Michelangelo’s David: Accademia Tickets and Visitor Guide

Michelangelo’s David stands in the Galleria dell’Accademia in Florence, a ten-minute walk from the Duomo. The ticket costs €20, the gallery opens Tuesday to Sunday from 8:15 am to 6:50 pm, and it is closed every Monday. Everything else you need is below.

The statue is 5.17 metres of Carrara marble and it is the reason almost everyone walks through that door. This guide covers the practical side, buying the right ticket and turning up at the right hour, and then the statue itself and the rest of the collection, which most visitors walk past without noticing.

Galleria dell’Accademia Tickets and Prices

Tickets sell out in high season, so book ahead. B-Ticket is the only official online box office authorised by the Italian Ministry of Culture for this museum. Beware of resellers charging more for the same entry.

Ticket	Ticket price	Booked online, with a time slot	Book
Adults	€20.00	€24.00	buy here
Reduced, EU citizens from 18 up to and including the day of their 25th birthday	€2.00	€6.00	buy here
Under 18, any nationality	€0.00	€4.00	buy here
Combined 48h: Accademia + Bargello	€26.00	€30.00	buy here
Combined 72h: all 6 museums	€38.00	€42.00	buy here

Read that third column, because it is the number you actually pay. The €20 is the ticket. Reserving a date and time costs €4 more per person, online or by phone through Firenze Musei on +39 055 294883. An adult booking ahead pays €24, not €20.

The €20 is what you pay at the ticket desk, on the day, after queueing. There is no way to reserve a slot and still pay €20.

This catches families out. Under-18s do enter free, any nationality, but free only applies at the door: book a time slot for a child and you still pay the €4. For a family of four booking ahead, that is €16 of booking fees on top of the tickets. The same €4 applies to the combined tickets, and to free tickets bought with them.

If your plans might change, a ticket bought through a guided tour that includes admission usually comes with free cancellation up to 24 hours before. It costs more than the museum ticket, but you are paying for flexibility and for someone explaining the room.

Combined Tickets for the Six GAMB Museums

Since 15 March 2026 the Accademia and the Bargello museums sell combined tickets. The 48-hour one covers the Accademia and the Museo Nazionale del Bargello for €26. The 72-hour one covers all six museums in the system for €38:

• Galleria dell’Accademia, for the David
• Museo Nazionale del Bargello, for Donatello’s David and the best sculpture collection in the city
• Museo delle Cappelle Medicee, with Michelangelo’s New Sacristy
• Orsanmichele, the church and sculpture museum
• Palazzo Davanzati, a furnished medieval merchant house
• Museo di Casa Martelli

One warning before you buy the 72-hour ticket: Casa Martelli is closed for building work until 31 December 2026. The pass is still worth it if you plan to see three or four of the others, but you will be visiting five museums, not six.

Free Entry Days

Entry is free on the first Sunday of every month, under the Italian Ministry of Culture’s #domenicalmuseo scheme. In 2026 it is also free on 25 April, 2 June and 4 November.

The catch: on free days you cannot book. You queue. In a museum where the timed ticket is the whole point, that often means an hour or more on the pavement in Via Ricasoli. Free entry suits a quiet winter Sunday far better than a first Sunday in May.

More free museum days across the region: #domenicalmuseo in Tuscany

Opening Hours and the Best Time to Go

The gallery opens Tuesday to Sunday, 8:15 am to 6:50 pm. Last entry is 6:10 pm and the ticket office shuts at 6:20 pm. It is closed every Monday, and on 1 January and 25 December.

Watch the clock at the end of the day. Closing procedures start ten minutes early, and from 6:40 pm you can no longer enter the musical instruments rooms on the ground floor or the rooms upstairs. A 6:10 pm entry gives you about half an hour, which is enough for the David and not much else.

Extraordinary openings: a few times a year the gallery opens late into the evening, or on a Monday holiday. In 2026 there were Tuesday night openings in July and August, and a Monday opening on 6 April. The Festa della Toscana, on 30 November, often brings one too, but it was not confirmed on the museum’s visitor page when we checked on 19 October 2026.

Queues are longest between April and October. Go right at 8:15 am or after 4 pm, and avoid the first Sunday of the month unless you are there for the free entry. Saturday is the worst day of the week.

Where to Find Michelangelo’s David in Florence

The original David is in the Galleria dell’Accademia, Via Ricasoli 58/60, a short walk from the historic centre and about ten minutes on foot from the Duomo.

Florence has two famous copies, and plenty of visitors photograph one of them believing they have seen the real thing. One stands in Piazza della Signoria, in front of Palazzo Vecchio, where the original stood until 1873. The other looks out over the city from Piazzale Michelangelo.

Both copies are outdoors and free to see. Neither gives you the scale or the surface of the marble. If you only have time for one, make it the Accademia and treat the copies as photo stops.

Read: The best hotels for art lovers in Florence

Why Michelangelo’s David Is a Must-See

The David is a 5.17-metre marble statue carved by Michelangelo between 1501 and 1504, when he was in his twenties. It was adopted as the symbol of the Florentine Republic.

The block he used had been sitting in the courtyard of the Cathedral workshop for 25 years, exposed to the weather and abandoned by two sculptors before him as unworkable.

What makes it new is the moment he chose. Donatello and Verrocchio had both sculpted David after the fight, standing over Goliath’s head. Michelangelo carved him before: the sling over the shoulder, the weight shifted onto one leg, the frown. It is a portrait of the instant of decision, not of the victory.

Walk around it. The back is the part people forget, and the twist of the shoulders only makes sense once you have seen the statue from behind.

Guided Tours of the Accademia

A guided visit costs more than the ticket, and there are two situations where it earns the difference.

The first is flexibility. Museum tickets are non-refundable once issued, so if your dates might still move, a tour with free cancellation up to 24 hours before protects you in a way the official ticket does not.

The second is the Prigioni. The unfinished Slaves in the corridor are the part of this museum that gains most from someone explaining what you are looking at, and the part most visitors walk straight past on their way to the David.

You can book a skip-the-line guided tour of the Accademia, admission included. Tours before opening hours exist too, at a higher price, if you want the Tribuna without the crowd.

Going without a guide is perfectly fine as well. The collection is small, and an audio guide from the bookshop costs €6.

What Else to See Inside the Accademia

Most visitors head straight for the David and leave twenty minutes later. The rest of the museum is small enough to see properly in an hour.

• The Prigioni, or Slaves: four unfinished Michelangelo figures lining the corridor to the David, still half inside their blocks. Many people find them more moving than the finished statue, and they show exactly how he worked.
• The Gipsoteca, a hall crowded with plaster models by Lorenzo Bartolini, studded with the metal pins used to copy them into marble.
• The painting rooms, with Florentine gold-ground work from the 13th to the 16th century, including Giotto’s circle and Lorenzo Monaco.
• The musical instruments collection, from the Medici court, with instruments by Stradivari and the oldest surviving upright piano by Bartolomeo Cristofori, who invented the piano.

Before You Go: Bags, Security and Access

There is no cloakroom. This catches out a lot of people arriving straight from the station: large bags, backpacks and helmets are not allowed in, and there is nowhere to leave them. Sort your luggage out before you come.

Entry is through a metal detector, and knives, scissors and glass objects stay outside. Eating and drinking inside is not allowed.

Audio guides cost €6 at the bookshop, for adults and children, and you leave an ID document as a deposit. Guided groups are capped at 20 people, and headsets are compulsory for groups of six or more.

The museum is fully accessible: entrance and ticket office at Via Ricasoli 60, a lift to the upper floor, an accessible toilet on the ground floor, next to the lift, and tactile maps on the ground floor and the first floor.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much does it cost to see Michelangelo’s David?
The ticket is €20 for adults, €2 for EU citizens aged 18 to 24 and free for under-18s of any nationality. Booking a time slot adds €4 per person, so an adult booking online pays €24.

Do I need to book in advance?
Not officially, but the museum itself recommends it, and without a timed ticket the wait can be long. Book through B-Ticket, the only authorised official channel.

Is the Galleria dell’Accademia open on Mondays?
No. It closes every Monday, plus 1 January and 25 December. Occasional Monday holiday openings are announced on the museum’s own website.

How long does a visit take?
About an hour to see the museum properly. Half an hour if you are only there for the David.

Where is the real David?
In the Galleria dell’Accademia, Via Ricasoli 58/60. The statues in Piazza della Signoria and at Piazzale Michelangelo are copies.

Can I photograph the David?
Yes, without flash and without a tripod.

Hours, prices and access conditions checked on the Galleria dell’Accademia’s official website on 19 October 2026.