Skip the Line: Vatican Museums and Sistine Chapel Tour

Rome, Italy

Take a morning or afternoon tour of the Vatican Museums and Sistine Chapel - and jump the queue by booking ahead. You'll enjoy a mini coach tour of Rome en route to the Vatican and see Michelangelo's famous Sistine Chapel frescoes, without wasting time waiting in line.

To start your morning tour of the Vatican Museums, you'll take a coach tour across Rome. Your city tour includes a live commentary and offers a brief introduction to Rome as you travel by bus to Vatican City. Highlights en route include Piazza della Repubblica, following the ancient Aurelian Walls, the famous Villa Borghese gardens and the northern gate of Rome leading into Piazza del Popolo.

Upon arrival, your guide will lead you into the museums. You'll see the beautiful spiral stairway and continue through the Gallery of Tapestries and Gallery of Geographical Maps, before arriving at the famous Sistine Chapel with its magnificent fresco of the Last Judgment by Michelangelo.

After your tour, you also have the option to indulge in an Italian lunch (drinks not included) before taking a guided tour of Christian Rome in the afternoon. Highlights include the Basilicas of Santa Maria Maggiore and Saint John in Lateran, and traveling along the ancient Appian Way to see Rome's Catacombs.

USD $76.61

Traveler Reviews

Review by: john k	April 2012
Very upset, because we booked the whole day tour, and i had to tell them after the morning tour which did not include the main part of the vatican, where the pope comes out, and she tolds us to go back to our hotel,walk! then they would pick up us hours later, for the other churches! (i think they messed up)Our guide was boring am! Afternoon guide was very good!

Review by: Lana E	April 2012
We would not recommend this tour at all. The guide was the worst we have ever experienced - rude, unprofessional, with bad English pronunciation, ill prepared to lead a group, e.g. no spare whispers on her, consequently when the batteries ran out on my machine half way through there was no chance in hearing anything what was being said by the guide. We went on a Monday afternoon and the queues into the Vatican museums were non-existant. Do it yourselves as if you get as BAD a guide we got, £50 per person is too expensive an experience to endure.

Review by: Mark B	April 2012
We like the tour and skipping the line but when inside the tour went to fast. I would have loved to look at the paintings more and maybe stop at the souvenier stands inside the museums.

Review by: Tracy P	March 2012
Excellent tour, but keep in mind that you only get to see a small portion since Vatican city is so big. But a good tour to see the basics.

Review by: Troy V	March 2012
This tour was ok and I am glad to say I did it. Clearly the climax of the tour was the Michael Angelo paintings. Not sure there was overwhelming passion from the tour guide.

Review by: Janet G	February 2012
Forgot the name of our tour guide but she was very good in explaining things. Viator was organized and helpful. We had a positive experience.

Review by: Peter D O	February 2012
Skipping the line is a must for the Vatican museum, do not try and do it any other way. The queues that we by passed were unbelievably long. Our tour guide was outstanding. The only down side is that there is no chance to visit the 'shops' with in the Vatican to purchase mementoes, instead the tour group take you to their affiliated shop that is not a touch on all of the ones in the Vatican.

Review by: Rosemary S	December 2011
Excellent. Our male guide ,from the start, gave us great insight even before we entered the museum. A truly masterful tour. One of our best ,if not the best tour in Rome.

Review by: Charles M	November 2011
We enjoyed this tour...guide was very well informed......(only negative was the large group)

Review by: Luis P	November 2011
Just what we need it!

Review by: Nancy S	November 2011
The group was much larger than I expected - really too large for one guide.

Review by: Leslie D	November 2011
Pick up at our hotel was on time. The guide was excellent and very knowledgeable. Overall I give this a 5 Star Rating. Excellent value, expecially for those that do not want to stand in line waiting for tickets.

Review by: Sandy	November 2011
Excellent tour and the guide was great and very knowledgeable.. Highly recommended the tour. The line on the day of our tour was at least 5 hours long. It was great to go to the head of the line…

Review by: michelle p	November 2011
i booked our skip the line vatican musuems and sistine chapel tour before travelling hoping to avoid delays and difficulties. How wrong I was. The pre departure time said be there for 9.15.The time on line was incorrect, the woman at the office was rude, insisting we were in the wrong until i showed them the email. It was resceduled. But worse was the guide. She was bored, in a rush and very rude to an elderly couple. I know this sounds all negative but I truly can think of nothing nice to say. I would not recommend this company and would recommend doing tour independently!

Review by: michelle p	November 2011
i booked our skip the line vatican musuems and sistine chapel tour before travelling hoping to avoid delays and difficulties. How wrong I was. The pre departure time said be there for 9.15.The time on line was incorrect, the woman at the office was rude, insisting we were in the wrong until i showed them the email. It was resceduled. But worse was the guide. She was bored, in a rush and very rude to an elderly couple. I know this sounds all negative but I truly can think of nothing nice to say. I would not recommend this company and would recommend doing tour independently!

Review by: Andrew E	October 2011
The guide at Vatican museums was really the worst I've ever encountered - she was completely clueless and unpleasant! This tour was an absolute waste of money, much better just to buy the tickets to the Vatican museums online or use a different tour company!

Review by: SM33	October 2011
It was fantastic. I have expected for this tour to be a bit "dry", but our guide had us laughing all the time.

Review by: Lisadi	October 2011
Very bad tour. Group was too big, and guide did not attempt to stop at any artifact to view and/or explain, Definitely do not recoeemnd if you are looking to have the guide provide information. Good if the only reason you are taking the tour is to skip the line.

Review by: Lissa G	October 2011
Worked out perfect. Tour guides were excellent. Picked up and dropped us off, just worked out wonderful!

Review by: michael m	October 2011
Meeting place was VERY hard to find due to lack of details as to the location. Tour was rushed wit hardly any opportunities to take photos.

Review by: Boon Hock C	October 2011
Guide is friendly and patient during the tour. It was not hurried as she took her time to tell us about the places and things we viewed. Save time for the skip the line as it was very crowded

Review by: Michelle W	October 2011
Great tour. Guide very informative. Only downside is that we were picked up late and by a Taxi to be dropped off at Carrani to meet the others on the Tour

Review by: TCB	October 2011
Excellent tour, guide knew her stuff very well but also knew which souvenir shops to take us to .... the most expensive ones, it is better to shop around before buying. As for skip the line, there was no line to skip, I guess we were just lucky.

Review by: Marz2u	October 2011
Our guide was very knowledgeable, but lacked enthusiasm and spoke very monotone. Keeping the groups was difficult for some older folks as they could not keep up the pace or see the staff with a scarf guides used to locate them. We were told if we got lost to go back out to the front of the building and wait for the tour to come back at the end!! You would want your mother to do that? That should be a clue to slow down.

Review by: Louis	October 2011
In my opinion it was a very Enlightment experiance specially when the guide explain the paintings step by step from the genesis the creation and and detail by Michael Angelo with his perception regardless of the corrections was understandable made by later puppils. it was great !!!!!!

Review by: Thomas R	October 2011
This was a diaster a spainish/english group of over fifty with one guide and disable couple, that had to been shown a short-cut for part of their tour meaning the guide left for 10 minutes whilst everyone else waited to go into the museums. At the back of the line you could not hear the audio when you walked through the museums. We left fifteen minutes late as it took that time to load the coach which was full. Passing through security took even longer as the tickets we had to collect where handed out to a group beside us by mistake so the had to be retreived. We failed to catch the coach as the tour was running so late it had left when we came out.

Review by: Judith G	October 2011
We were very thankful that we included the Skip the Line tour instead of doing it on our own!! As we entered the entrance to the Vatican the line to get in was very long and we just "skipped the line!!" Definitely the way to go.....

Review by: margi	October 2011
HAD A WOUNDERFUL DAY WELL ORGANISED AND THE LUNCH WAS GREAT

Review by: Songbird	September 2011
The tour guide we had really rushed us through everything..audio guide aids had very poor reception..guide was informative but disinterested. The best part is getting to skip the line..but I would suggest buying a skip the line option and just see the places yourself..

Review by: baker	September 2011
We did 4 tours and airport transfers with Viator in Rome and everything was great except this one. While in the SIstene Chapel, my wife got seperated from us. We think the problem was that the mic and headsets didn't have enough range for everyone to hear the notice to get ready to go there. When that part of the tour was over, the guide didn't seem to care AT ALL that she was missing and left us to our own devices. Eventually, we both found our way back to the hotel safely, but it was a frightful experience. It was her 1st use of foreign mass trans alone and not one you would have planned that way...

Review by: Lindsay C	September 2011
An excellent tour. The Guide was very helpful and spoke perfect English. The commentary provided via radio headsets cut down on the overall noise levels and meant that the guide could always be heard, making this tour far superior to my previous visit to the Vatican several years ago.

Review by: Bradys	September 2011
Very well done. Our transportation was good, on time, our guide was knowledgeable and although it was a large group, we were given headsets to hear her comentary. I would recommend this one.

Review by: Monica H	September 2011
This was wonderful

Review by: blulvr	September 2011
Rather than getting a chance to really see the museums, the tour guide rushed us through the museums after spending 25 minutes outside explaining the paintings of the sistine chapel. Then we practically ran through the museum, not even entering most of it, to run to the sistine chapel. Then after we were in the chapel we spent another 15 minutes repeating the same information we had just gone over. Time could definitely have been better spent. One person lost his wife in the chapel and we didn't even have 1 minute to look for her. We actually left her there. Then after the chapel we left and stopped at a gift shop outside the museums that seemed to be friends of the tour guide, rather than let anyone look at the gift shops in the vatican itself. Overall I think worth doing but maybe with a different tour company.

Review by: Daniel Lee S	September 2011
A routine walk-through of museums. No time to experience or understand the rooms. More than half of the tour was spent traveling or getting the group organized.

Review by: irinaslosberg	September 2011
Великолепно!!!

Review by: Andree D	September 2011
The visit was a race beginning to end. The guide told us that she has been doing this for 22 years and it felt like a burden more than anything.We did not have time to see as we were walking so fast that we could not see or read anything. I had a much better experience in 2001 than this year at the vatican. We had more time in the official Vatican store than in any room, of the vatican!!! I do not recommend this at all or not whith this guide. She had to speak spanish and french and she was far more interested to speak spanish so we had to hear spanish first for longer than the explanation in French. So we lack on information.

Review by: Sharon B	September 2011
This was quite a good tour. You get to walk through the Vatican and the Sistine Chapel and the guide was very well informed. You don't however get into St. Peter's Basilica as it's not included on this, but you can queue separately for that and there is no charge. Overall quite a good tour and glad we took this one.

Review by: Carol M. K	September 2011
SURREAL, very well put together, the guide was so interesting and knowledgeable. Can't wait to go again, highly recommend this tour, thank you.

Review by: Alexandra G	August 2011
It was very convienent to have the skip the line ticket to see the Sistine Chapel, the queues were enormous! _br/_ The 'tour' itself couldn't have been faster. The was no time to pause and look around which was a shame as it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience for us. _br/_ We were, also disappointed that the bus left without us, leaving us standing at the side of the road near St. Peter's.

Review by: Curtis F	August 2011
we were dissapointed with the tour_br/_ group size was fine but the guide wasn't engaging and she seemed more concerned about getting it done on time._br/_ we felt very rushed thru the museum-she was always 10-2- steps ahead of the group_br/_ how were we suppose to hear much less understand what she was saying_br/_ i would not recommend this tour

Review by: May Chen S	July 2011
Wish I could have skipped the lines for St. Peters Basilica as well. It was a good tour but a bit rushed I found.

Review by: Donald Paul R	July 2011
Our guide was professional, knowledgeable, friendly and beautiful. We jumped a long line and in no time were inside the museum which was absolutely breathtaking.

Review by: Sandra P, Australia	June 2010
Guide was well informed & multi-lingual skilled. However, she was too kind to a man who broke rules as to arriving on time leaving the Sistine Chapel. It obvious to many of us that he had been taking photographs in that overtime as his partner was given the camera and spent quite some time with the camera looking at shots as we left the complex!

Review by: L. T, United States of America	June 2010
The fact that we were able to bypass the 2-3 hour long line to begin our Tour as scheduled was a huge factor in our pre-purchase of this Tour, else we would not have waited in line to enter. We definitely want to recognize our spectacular Tour Guide. She was extremely knowledgeable and very thoughtful and organized in her presentation throughout the entire 3 hours. She explained the background and history of the artists along with showing us pictures depicting various artists work in the museum and Sistine Chapel prior to entering each area, which was very helpful and increased our appreciation of the art. Her enthusiastic personality was entertaining and quite humorous which made the Tour so much more memorable. This was our 1st time using Viator and we will definitely use this service for all future travel.

Review by: James H, Australia	May 2010
An excellent tour with a very good guide. I have health problems and often find it difficult to keep up with guides, but was able to do this with minimum effort.

Review by: Robert R, United States of America	May 2010
Good tour, but lots of walking. It is a forced march through some crowds, but well worth the effort.

Review by: Anonymous, United Kingdom	May 2010
Well organised tour. Excellent guide

Review by: Brett F, United States of America	April 2010
Tour does not include St. Marks Square. Rather hurried tour of the Vatican Museums and the Sistine Chapel, which was breathtaking. The AV equipment worked great and was absolutely crucial to the tour.

Review by: Beau C, United States of America	April 2010
It was a good tour. We felt a little rushed at times, but we soon learned that you must move pretty quickly if you expect to make it through the museums. By the far, the best value of the tour was "Skip the Line" aspect. When w left the Vatican Museum the line to get in streached halfway around the Vatican See. The line was 5 people wide and literally a mile long.