Visiting the Prince's Palace of Monaco, room by room

The Prince’s Palace is the visit people miss most often simply because they didn’t check the calendar. It only opens inside for part of the year, it can shut without warning if the family needs it, and every morning it puts on the best free show on the Rock right outside its gates. This is how I’d plan it to see the good rooms, avoid overpaying and not climb the hill twice.

Can you actually go inside the palace in Monaco?

Yes, within set dates. The State Apartments, the ceremonial rooms open to visitors, welcome the public from 30 March to 15 October 2026. In March, April, May, June, September and October the hours are 10:00 to 18:00 with last entry at 17:15, and in July and August closing moves back to 19:00. Outside the season you only see the Palace from the square, and on 29 September 2026 the official website had not yet published the 2027 dates.

The line on the Palace website I care most about is one almost nobody reads. Because it’s a working residence, the Palace can close to the public without prior notice. It also stays shut over Formula 1 weekend, and in October 2026 the ticket office lists it closed from 1 to 4 October. VisitMonaco adds 7 October. Should your visit coincide with one of those dates, I’d have a plan B ready on the Rock itself, starting with Monaco Cathedral and the royal tombs, five minutes away on foot.

I also wouldn’t recommend it to anyone using a wheelchair. The website is blunt about it, as the route is stairs only. Dogs are allowed if they’re assistance dogs or small enough to travel in a bag, and there’s no café or food shop inside.

How I’d plan a morning on the Rock

With one morning to spare, I’d be through the door at 10:00, as it opens, and take the rooms slowly. On the way out I’d stay on the square for the Palace’s daily changing of the guard, which starts at 11:55. The tourist office suggests turning up fifteen minutes early in high season, and leaving the Palace puts you right there.

The reverse order works too, with a catch. Watch the guard first and you reach the rooms after midday, having lost the first hour, which I think is the best hour of any visit. The website gives no official length for the tour, and unofficial sources put it at an hour to an hour and a half. I’d allow that plus another half hour for the square, the cannons and the viewpoint that looks down on both harbours, Hercule and Fontvieille.

The rooms that earn the €13

The tour starts in the Main Courtyard, and to me it’s among the highlights. The Carrara marble staircase takes its cue from the one at Fontainebleau, and the façade has frescoes attributed to Luca Cambiaso, including the Triumph of Bacchus and the Sea Deities. Staircase and Porte d’Honneur date from the reign of Louis I in the 17th century, when the courtyard took on the look it has today. Glance down as well, at a pattern laid in pebbles and stone slabs.

Upstairs is the Hercules Gallery, the room I’d put first. The architect Dominique Gallo built it under Honoré I, and Orazio dei Ferrari painted the hero’s birth, labours and death in the lunettes of the vault. What wins me over goes beyond the painting. This is where the sovereign steps out to address the Monegasques gathered in the courtyard, for an accession, or to present a future princess or a new child of the family. It’s the balcony of the Grimaldi family, and you walk along it.

After that come the Hall of Mirrors, modelled on Versailles, the York Room and Bedroom, the Louis XV Room with its bedroom, and the Throne Room, which still hosts the great state occasions. Spread across them are about 600 m² of Italian Renaissance frescoes that a recent restoration brought back into view. The two official websites can’t agree on the year that work began, so I’ll stick to what matters, which is that for a long time nobody saw them.

What you don’t see, and why it explains the building

Construction began in 1215 on the ruins of a Genoese fortress, and you can tell from the crenellated tower you see from the square. During the French Revolution it was looted and turned into a military hospital for the Army of Italy, a detail that helps me understand why so much of what you see inside has been recovered.

My favourite fact lies under the floor. Beneath the complex is a cistern cut into the rock, 15,000 m³ in volume, 20 metres long, 18 wide and 5 deep, designed so that a thousand men could hold out through a 648-day blockade. It isn’t open to visitors, but it changes how you look at the place, which was a castle long before it was a set of drawing rooms. I tell that side of the story date by date in the history of Monaco.

Tickets, resellers and the ticket office’s warning

Adult entry is €13, students pay €11 and ages 6 to 17 pay €8, with under-6s free. Tickets are sold on the official website and at the desk on Place du Palais, never by phone, and they can’t be changed or refunded. The English FAQ says a ticket is valid all season, while the ticket office says the opposite, so I wouldn’t count on shifting the date.

Plenty of visitors get caught out here. The official ticket office publishes a list of resale sites, TripAdvisor, Viator, Evendo and TourScanner among them, whose tickets don’t give access to the Palace. You can pay and still end up stuck on the square. I’ve collected more traps like this in scams and safety in Monaco. One last-minute note, too. When I checked the sources on 25 September 2026, the website reported a technical fault with online sales and asked people to buy at the desk, with tickets already bought still valid.

If you’re seeing more than the Palace, a combined ticket makes sense. The Palace plus the Prince’s Car Collection costs €25 for an adult instead of €28, and the Palace plus the Oceanographic Museum of Monaco costs €31, against €33.50 bought separately. It’s not a big saving, but it’s one queue fewer.

Getting up the Rock without suffering the hill

The number 1 and 2 buses terminate at Place de la Visitation, five minutes’ walk through the lanes. On foot from Place d’Armes it’s about ten minutes up the Rampe Major, cobbled and stepped, so wear comfortable shoes. If you’re driving, cars without a Monaco or Alpes-Maritimes (06) number plate can’t go up onto the Rock and park at the Parking des Pêcheurs instead. Everything else, from the €5.50 day bus pass to the public lifts, is in getting around Monaco.