• Private Tour
• Carbon Neutral

Unveil the mysteries of the Vatican and get the most out of your visit on this enriching tour! Get to know everything about this magnificent attraction with the insights provided by a local expert.

Destination

Rome, Italy

Category

Skip The Line Tours

Duration

2 hours

Transport mode

Walking tour

Available languages

English, Italiano, Deutsch, Français, Español

Included

• Private Guide
• All Withlocals Tours are Carbon Neutral

Excluded

• Entrance tickets are not included and need to be paid in cash directly to the host
• Note: Tickets will be purchased by your host in advance and a list of all participants with full names and ages is required at the time of booking.

What you can expect

Choose your local

Get to know these 8 passionate locals, each bringing unique perspectives and talents. Choose your favorite, check their availability, and book to create an unforgettable adventure tailored to you.

This is the plan

Check out the plan below to see what you'll get up to with your local host. Feel free to personalize this offer with the host of your choice.

1. Meeting point

   Meet at in front of Cafe Vaticano, Viale Vaticano 100 - Rome to start your journey

   View on Maps

2. Itinerary

   This is what our experience could look like, but it’s not set in stone! Once you book, you can chat directly with your host to make small tweaks to suit your preferences.

3. Inside the Vatican

   Once you are inside, follow your local host’s insights as you check out the must-sees like gallery of maps and Sistine Chapel, as well as the hidden gems that not many know about. Be part of an enriching tour that will satisfy your curiosity and answer all of your questions!

4. Keep Exploring

   After the time with your host is over, you can either stay inside the attraction and keep exploring by yourself or say goodbye outside the attraction where your host will point out other spots to explore in Rome

5. Make it yours

   Want to tweak the itinerary? Book directly & chat afterwards with your host to adjust highlights, skip stops, or make small changes to fit your preferences.

   Book risk-free: Cancel within 24 hours for a full refund.

   Need something special? Personalize your experience for more time, alternative locations or a completely tailored plan.

Flexible cancellation policy

• Feel confident booking

  Cancel within 24 hours for a full refund. Even up to 7 days before your experience, you’ll receive a refund, minus the service fee.

• Change of plans?

  Reschedule your experience to a date and time that works best for you.

• Loved by travelers worldwide

  Simple and flexible – your plans, your way.

Reviews from guests

Ghazaal🇺🇸 United States

(About local Eleonora)

24 July 2025

We enjoyed our time with Eleonora She was knowledgeable and friendly She arrived on time and was easily reached We are so happy we picked her Excellent

Sara

(About local Yanira)

21 July 2025

Yanira was an absolutely fantastic guide! She brought the Vatican and Sistine Chapel to life with her knowledge, energy, and warmth. What really stood out was how engaged she was with the kids—she even created a fun scavenger hunt to keep them interested throughout the tour. We all learned so much and had a great time. Highly recommend her for families!Shes amazing with kids!

Patty🇺🇸 United States

(About local Eleonora)

20 July 2025

Eleonora was an amazing tour guide for our family of five, which included our three children, now young adults. Not having been to the Vatican before, we were so grateful for her knowledge. She had the perfect personality to keep all of us engaged and interested. She covered a lot of information and territory within our 2+ hour tour. Given the volume of crowds, a private tour is definitely the best way to see the Vatican. We highly recommend Eleonora as your private guide!Excellent Private Tour of the Vatican

Amy

(About local Valentina)

13 July 2025

It was a joy to go on a Vatican tour with Valentina. She is incredibly knowledgeable and passionate about the art and it came across in the way she explained of the museum. She did a wonderful job engaging our young daughters, 7 and 11, who did not quite know what to expect from the day. It was a magical experience and I thank her very much for the the time!!Art lover’s dream!

Howard🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

9 July 2025

We hired Valentina for tours of both the Borghese and Vatican Museum. She did an amazing job. Communicating was easy and we had no issues meeting on-site for both tours. Valentina was friendly, extremely knowledgeable, and was able to make both tours interesting for both adults and children. I highly recommend Valentina for all of your Rome-based tours! Amazing Borghese and Vatican Tours

Venetia🇸🇬 Singapore

(About local Francesca Romana)

6 July 2025

Francesca was a great guide. Her knowledge and passion about art shines through. There is so much history and Francesca communicated these beautifully. The tour was enjoyed by us all ( including the kids!) Informative tour of Vatican.

Michelle

(About local Francesca Romana)

4 July 2025

We enjoyed oud visit with Francesca very much. She helped us perfectly to the museum, with attention to the beautifull details. Wish we could have spent a whole day at the museum with her. Super nice visit to the vatican musea

Lewis🇫🇮 Finland

(About local Valentina)

2 July 2025

So Valentina is informative, chatty and easy going. The Vatican would have been a hot, busy and frustrating experience without her. She navigated us in the time we had around the Vatican, answering all our questions and being a friendly insider which took out 90% of the stress of the visit. We all would highly recommend her.Great Experience

Jesse🇨🇦 Canada

(About local Alessandra)

1 July 2025

Alessandra was a wonderful guide through the colosseum and forum. Great for families and kept it moving. Very kind and answered all our questions. Patient and passionate!!Amazing friendly knowledgeable easy going!

Cathy

(About local Francesca Romana)

29 June 2025

Francesca is a wonderful guide sharing so much knowledge of the Vatican museums. She recommended we do the tour late in day to avoid the big crowds and the heat which worked very well on a very hot day. She’s very friendly and shares her passion and knowledge in a very engaging way. I highly recommend Francesca. Vatican tour

Angelica🇸🇪 Sweden

(About local Eleonora)

27 June 2025

A wonderful and informative experience, despite a very hot day this was a smooth journey through stories and incredible scenery. a very knowledgeable guide who could easily relate to the present and the past, find connections between human behavior and the collecting habits of men with great power and wealth, and could tell us about the buildings, the landscapes and the incredible art treasure that exists. we left the vatican extremely happy with the visit and the experience. thank youWonderful and informative experience

Temple🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

10 June 2025

Valentina’s tour was smart, fun, and engaging. My students and I thoroughly enjoyed every moment. My only regret is that we didn’t book Valentina for a few of her other tours. I won’t make that mistake again.Valentina’s Vatican Tour is A+!

Christy🇺🇸 United States

(About local Lia Beatrice)

10 June 2025

Lia is a wonderful guide — knowledgeable, kind, and great with our teenagers! Highly recommend! Wonderful way to experience Rome!

Kerry🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

27 May 2025

Valentina gave us a wonderful tour! She was fun to be with and extremely knowledgeable. I recommend confirming who is to purchase your entrance tickets when booking.Very Informative & Enjoyable

Debra🇺🇸 United States

(About local Eleonora)

26 May 2025

Eleonora is hands down the best tour guide you will ever have! She is a local that is knowledgeable, enthusiastic and has such a wonderful pleasant manner. I wish all my tours were booked with her! You won’t be disappointed she is the absolute best and worth every penny! Thank you Eleonora for a wonderful tour to the Vatican museum, Debra & family ❤️Excellent tour with a local expert!

wendy🇳🇱 Netherlands

(About local Valentina)

25 May 2025

Valentina loodste ons moeiteloos door deloeidrukke vaticaanse musea en vertelde ons daarbij mooie verhalen. Ze tipte ons waarop te letten en door de bomen het bos te zienQueen

Michiel🇧🇪 Belgium

(About local Valentina)

18 May 2025

Valentina was friendly, knew a lot about everything was a pleasure to do a tour with herPerfect

Uwe

(About local Eleonora)

17 May 2025

Eleonora ist eine positive, sehr empathische junge Frau mit exzellentem Wissen und besten Deutschkenntnissen. Sie hat uns eine sehr lebendige, anschauliche private Tour für 2 Personen gegeben. Sie ist exakt auf unsere Wünsche eingegangen und wir konnten uns aufgrund ihrer Erklärungen und Hintergrundinformationen ein tolles Bild von allem Gesehenen machen. Wirklich sehr empfehlenswert! a very polite and empathetic young lady with excellant know how who has given us a very vivid and well personalised private tourgreat!!! einfach toll

Mary

(About local Valentina)

16 May 2025

Valentina took us on a tour of the Vatican Museums and was super informative and knowledgeable. We learnt a lot from her and really enjoyed the experience. Excellent and infornative guide

Steve🇬🇧 United Kingdom

(About local Francesca Romana)

7 May 2025

Fantastic tour of what would otherwise be a very difficult place to navigate. Francesca took the time to explain the background to what we were seeing, as well as linking it in to the current Conclave preparations. Communication was excellent, particularly around the changes required as a result of the passing of the current pope. She was also very flexible, ensuring that we got great value for money despite some of the Vatican imposed restrictions. Francesca was very friendly and approachable, making sure we were happy to ask questions and understood what we were seeing. She also made a great effort to accommodate the reduced mobility of my elderly mum, which was really appreciated. Highly recommended.Outstanding tour

Amanda🇺🇸 United States

(About local Eleonora)

7 May 2025

I got a guide to the Vatican for my dad, brother & sister in law and Elenora was fantastic from the start. She reached out to me immediately so I could give her the details of the booking and most importantly, that I would not be apart of it. This tour was originally booked for a week after the pope passed away, and as soon as the news released that the pope had passed, she reached out to me to start figuring out a solve & seeing if the tour was still a possibility. Elenora was focused on still making this experience all it could be and we ultimately were able to change the day of the tour so they would have full access to the Vatican. They had an excellent time and I couldn’t be more grateful to Elenora for being proactive and committed to making this tour happen. The tour was ultimately a highlight of their trip! Excellent communicator & guide!

Mathew🇺🇸 United States

(About local Lia Beatrice)

5 May 2025

I originally engaged Lia for a tour of the Vatican. With the death of the Pope, the Vatican was closed for the date we were supposed to visit. With ease, Lia was able to create a new itinerary which ended up being an amazing tour of many of Rome's best sites, while working around a funeral procession going on around us. Possibly my favorite was stopping at a cafe where she taught me about the Italian way to enjoy an espresso! Thank you for an amazing experience! Highly recommended guide.Amazing guide!

Elias

(About local Lia Beatrice)

4 January 2025

Fue muy acelerado la visita, no cumplió nuestras expectativas Acelerada

Cedric🇨🇭 Switzerland

(About local Valentina)

18 November 2024

Nous avons réservé une seconde fois la visite du Vatican avec Valentina Toujours aussi exceptionnel. C'est une source de savoir et elle sait rendre la visite agréable. Pour la 2ème expérience

Elke🇦🇹 Austria

(About local Valentina)

16 October 2024

Valentina was the best guide we ever had. She's a lovely person and has a vast knowledge of art history. Her tour of the vatican was inspiring, full of in depth knowledge but also mixed with funny stories which you don't find in any book. The hours flew by and we are looking forward to the next opportunity for a tour with her.Wonderful experience

Bojidar🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

9 October 2024

She is everything a great tour guide should be: efficient, knowledgeable and accommodating. We’ve been in Vatican before but she opened our eyes for things we would never discover by ourselves. Can’t recommend it highly enough Don’t miss it

Susanna🇺🇸 United States

(About local Federico)

19 June 2024

Federico is a great guide, with a deep academic understanding of Roman history and culture. He offered insight into the roots of Western politics, religion and philosophy, and helped our group gain a deeper appreciation of Rome's historic sites. Excellent Tour from Federico

Cliff🇬🇧 United Kingdom

(About local Federico)

18 April 2024

Frederico assessed our requirements at the beginning and then took us through the tour, checking along the way that he was providing the level of detail we were looking for which resulted in a perfect tour Perfecty tailored guided tour

Pamela🇺🇸 United States

(About local Francesca Romana)

27 March 2024

We were so glad that we booked our tour of the Vatican Museum with Francesca - she’s highly experienced, and is highly knowledgeable about the art and the history of the Vatican. Plus being with her, made it easier to navigate the museum which is both crowded and overwhelmingly large with so many things to see so having her be our guide helped us pick and choose where to spend our time and focus on the things we were really interested in. I booked the shorter tour with her, which I think was good, because we were all pretty tired that day, but if you have the time and energy, I bet the longer tour would be great. We still had some more things we wanted to see after the official tour culminated at the Sistine Chapel, and she gave us tips on how to navigate the museum on our own find the artwork on our list, which worked out great. Many thanks to Francesca for her expert guidance! Introduction to the Vatican museum

Eric🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

22 March 2024

Valentina did a great job getting us familiar with the Vatican. Wish only that we had booked a longer tour.Good introduction to the Vatican.

Melisa 🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

20 March 2024

Our 1.5 hour tour with Valentina was perfect. We only had a short amount of time but she made sure made sure we saw the highlights and explained in details what we were seeing. She did such a great job that now my teenage son wants to return to learn more. Thank you Valentina! We will reach out again when we are back in Rome!Speed dating with the Vatican

Matilda🇺🇸 United States

(About local Lia Beatrice)

27 October 2023

This was my first time using WithLocals and I was incredibly impressed. My husband and I bought a tour of the Vatican with Lia. She is a wealth of knowledge - about the history of Rome, the art and sculptures and tons of little details that might be overlooked with a different tour. Lia was funny and engaging and really helped us get the best experience possible. I highly recommend Lia and cannot thank her enough !!Lia is an exceptional tour guide !!

Allyson🇺🇸 United States

(About local Francesca Romana)

1 August 2023

We toured the colosseum one afternoon and the Vatican museums the following morning with Francesca. She was friendly and informative. We chose shorter tours due to the attention span of our children, the youngest age 12. Francesca hit the highlights for us, and that’s exactly what we were hoping for. Having Francesca as our tour guide gave our visits much more depth and understanding. Francesca was our tour guide 2 times!

Uta🇩🇪 Germany

(About local Lia Beatrice)

31 July 2023

Lea Beatrice was a very experienced and passionate tour guide. Deeply knowledgeable. She answered every question and gave us a wonderful time. She customized the tour perfectly for us. Brings history to life! We are taking away many great memories! Grazie mille!Top notch and very impressive!

Eun🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

25 July 2023

Valentina was masterful in navigating the Vatican museum. She was so full of fun facts, and she kept us engaged throughout the tour. Even with the museum being so crowded (omg the line outside), she was able to move us through the highlights smoothly. Valentina’s calm and confident energy got us through the museum successfully with our three sweaty and sticky kids!Maestro

Caitlin🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

19 July 2023

Valentina was a wonderful guide to the Vatican! She was responsive and communicated throughout the process and shared so many interesting tidbits of information. It was a great way to get to know the Vatican and navigate the museums and chapels. She was also very attentive to our needs with a hard-of-hearing guest, which made the tour even better! We would highly recommend Valentina for any trip to Rome or the Vatican! Fabulous!

Karen🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

11 May 2023

My granddaughter and I had an enjoyable time learning about the Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel from Valentina. We would recommend her for certain.

Anouchka🇺🇸 United States

(About local Francesca Romana)

13 April 2023

Francesca was wonderful from the start. She was very responsive and made the planning easy. We were able to walk right into the Vatican without a wait. She was very knowledgeable and shared many insightful details throughout the tour. I would highly recommend a tour with Francesca!Insightful tour of the Vatican

Meghann🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

7 March 2023

Valentina was an absolute pleasure. She always had a smile on her face and was happy to answer all of our questions. It was apparent that she had a lot of knowledge about the art, the Popes, and the history of the Vatican. Leaving the tour, I felt as if I had a brand new knowledge of the Vatican City, and so did my grandmother that had toured it once before.Incredible Knowledge

Serio🇺🇸 United States

(About local Yanira)

3 March 2023

Yanira was amazing. She was very careful for me not to miss anything. Her knowledge was incredible. She really takes her time to explain every thing. I would highly recommend Yanira to any one looking for a guide. Amazing trip

Scott🇺🇸 United States

(About local Cecilia)

23 December 2022

Cecilia Was a great host for our Vatican visit. Her depth of knowledge and her relatable explanations were perfect for our family of four. Cecilia shared insights about places to visit in Rome, including a top notch dinner spot, de Enzo. Art with an Art Historian

nacer🇨🇭 Switzerland

(About local Yanira)

4 November 2022

The guide was very enthusiastic and provide Ou her knowledge and history of each place visited. All organization was good and the guide here to help and make a good experience of the visit.Well done 👍

Elisabeth🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

28 October 2022

marknakajima🇺🇸 United States

(About local Yanira)

25 October 2022

Maria🇬🇧 United Kingdom

(About local Monica )

9 October 2022

Monica kept us updated prior to our visit. Very clear instructions on where to meet. Accommodated my mothers needs to make the experience enjoyable for us all. Very good knowledge of all aspects of the Vatican. Vatican experience

Gail🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valeria)

20 September 2022

Valeria was extremely knowledgeable about all aspects of the Vatican. She clearly explained in detail what we would be seeing in the Sistine Chapel. She also got us through the crowds pretty quickly. I move a little slower and Valeria was patient and kind about that. Highly recommend! Perfect

Beth🇺🇸 United States

(About local Valentina)

17 September 2022

We met Valentina on our 2nd day in Rome. We toured the Colosseum and the Forum. She was knowledgeable and friendly. We had toured “With Locals” in Paris and had the expectation that we would have the full attention of our guide. Valentina had a busy schedule that day and was distracted with texts and phone calls. There is so much to see and do and it can be overwhelming to learn everything! We had already scheduled Valentina again the next day for a tour of the Vatican. I mistakenly signed up for the short tour and would recommend the 3 hour tour to cover all the highlights. 1.5 hours is not enough to see and learn everything. That was my fault with the schedule!Walking tours in Rome

Unknown

(About local Valentina)

10 September 2022

Valentina heeft ons een prima High light tour van het Vaticaan gegeven . Ze heeft heel veel kennis spreekt goed Engels en heeft humor. Als we de volgende keer weer in Rome zijn en het Vaticaan bezoeken wil ik graag weer achter Valentina aanlopen . Prima Valentina

Emily🇺🇸 United States

(About local Francesca Romana)

6 September 2022

Francesca was informative and delightful. We leaned a lot during the tour. Great Tour

Maria🇨🇦 Canada

(About local Lia Beatrice)

14 August 2022

We had a great time with Lia! Wealth of knowledge, very accommodating and pearsonnable, answered all the questions we had. We had a short tour booked as I had 5yo with me, I woudl definitely recommend a longer tour to make sure you are not rushed. Great experience!