Verona

Arena & Piazza Brà

Verona's front door: the biggest square in the city, a first-century amphitheatre still selling out opera, and a marble promenade the Veronese have been walking for 250 years. Grand, open, and — on the frontage — the most expensive place in Verona to eat badly.

Who it's for: Anyone arriving from the station or on a day trip, opera-goers, first-timers who want the single unmissable Roman monument, and travellers who like a big square to sit in at dusk.

Things to know

  • The Arena closes to daytime visitors in the early afternoon on opera-performance days, so the stage can be built. In July, August, September and October 2026 that means numerous 15:00 or 17:00 closures — do the monument in the morning, or on a dark day.
  • The Arena is closed Mondays. Full admission is €12.00, reduced €9.00, ages 18–25 €3.00, free under 18 and with a VeronaCard. From November to March the first Sunday of the month is €1.00.
  • Restaurants with photo menus and English-speaking touts on the Listone and Vicolo Listone charge frontage prices. Walking 100 metres behind the Arena — Via Leoncino, Via Anfiteatro, Via Dietro Pallone — costs roughly half for better food.
  • San Fermo Maggiore is on the four-church Chiese Vive circuit, whose combined price is not published anywhere online. A single-church ticket is €4.00 (groups €3.00, schools €2.00, free 0–11 and disabled visitors with a companion) per the Comune's tourism office.
  • Two civic museums on the square and just south of it — the Museo Lapidario Maffeiano at Piazza Brà 28 and the Museo degli Affreschi at Juliet's Tomb — are both €6.00 and both free with a VeronaCard. Neither has its own ticket desk; buy online or at the Arena or Castelvecchio.
  • Closing days worth planning around: Al Bersagliere serves Tuesday to Saturday only; the Arena, the Lapidario and the Museo degli Affreschi all shut Monday.
  • Piazza Brà on an opera night empties 12,000 people at once around midnight. It is the one time and place in Verona where pickpocketing is a live risk rather than a theoretical one.
  • There is very little shade on the square. In July and August the stone holds heat well past dark — plan the piazza for the evening, not for two in the afternoon.