Small Group Colosseum Underground and Arena Floor Guided Tour
Rome, Italy
- 3 hours (approx.)
- Mobile ticket
- Offered in: English
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Overview
Travel back to the glory days of the Roman Empire on this small-group tour of the Colosseum. Step onto the arena floor through the famed Gladiator’s Gate and descend into its underground that once held wild animals. Continue your journey into history with a walk among the ruins of the Roman Forum before ascending Palatine Hill.
- Go beyond the standard Colosseum access with arena floor and underground visit
- Explore three ancient landmarks in one seamless tour
- Ask questions freely with an engaging small-group experience
- Choose morning or afternoon tour times to fit your plans
Why Travelers Choose This Tour
With fewer people, this small-group tour feels more relaxed and immersive than big group options.
What's Included
- Headsets
- Colosseum Underground
- Roman Forum and Palatine Hill Entrance Fee
- Guided Tour with a local official Guide
- Arena Floor Entrance Fee
- Colosseum and Arena entrance ticket valued at €24 per person.
- Colosseum reservation fee (valued at €2 per person)
- Gratuities
Meeting and Pickup
Meeting point
- Largo della Salara VecchiaL.go della Salara Vecchia, 00186 Roma RM, Italy
Entrance of the Roman Forum, by the ticket office
End point
- ColosseumP.za del Colosseo, 1, 00184 Roma RM, Italy
Itinerary
1
Colosseum
40 minutes • Admission Ticket Included
2
Colosseum
40 minutes • Admission Ticket Included
3
Roman Forum
40 minutes • Admission Ticket Included
4
Palatine Hill
40 minutes • Admission Ticket Included
Additional Info
- Confirmation will be received within 48 hours of booking, subject to availability
- Near public transportation
- Stroller accessible
- Not wheelchair accessible
- Travelers should have a moderate physical fitness level
- Each traveler must present a valid ID card or document that matches the name provided at the time of booking for successful entry to the Colosseum and Roman Forum.
- The Colosseum can change the access time or decide extraordinary closure in any time. In case of public events, political events and other unexpected events, the starting time of the tour or meeting point may be changed. PLEASE CHECK YOU EMAIL some days before the tour to verify the booking details and EVENTUALLY changes of starting time/meeting point. If it is possible, PLEASE LEAVE A PHONE NUMBER able to receive Whatsapp messages: this will let easier the communications
- This tour/activity will have a maximum of 8 travelers
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Cancellation Policy
This experience is non-refundable and cannot be changed for any reason. If you cancel or ask for an amendment, the amount you paid will not be refunded.
Traveler Photos
Reviews
4.2
based on 57 reviews
Ronald_W, Nov 2025
Claudia was a special guide, knowledgeable, friendly, excellent English. Coliseum floor was amazing. Thank you
Kelly_S, Nov 2025
This tour was amazing and our guide, Claudia, was amazing. She is a local and spoke very good English. She was so knowledgeable and taught us so much about the history. The underground Colosseum is a must.
AMY_C, Oct 2025
Great tour with Allessandra. She was very informative and provided loads of information. Be aware this is a very crowded area.
Alison_K, Oct 2025
Great tour, very informative and interesting. Virginia was our tour guide and made the experience fun and memorable. She is amazing! You definitely want to do the underground portion, history of the gladiators and to see the tunnels and lifts is worthwhile. Highlight of our trip!
Connor_N, Oct 2025
I would consider this to be one of the best tours available! Our guide, Guillem, was nice and knowledgeable; he made the whole experience extremely pleasant especially navigating the large crowds. Happy to say the underground Colosseum was completely worth it and included was special access to a viewing platform with the BEST photo spots without all the people! Got to experience everything we were hoping for and would highly recommend to friends and family!
Julia_W, Oct 2025
Guillem was amazing. He did a great job of brining alive the context of the forum and the colosseum. And we really enjoyed it when he was providing information. The tour was professional and they did a great job of getting us all at the meeting point. The small group was fabulous.
The reason I didn’t give it 5 stars is because the underground part was disappointing. The tour I booked was English and they informed us a few days beforehand that they couldn’t secure the underground tickets in English. We were disappointed but went with it being told the app would tell us what we needed. After the start in the forum with Guillem I was now looking forward to underground even if it wasn’t in English. However, the app was terrible (the app is by the official colosseum site - so not by Rome with Silvia - and it just is so dry and long and not great - we stopped listening) and the official guy who took us all down, even though he could speak English and everyone in our group spoke English - refused to do the tour in English (despite the Rome By Silvia crew trying to convince him to do so). In fact he didn’t even do it in the language we were booked on, which I wish he had at least done that as it may have been better because we could’ve used google translate. Instead he rushed us through (in English) and we barely had time to look at the artifacts or read the plaques. To be fair this wasn’t within Rome With Silvia’s control but honestly if Guillem had been allowed to come down I imagine it would’ve been a much better tour.
It was cool seeing underground but it would’ve been better to have a guide who provided the same level of context as Guillem and who gave us time to look at the everything under there. My kids joked that if this happens again everyone needs to leave their earphones in and someone FaceTime with Guillem so he could tell us what we are looking at.
So five stars for Guillem. And a thumbs down for the Parco Colosseum crew running the underground part.
Bethany_L, Oct 2025
The Colosseum employees manage the underground tour and your tour guide will not be going underground with you. They offer an audio tour as a tour in your language may not be available. The audio may not work because you get no reception in the underground.
This company has very poor communication. They canceled my tour at the last minute offered a different experience. I had questions about the different experience that after four attempts I never heard back from the company.
In messages, while negotiating the new experience I was told to Arrive at three. The viator that I was told by the company to book was 1:30pm and was confirmed by the tour company at 1:30pm time via the Viator website. Since they confirmed 1:30pm, we showed up at 1:30pm. At that time we were
Told by the tour guide to come back at 3pm. Even when I showed him the confirmation for 1:30pm and told him that I attempted through four message attempts to the company all of which went without an answer he still would not accommodate the confirmed time and we had to come back at 3pm.
Further, the new experience that I agreed to and thought I was paying for did not exist. They bumped me back to my original experience, which is fine, but I has zero knowledge of that until we were actually onsite as there was zero communication from this company as soon as I had paid in full and was within the non refundable time.
The only reason this wasn’t a one star review was because our guide was good.
Other companies offer similar experiences- book with someone else.
Response from Host, Oct 2025
Dear client, I'm sorry to hear that.
Actually we send you a message to advise that your afternoon tour was canceled for inner reasons, asking if it was possible to reschedule in other time/date. Otherwise we offered you a refund.
You accepted to change with the ARENA FLOOR and we gave you all the information, including the link with the new booking. At the end we were able to fix your booking, so you accessed the Underground as planned. You sent us more that 20 messages and emails and we answered to each one. I'm sorry that you didn't love the tour.
Judith_M, Sep 2025
Our guide Giorgio was fantastic. What we didn't like was when he turned us over to another guide to explore the underground she spoke French only so we felt cheated.
Sarah_G, Sep 2025
Booked this is in May for our trip to Rome in Sept. One of the main reasons for choosing to visit Rome was for the collesuem so we opted to book the underground and arena floor. On arrival at the meeting point with the coordinator we were told that Viator hadn’t passed on our booking and that there was no space for us and that we needed to contact Viator. We phoned Viator immediately who told us that it’s 100% cancellation fee, but as we were on the call, Sylvia who organises the trip phoned the coordinator. She offered us a trip for the following day which wasn’t suitable for us so then said she would refund us the full amount. We immediately received an email and a WhatsApp message photo confirming the refund was processing - which proved to us that she did in fact have our booking as she sent me a screenshot of her computer screen which showed all my details there. So this was a mistake from “Rome with Sylvia” and in fact not viator as they claimed. We ended up paying regular entrance fees to the Collesuem and didn’t get the full experience that we came to Rome for.
Victoria_L, Sep 2025
It was scheduled for 9 am, which was perfect, but then it got changed to 3 pm, which was more rushed for us cause it was a 3 hour tour perfect but we had to meet our group at 7, which was cutting it close, especially since you could not arrange transportation for us. Tour guide was perfect & nice. However, then we get a message 2days before that the underground part would all be in Italian and our tour guide will explain when we get up top,which was not sufficient. Thanks for getting us booked.
AnneMarie_M, Sep 2025
Good tour except underground tour was in French and we booked English which was a bit disappointing !
Kieron_L, Sep 2025
Our tour Guide Alexandra was excellent and made the 3 hour plus tour extremely interesting. Highly recommend this tour and tour guide.
Antony_M, Sep 2025
Our tour guide Alexandra was very knowledgeable and engaging about all the sites and explained everything to us - she was very friendly and made the tour very enjoyable for us
Eric_M, Aug 2025
It was a really great tour of the coliseum and included the underground. The “coliseum floor” is also included but there really isn’t a floor. The underground is exposed. It’s a more elaborate tour than others. Expensive but worth the money for us.
cindy_m, Jul 2025
Arianna was fantastic! So knowledgable and very friendly! Made sure we were all together too - thoughtful
Anna_K, Jul 2025
The tour operator never showed up to the tour. They then claimed to have changed the time to 1.5 hours EARLIER. Viator would do nothing to refund our money. I cannot believe Viator would allow their customers to experience this type of service?
Response from Host, Jul 2025
Dear Anna, I'm sorry about what happened. The tour run as planned. Viator didn't refund you because you didn't have the right to be refunded. You didn't show up at the meeting point. I understand your disappointment but the tour operator bought for you the tickets and they proofed that the tour took place as planned.
Olivia_C, Jul 2025
Daniela was our tour guide and she was terrific! So knowledgeable and passionate about the history of the Colosseum and the surrounding areas. She was so great with our boys too, aged 11 and 9. Really engaging them and involving them in the tour. It was brutally hot the day we did the tour but it was so worth it. The underground tour is a must do, don’t visit the Colosseum without doing that part. It’s the best part! Thanks Daniela!
Selena_S, Jul 2025
Our guide contacted us that our orginal tour could not happen due to an accident. She gave us an alternative option. This option was great!
Briana_H, Jul 2025
Sylvia our guide was so knowledgeable and friendly. Such a great afternoon roaming through these ancient ruins and learning their history.
Bob_M, Jul 2025
In January, I booked tours for my family of 8 at 9:30am for an English speaking tour. I needed to book 2 and then 6 because I could not order 8 on one booking. Both were paid for & confirmed by Viator. The Viator organizer of our tour (Sylvia) split our group…2 at 9:00 and the remaining 6 at 11:00 & refused to accommodate us at the requested time. She said she sent an email the day before but we were in flight from the USA. 2of our group went at 9:00 but we’re met in the underground Colosseum by another group (not the small group that was advertised) with a guide that only spoke French. The remaining 6 went at 11:00 and were combined with a larger group and a guide that only spoke Italian. We only speak and understand English! My daughter’s family had another Viator tour of the catacombs and needed to leave the Colosseum to walk to the meeting place for the catacomb tour. The small group Underground Colosseum tour at 9:30am in English is not what we requested and am requesting a refund.
Response from Host, Jul 2025
Dear client,
I'm sorry to hear this.
Unfortunately my groups can be made by 6 people maximum. So you were 8 people and for this reason you were in 2 differente groups.
Moreover I've tried to contact you in many occations: you didn't answer to any emails, calls and Whatapp messages. Even Viator tried to contact you to advise about the situation of two groups. I didn't refuse to move you in the same group. Simply it is forbidden.
Janice_C, Jul 2025
Do not book this tour! We showed up to the meeting point 1 hour before the tour started and waited. When it was the meeting time, the tour guide didn't show up. Other tour guides from this tour company told us we were at the right meeting place. One guide called head office and checked for us. She said our tour was moved 45 min later. We waited for another 1.5 hours and no tour guide showed up. Customer service blamed us for missing the tour. Other tourists we spoke to who booked tours with them also had their times delayed more than once. We asked and received a full refund. Very disappointed at this level of service and our missed opportunity to see the full Colosseum experience.
Response from Host, Jul 2025
Dear client,
you didn't show up at the meeting point. You was part of a party of 8 people. The other clients partecipated to the tour. I have the tickets of your entrance, fixed for 1.30 as planned. Your friends did the tour. The only person that didn't join out tour was you.
Moreover you contacted me at 2.00 pm, asking for the guide: 45 minutes later than the meeting point's time.
Despite the situation was your fault, you was fully refunded.
I think that we did the best for you.
Lyndal_M, Jun 2025
This was a compact tour of the Roman Forum, Palatine Hill, the underground of the colosseum and the arena. I have been on tours before but this was the best by far. It was the first time visiting the underground of the colosseum and the hefty price was worth it! Kumba was an excellent guide with just enough information, but not an overload. Highly recommended!
Michelle_K, Jun 2025
STOP! DO NOT BUY! FIND ANOTHER! Read all the reviews first! We found out too late that this company does a bait and switch at the last minute! They changed our tour start time from 1:30pm to 12pm (90 mins earlier) and changed the underground part of the tour from English to Italian at the LAST MINUTE! Buyer Beware! The tour company then failed to properly communicate these changes and called us (1st notification of these changes) at 12:16pm on the day of the tour!!! They did not call us prior or leave a voice mail via phone! We chose this tour because of our late arrival time into Rome and we could not meet at 12pm so I would have cancelled if I knew the tour time changed! We were flying when they sent the notification in the Viator app and I was groggy and thought the notice was for my Sat 12pm tour. Virginia or Silvia said they would help us and call us back but they lied! They apparently gave us 3 mins until 12:19pm to get to the tour and left and never called us back as promised. We scrambled and arrived at 12:35pm for the 2.5-3 hour tour but Silvia or Virginia refused to help us and meet us. Viator does not care and is also just as unscrupulous! They filed a claim with Viator but when the tour company declined the claim, they did nothing to help us! Only book with this company if you want them to give you nothing!!!
Response from Host, Jun 2025
Dear client,
I understand your disappointment.
Actually you was advised about the starting time of the your and you confirmed. I have the proof of this. How I could understand that your confirmation wasn't a confirmation? This is the reason because Viator refused your refund.
Moreover you was so aggressive and rude with Virginia, that was trying to help you. This review is aggressive as well and reflects your attitude.
In spite of your responsibility, you have blocked payment towards us. I think that you should reflect on your responsibilities. All other participants of the tour have been notified as you and they have correctly participated in the guided tour which, moreover, was made completely in English
Tony_R, Jun 2025
Following extremely poor communication from Viators delivery partner Silvia of Rome we nearly missed our tour as did everyone else on the tour. A proposed time change was communicated very late and it was fairly clear that this was known about before it was communicated late on the prior evening. This necessitated changing our day and missing another tour already booked. Everyone else on the tour were also affected in a similar way. Beware as what you thought you boooked may be different to what you are actually presented with.
The tour which we could have easily missed at great cost was very good but no thanks to Silvia
John_W, Jun 2025
It was tricky finding the meeting point as there are at least three possible entrances. Our guide Lucia was very professional and solicitous. Unfortunately, we were advised last night that the actual walk through the underground would be with a guide who was instructed to only speak Italian. We got the gist of the explanation but would’ve gotten more out of it with an English speaking guide.
Christine_N, Jun 2025
Lea was our tour guide she was great and very informative. Unfortunately the underground portion was done by an Italian speaking different guide so that is why we gave it three stars. False advertising especially after paying $350+
KelvinZhiHao_T, Jun 2025
Did the tour with Iorio on 19 June 2025. Not only was she able to show her knowledge about the various parts of the trips, it can be felt from her tour that she was extremely passionate about sharing her culture to people all over the world. Was an excellent tour and would highly recommend.
Catherine_G, Jun 2025
Giorgio was amazing. He answered all our questions and took his time with us. Would definitely recommend.
Heather_T, Jun 2025
Eddie was an amazing guide. He has a wealth of knowledge, which he communicates while being chill and flexible. The Coliseum was the number one item to see for my kids (10 and 12) and this tour blew us away. I was impressed at how much they could explain that evening to my aunt. So much context was built for them through the experience!
The site is big and busy, but Eddy always found a place in the shade to explain what we would see. Climbing the Palatine Hill was with the incredible views and photos. You should have some moderate fitness because of the stairs and walking. Come hydrated and prepared for the weather.
We had another excellent guide for the underground Coliseum portion. This area had very limited access. Eddy also made sure he explained everything about the underground before and after this portion.
Grazie Mille, Eddie. I hope you enjoyed the concert!
Sheryl_V, Jun 2025
Not the experience we expected. Guide was hard to find (late and did not have a sign or flag). A few days before our tour, we were informed tickets were only available in Italian for the underground portion. It was too late to find other tickets as they were sold out by then. We were a small group of 7 but then were merged with a larger group for the underground tour so we ended up with over 20 listening to a guide who the majority of us could not understand. It was nice to get to see the underground area but no commentary made it very disappointing. By the time we finished at the colosseum we didn’t have enough time to spend in the Roman forum so only walked to an overlook and got a short explanation. Would be a great experience with the right guides.
Response from Host, Jun 2025
Dear client, I'm sorry to hear that. Actually you confirmed that the changed worked for you. My group was made by 7 people but to visit the Underground it is mandatory following the rules of the Colosseum. And It imposes to be part of a bigger group to allow the access to the Underground for more people. You stayed in the Colosseum for 2h. So there ere 30 minutes for the Roman Forum and Palatine hill. Officially the tour lasts 2h30 but the guide stayed with you 45 minutes more. We do the best that we can to assure you the best experience but you need to consider the whole experience and the many difficulties to have the tickets for the Underground.
Thank you
From $209.21
per person-You will not receive a refund if you cancel.
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