What we compare
Price, what the ticket actually includes, whether a guide is included and for how long, cancellation terms, rating, and the number of reviews behind that rating.
How this site works
Editorial Policy
How we choose which tickets to show, where our facts come from, when they were last checked, and what our affiliate income does and does not change. Published because a visitor guide that recommends things should be willing to explain its own method.
Method
How we review and rank tickets
Every option on this site is ordered by review volume, highest first — not by commission, not by price, and not by what a merchant would like promoted. Review volume is the measure we trust most because it is the hardest to distort: a 5.0 rating from nine people tells you almost nothing, while a 4.0 across four thousand tells you a great deal about what a typical visit is like.
How we label options
Evaluative labels — best value, most booked, cheapest — are only used where the arithmetic is shown. If we call something best value, the comparison that makes it so is on the page.
When we recommend spending less
Regularly, and deliberately. On Sunday mornings our advice is to move your visit rather than buy anything. For visitors with a disability certificate it is to check free admission before paying. Both cost us money.
What we will not do
Present a merchant's product description as our own assessment, or mark up someone else's star ratings as this site's structured data.
Sources
Where the facts come from
Two kinds of information appear on this site and they are gathered differently. Rules and times come from the operator. What actually happens at the door comes from visitors — and the two do not always agree, which is usually the most useful thing we can tell you.
Opening hours, admission categories, access rules
Taken from the Procuratoria di San Marco's own published visitor and ticketing information — the body that runs the basilica — rather than from other guide sites.
Prices, ratings and review counts
Read from the booking platform each option is sold on, at the time of checking. Prices move; treat ours as indicative and the listing as authoritative at the moment you book.
What visitors report
Where written policy and visitor experience differ — the bag rule is the clearest case — we say so and describe both. Enforcement at St Mark's is inconsistent, and pretending otherwise would make this site less useful.
What we do not do
We do not copy text from other guide sites, and we do not present figures we have not checked. Where a source contradicts itself, as the arrival-tolerance guidance does, we say that rather than picking whichever number reads better.
Currency
Keeping it right
Access rules at St Mark's change more often than at most sights, and a wrong opening time here costs somebody a morning in Venice. This page and the visitor information across the site were last checked against source on 17 September 2026.
Correction policy
Tell us what is wrong and where, at info@saintmarksbasilicatickets.com. Corrections are handled before any other enquiry.
Re-check schedule
Opening hours, admission categories and entry rules are re-checked on a schedule and after any notice of change from the operator.
Independence
This site is not operated by, or affiliated with, the Procuratoria di San Marco. See our Disclaimer.
Affiliate income
Some links are affiliate links and we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. It does not affect the order of the options or what we say about them.
Why this page exists: anyone can write confident travel copy. Being able to say where each number came from, when it was checked and what we would not claim is the part that should earn your trust — or lose it, if we get something wrong.