Best Museums in Italy
Italy is home to 17 world-class museums across 6 cities, from ancient art and archaeology to modern and contemporary collections.
All Museums in Italy
Florence
Uffizi Gallery
A prominent art museum located adjacent to the Piazza della Signoria in the Historic Centre of Florence.
Founded 1581
Florence
Galleria dell'Accademia
Home of Michelangelo's David and one of the most-visited museums in Italy.
Founded 1784
Florence
Museo Nazionale del Bargello
The world's most important collection of Renaissance sculpture, in a thirteenth-century fortified palace.
Founded 1865
Florence
Palazzo Pitti
Florence's grand Medici palace, holding the Palatine Gallery, the Royal Apartments, and the Boboli Gardens.
Founded 1828
Florence
Museo dell'Opera del Duomo
The museum that preserves the sculpture and architecture of Florence's Cathedral complex.
Founded 1891
Florence
Museo Galileo
A history-of-science museum on the Arno, with Galileo Galilei's original instruments and Medici scientific collections.
Founded 1930
Rome
Capitoline Museums
The world's first public museum, on Michelangelo's Piazza del Campidoglio.
Founded 1471
Rome
Galleria Borghese
The cardinal Scipione Borghese's villa, holding the greatest concentration of Bernini sculpture in the world.
Founded 1903
Rome
Galleria Doria Pamphilj
A privately owned palace gallery on Via del Corso, with five hundred Old Master paintings still hung in their princely setting.
Founded 1651
Rome
Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica – Palazzo Barberini
Italy's national collection of ancient and Baroque painting, in the magnificent Palazzo Barberini.
Founded 1949
Rome
MAXXI – National Museum of 21st Century Arts
Zaha Hadid's first major museum building, devoted to the architecture and contemporary art of the twenty-first century.
Founded 2010
Rome
Palazzo Massimo alle Terme
The principal site of the National Roman Museum, with extraordinary Roman sculpture, mosaics, and frescoes.
Founded 1995
Milan
Pinacoteca di Brera
Milan's main public picture gallery, holding one of the foremost collections of Italian Renaissance painting.
Founded 1809
Naples
Museo di Capodimonte
A vast royal palace and park above Naples holding the Farnese collection and major southern-Italian Baroque works.
Founded 1957
Venice
Gallerie dell'Accademia
Venice's foremost gallery of pre-nineteenth-century Venetian painting, on the Grand Canal at the foot of the Accademia bridge.
Founded 1817
Venice
Peggy Guggenheim Collection
Peggy Guggenheim's personal modern-art collection, in her unfinished palazzo on the Grand Canal.
Founded 1980
Turin
Museo Egizio
The world's oldest museum dedicated solely to Egyptian antiquities, second in importance only to Cairo.
Founded 1824