcello - This early blueprint for the Colosseum survives even though medieval builders grafted a series of apartment buildings on top of it (don't tell me the Romans don't know how to recycle).... » Full Story

Teatro di Pompeo - The remains of an ancient Roman amphitheater in the basement of a contemporary Roman restaurant (killer pasta all'amatriciana, too).... » Full Story

The Vittoriale - The Monument to Vittorio Emmauele II—the undisputedly ugliest and most pretentious buildling in all of Rome—now has one saving grace: you can now climb it for a magnificent panorama over the heart of ancient Rome.... » Full Story

Pasquino - Rome's favorite public pundit and editorial cartoonist has been on the job for centuries now, dispensing his wit, wisdom, and barely concealed rage at the problems facing society from the corner of a palazzo just off Piazza Navona.... » Full Story

Column of Marcus Aurelias - The emperor's exploits and most famous victories spelled out comic-strip fashion in a spiral up this giant marble pillar along the Via del Corso.... » Full Story

The Foro Boario - The forgotten forum, a pair of teensy, utterly ancient temples slung between the back side of the Capitoline Hill and the Tiber River, across from the Mouth of Truth, in what was until modern time a cow pasture.... » Full Story

The Knights of Malta Keyhole - A peek-a-boo view of St. Peter's from the top of the Aventine Hill—and the entrance to the private fiefdom of an order of knights that has survived since the Crusades.... » Full Story

Ponte Sant'Angelo - The prettiest bridge across the Tiber River is strung with stateus of angles designed by Bernini and leads right to the Pope's private castle, Castel Sant'Angelo.... » Full Story

Palazzo Zuccari - The artists who once owned this palazzo near the top of the Spanish Steps laid out an unusual unwelcome mat in the form of turning the door and window frames into the gaping maws of monsterous faces .... » Full Story

Museo delle Anime del Purgatorio (Museum of Souls in Purgatory) - Proof that not everyone makes it to the afterlife on the first try.... » Full Story

NO LONGER FREE: The Roman Forum - I include this on this list even though they charge €11 to get in now because (a) it's a major site that (b) until 2008 actually was admission-free. It had been so for nearly a decade, and some of your guidebooks or other travel materials might still say this; I just wanted to give you the heads-up.

Not that a visit isn't still worth it (and the ticket also gets you into the Colosseum and Palatine Hill). The famous forum's lines of chipped columns, crumbling triumphal arches, broken temple porticoes, the curve of abandoned marketplaces, armless statues patinaed with age allowing you to wander through the ghost city of an ancient Rome that, 2,000 years ago, ruled the entire known world.... » Full Story