Royal Palace of Madrid Tickets and Guided Tours
20 listings, 29,906 reviews and the highest rating in this catalogue at 4.741. The rooms take 45 minutes, the median product 140, and the palace can close for a ceremony.
There is a sentence on the Royal Palace booking page that no reseller repeats, and it is the most important thing about buying a ticket here. Next to the list of fixed closures, Patrimonio Nacional writes that there may be additional closures caused by the holding of official ceremonies. This is a working royal residence, not only a museum, and it can shut on the morning of the day you booked. No advance ticket protects you from it, ours included, and none of the 20 listings we track mentions it. What they do offer, and it is the sane response, is a way out: 19 of the 20 allow free cancellation, the highest share of any monument in this catalogue.
The second thing worth knowing is how short the visit is. Patrimonio Nacional puts the self-guided tour of the rooms at about 45 minutes. The median product sold for this palace runs 140 minutes. Two thirds of what you buy, in other words, happens outside the building, and once you know that the catalogue reads very differently. The best rated listing on this monument costs 2.99 EUR and has 7,436 reviews at a flat 5.0, which looks impossible until you do the arithmetic: a product costing 2.99 cannot contain a 24 EUR entry ticket. It is a tip-based walking tour of the old town that takes in the palace from outside, with a token booking fee, and it is very good at being that. Reading it as the cheapest way into the Royal Palace would be a mistake, and reading a price range that starts at 1.99 EUR as the cost of visiting a palace would be a bigger one.
The rest of the pricing is unusually settled. The first quartile and the median are the same number, 39 EUR, which happens when a market has agreed with itself: four of the ten most reviewed listings here charge exactly that. The third quartile is 72 and the ceiling 295, with a single listing above 250. And there is one genuine oddity: a fast-track entry ticket sold at 22 EUR, two euros under the palace's own counter price of 24. It is the only place in the Spanish catalogue where a reseller sits below the ticket office.
What follows is the fare ladder and the two things missing from it, why the hour printed on a guided ticket decides which language you get, and the free evening window that is two hours long and one hour wide.
Madrid Old Town Dated: 1619 Plaza Mayor to the 1993 Cathedral
A two-and-a-half-hour walk with the dates attached: the Plaza Mayor of 1619, the market of 1916, the cathedral consecrated in 1993, the 2004 royal wedding.
Madrid Old Town Pay-What-You-Want, and the Tunnel to the Royal Palace
The booking holds your place and the guide is paid at the end, as much as you thought it was worth. The route ends outside the Royal Palace at the mirador.
Madrid from the 9th-Century Wall to the Palace: Why It Was Called Magerit
Two and a half hours from Puerta del Sol to the palace viewpoint, taking in the 9th-century wall that founded the city, with a printed map handed out.
Private Palace and Prado in Four Hours, with the Taxi Between Included
Four private hours, and the transfer from the palace to the Prado is by taxi rather than on foot, which is what makes both fit into one morning.
Private Royal Palace: the Crown, the Sceptre and the Tiepolo Ceiling
Two and a half private hours that take in the crown and sceptre of the Spanish monarchy, the Tiepolo ceiling in the Throne Room and the Sabatini staircase.
Royal Palace Madrid for Eight: the Clocks, the Sabatini Staircase
A group of eight at most, taken through the Hall of Columns, the Sabatini staircase and the Throne Room, with the palace clock collection along the way.
Prado First, Palace Last: Optional Early Access an Hour Before Opening
The Prado is taken first, with an option to go in an hour before it opens to the public, and the day ends at the Royal Palace. Sixteen guests at most.
Royal Palace Madrid: the Porcelain Room and the Armour of Charles V
The route covers the Porcelain Room and the Royal Chapel, then leaves you in the Armoury with the mail and helmets of Charles V. It can close for repairs.
Private Palace and Prado in English, Walking the Old Town Between
A private guide working in English, both admissions included, and the walk between the two crossing the old town rather than being spent in a vehicle.
Royal Palace and Almudena Cathedral: the Gasparini Chamber Included
The cathedral is included alongside the palace, and the route inside takes in the Gasparini Chamber and the Hall of Mirrors. Starts at Ópera metro.
Royal Palace of Madrid: the Throne Room, Goya and Giordano
A guided route through the Throne Room, the banqueting hall and the private apartments, with work by Giordano and Goya. Meet at the souvenir shop, not the gate.
Royal Palace Madrid Guided: the Portrait Gallery and the Armouries
A guided route up the marble staircases and through the portrait gallery to the armouries, in a residence covering 135,000 square metres. Free cancellation.
Madrid Old Town: the Square That Changed Its Name Five Times
The walk to the palace goes through the Plaza Mayor, which has carried five names under five regimes, the San Miguel market and the Torre de los Lujanes.
Royal Palace and Prado in One Day, Running from Four People Up
Both admissions are in the price and the walk between them passes the Congreso and Puerta del Sol. The tour needs at least four people to run.
Royal Palace Madrid and the Palatine Stradivarius Collection
The route includes the palace collection of musical instruments and the Palatine Stradivarius, held by Patrimonio Nacional. Four people minimum to run.
Royal Palace of Madrid Fast Track: Crown Room, Armoury, Galleries
A fast-track ticket with no group attached, covering the Crown Room, the weapons armoury and the painting galleries. Tickets are non-refundable.
Royal Palace of Madrid and an Iberian Tasting on Calle Mayor
Two guided hours through the Throne Room and the Gala Dining Room, with an optional Iberian tasting of ham, chorizo and Manchego to take afterwards.
Royal Palace of Madrid, Twice the Floor Area of Versailles, Group of 15
Madrid's palace covers 135,000 square metres against Versailles's 67,000, and this semi-private group is capped at fifteen for the walk up Calle Bailén.
Royal Palace Early Entry, with the Armoury Left to You Afterwards
Early entry through the Royal Chapel, the Grand Staircase and the Crown Room, then the Royal Armoury on your own once the guided part is over.
Royal Palace via the Plaza Built Over the Caños del Peral Theatre
The ticket is sent before the day, so you can either meet the guide by the Isabel II statue or go straight to the palace ticket office and use it.
Ratings collected by Viator, Tripadvisor, Civitatis and Tiqets
The closure nobody prices in
Four dates in 2026 are closed outright, the two Januarys, May Day and Christmas, and two more are half days: on 24 and 31 December the palace stops at 15:00 with the desks stopping at 14:00. All six are on a calendar and easy to work around. The other kind is not. The body states that closures can also happen because of official ceremonies, and gives no notice period, because it cannot: a state visit is not scheduled around ticket sales.
The practical consequence is small in probability and total in effect. If it happens on your day, you do not get in, and no operator has a channel that overrides the household of a working palace. What you can do is book something you can cancel and check the day before. Nineteen of the 20 listings here allow free cancellation, which is the highest proportion on this site and, on this particular building, the feature worth choosing on. A non-refundable ticket to the Royal Palace of Madrid is a slightly worse bet than a non-refundable ticket to anything else in Spain, and the difference is not the crowd, it is the constitution.
| Ticket | Price | What it covers | Worth knowing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Basica | 24 EUR | The rooms, self-guided | The body puts the visit at about 45 minutes |
| Reducida | 12 EUR | The same, reduced rate | Documents shown on the day |
| Basica guiada | 26 EUR | The rooms with a guide | The slot you buy decides the language |
| Reducida guiada | 17 EUR | Reduced, with a guide | Meet in the Zaguan five minutes before |
| Gratuita guiada | 8 EUR | Free entry, paid guide | The entry is free, the guide is not |
| Combined with the Real Cocina | 24, 12 or 8 EUR | Adds the royal kitchen | In the combined ticket those entitled to free entry pay 8 |
| Exclusiva Real Cocina | 8 EUR | The royal kitchen alone | Sold as its own product |
| Free window | 0 EUR | Self-guided only, Mon to Thu | No guided groups during it, and desks only |
| Galeria de las Colecciones Reales | Separate ticket | The museum next door | Same body, adjacent building, not in the 24 EUR |
You buy an hour, and the hour decides the language
This catches people who booked a guided visit on the official site and assumed a language menu. There is not one. The guided tours run in the language attached to the slot, and the slots are fixed. English runs four times a day, at 10:45, 11:45, 13:45 and 15:15 from Monday to Saturday, and at 10:45, 11:45, 13:45 and 14:15 on Sunday. Spanish runs from 10:30 to 16:30, with an extra 17:00 on Friday and Saturday and a shorter Sunday. Italian exists at exactly one time, every day, at 12:45.
So the 26 EUR guided ticket is really four products, and choosing the wrong hour buys you a tour in a language you may not follow. The procedure is precise too: enter by the preferential door 15 minutes before the time on the ticket and be at the meeting point in the Zaguan five minutes before. On a 45 minute visit, arriving 10 minutes late is not a late arrival, it is a different plan.
Forty-five minutes, and 140 sold
The gates in the photograph are the front of a building the owner says takes three quarters of an hour to walk through. That figure is honest and slightly startling next to a 24 EUR entry, and it explains the whole shape of this catalogue: the median listing runs 140 minutes and 6 of the 20 finish inside two hours, because the guides have filled the difference with the old town, the Plaza Mayor, a market, or in one case the Prado.
The longest listing here runs 300 minutes and pairs the palace with the Prado at 72 EUR. The shortest at 90 minutes is an early entrance product. Between them the difference is not how much palace you get. Everyone gets the same rooms in the same three quarters of an hour.
The free window is two hours long and one hour wide
Four afternoons a week, Monday to Thursday, the palace stops charging: 17:00 to 19:00 from April to September, 16:00 to 18:00 from October to March. Who qualifies is written broadly, and the accepted proof is written broadly too, a national identity card, a passport, a driving licence, a residence permit or a work permit. It buys the self-guided visit and nothing else, and no guided group is admitted while it runs.
Now the arithmetic that the announcement hides. Those free tickets are sold only at the ticket desks, and the desks close one hour before the palace does. In summer the palace closes at 19:00, so the desks stop at 18:00, and the free window that reads as 17:00 to 19:00 is a buying window of 17:00 to 18:00. In winter the palace closes at 18:00, the desks stop at 17:00, and the announced 16:00 to 18:00 is really 16:00 to 17:00. Either way you have one hour to get the ticket, not two, and you are queueing for it in person with everybody else who worked that out. Visitors with a disability of 33 percent or more enter free at any hour, with a companion where the card requires it, on documents shown at the desk that day.
What the 24 EUR does not include
Start with the building people assume they have covered and have not. The Galeria de las Colecciones Reales stands next door, under the same owner, and sells its own admission. Two buildings, two tickets, and the 24 EUR you paid opens one of them.
The Real Cocina, the royal kitchen, is the other one, and it carries a quirk worth reading twice. It is sold as a combined ticket at the usual fares, 24 and 12, and as a product on its own at 8 EUR. In the combined version, the people entitled to enter free pay 8 EUR. The kitchen is not covered by the free entitlement, so a free ticket plus a kitchen is 8 EUR rather than nothing, which is logical once stated and surprising until it is.
No tourist pass we could find is accepted on the official platform for this palace. The Paseo del Arte ticket is the one people expect to work and it covers the Prado, the Reina Sofia and the Thyssen, which are art museums under a different owner. There is also a standing notice asking visitors not to bring large backpacks, cases or parcels while improvement work is under way.
What the 20 listings are, and the one number that surprises
Sixteen come from Viator, three from Tiqets, one from Civitatis. The weighted rating is 4.741 across 29,906 reviews, the highest of any monument in this catalogue, Spanish or otherwise, and the two products carrying most of that weight are a 39 EUR guided tour rated 4.8 on 7,841 reviews and the 2.99 EUR walking tour rated 5.0 on 7,436. The lowest rated listing with a real review count is a 35 EUR guided tour at 4.2 on 510.
A rating that high usually means expectations were modest and got beaten. Here it means something duller and more useful: the product works. Tickets are not named, entry is not capped by the half hour, no daily allocation runs out, and a guide who promised a palace can deliver one. The one caution is about wording. Eleven of the 20 put skip-the-line in the title and three carry the attribute in the supplier data. With advance tickets sold online and desks that close an hour early, what the phrase mostly means is that somebody bought the ticket before you arrived. Worth something on a Saturday in April. Not a separate door, and not protection against a state ceremony.
Royal Palace questions with a number in the answer
How much is a ticket to the Royal Palace of Madrid?
24 EUR at the counter, 12 reduced, 26 with a guide. In this catalogue both the first quartile and the median are 39 EUR, and one fast-track entry ticket sells at 22, which is two euros under the palace's own price. Free entry is available Monday to Thursday in the late afternoon for those who qualify.
How long does the visit take?
Patrimonio Nacional says about 45 minutes for the self-guided rooms. The median product sold here runs 140 minutes, so most of what you buy is a walk through the old town with the palace attached. Six of the 20 listings finish inside two hours and the longest runs 300 minutes, because it adds the Prado.
Can the palace close on the day I booked?
Yes, and it says so. Beyond the fixed closures, the booking page states that additional closures can happen for official ceremonies. It is a working royal residence. Book something with free cancellation, which 19 of the 20 listings here offer, and check the day before.
Will the guided tour be in English?
Only if you buy the right hour. English guided visits run at 10:45, 11:45, 13:45 and 15:15 from Monday to Saturday, and at 10:45, 11:45, 13:45 and 14:15 on Sunday. Italian runs once a day at 12:45. The rest of the slots are in Spanish, and the language is fixed by the time rather than chosen at the door.
How do I get in free?
Monday to Thursday, 17:00 to 19:00 in summer and 16:00 to 18:00 in winter, for EU citizens, EU residents, holders of an EU work permit and citizens of Ibero-American countries, with a document. Buy at the desk, not online, and remember the desk closes an hour before the palace, so the real buying window is one hour, not two.
Is the Galeria de las Colecciones Reales included?
No. It is a separate museum with a separate ticket, next door and under the same body. The royal kitchen is a separate product too, 8 EUR on its own, and in the combined ticket even visitors entitled to free entry pay that 8.
Which day and hour should I avoid?
Sunday afternoon. The palace shuts at 16:00 whatever the season, so a summer Sunday loses three hours against the Saturday before it, and access stops at 15:00. Also 24 and 31 December, when it shuts at 15:00 and the desks at 14:00, and 1 and 6 January, 1 May and 25 December, when it does not open.
Data verified on. Fares, guided-visit times, hours, closures and free-entry rules from the Patrimonio Nacional ticketing page for the Palacio Real de Madrid. Catalogue figures from the 20 listings on this site.