Nearby Attractions

The Spanish royal collection: Velázquez's Las Meninas, Goya's black paintings and Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights. Two to three hours covers the essentials; a full visit eats half a day.

Closed: 1 January, 1 May and 25 December

€15 general, €7.50 reduced for over-65s. Free for under-18s and for students up to 25 at any time. Free for everyone Monday to Saturday 18:00-20:00 and Sundays and holidays 17:00-19:00 - expect a long queue in that window. The €32 Paseo del Arte pass covers the Prado, Thyssen and Reina Sofía for a year.

Twentieth-century Spanish art in a converted eighteenth-century hospital. Picasso's Guernica hangs in room 205.06 with its preparatory sketches, and there is no photography allowed in front of it.

Closed: Tuesdays, plus 1 & 6 January, 1 & 15 May, 9 November, 24, 25 & 31 December

€12 general, with a 50% discount for some groups available at the ticket desk. Free for under-18s and over-65s. There are also free evening slots most days and free Sunday afternoons - check the current schedule, it changes.

The largest working royal palace in Western Europe by floor area, with 3,000-odd rooms, a Tiepolo ceiling in the throne room and the only complete Stradivarius quintet in the world.

Closed: Closed for official ceremonies at short notice; also 1 & 6 January, 1 May, 25 December

General admission is around €14 through Patrimonio Nacional, with reduced and free slots late in the afternoon for EU citizens. State ceremonies close parts of the palace at short notice. Confirm the current price and any closures on patrimonionacional.es before you go.

A fully enclosed arcaded square finished in 1619, once used for bullfights, markets and public executions. The frescoed Casa de la Panadería on the north side is the building everyone photographs.

Free and open at all hours. The terrace cafes inside the arcade charge two to three times the price of a bar one street away - worth it once, for the view.

125 hectares of former royal gardens, UNESCO-listed since 2021. Row a boat on the lake, then walk to the Palacio de Cristal, a glass pavilion built in 1887 to house Philippine plants and now used for art installations.

The park and the Palacio de Cristal are free. Rowing boats on the Estanque cost roughly €7-10 for 45 minutes per boat. Gates close earlier in winter, around 22:00 in summer and 00:00 for the main avenues.

A 1916 iron-and-glass market hall beside Plaza Mayor, now a stand-up tapas hall rather than a food market. Prices are high and it gets packed after 20:00, but the produce is genuinely good.

Closed: Open daily, generally from 10:00 until midnight or later at weekends

Free to enter; you pay per tapa at each counter. Go at noon on a weekday if you actually want to move around and get a spot at a counter.

A genuine 2nd-century BC Egyptian temple, given to Spain in 1968 for helping rescue monuments from the Aswan dam floodwaters and rebuilt stone by stone above the Manzanares. The best sunset view in the city.

Closed: Mondays, and the interior closes in the hottest afternoon hours in summer

Free, but the interior has limited capacity and a timed entry system in high season. The surrounding park and the reflecting pool, which is where the photographs happen, are always open.

A private collection bought by the Spanish state in 1993 that fills the gaps the Prado leaves: Italian primitives, Dutch portraits, Impressionists, German Expressionists and American Pop, hung chronologically from the top floor down.

Closed: Open daily, but the permanent collection has shorter hours on Mondays; closed 1 January, 1 May and 25 December

Around €14 for the permanent collection; temporary exhibitions cost extra or come as a combined ticket. Free on Monday afternoons for the permanent collection, with limited capacity. Included in the €32 Paseo del Arte pass.