Visit Tuscany in a nutshell
It is Tuscany's official tourism shop window: articles, travel ideas, events and pages on individual places. It is not a ticket office and it is not a travel agency. If you are looking for somewhere to buy an entry ticket, the most you will find here is a link to whoever sells it.
Who runs the official Visit Tuscany portal
The portal is a public project with several layers. The footer states that it is promoted by the Regione Toscana, created and run by Fondazione Sistema Toscana, and developed in collaboration with Toscana Promozione Turistica, with a contribution from the Ministry of Tourism. The claim, often repeated, that it is "run by Toscana Promozione Turistica" is only partly true: day-to-day management lies with the Fondazione.
For travellers the consequence is simple: the portal earns nothing from sales, so it has no reason to push you towards one product rather than another. That is a guarantee of neutrality, but it is also the reason it doesn't take you all the way to the checkout.
What you'll find and what you won't
| You'll find | You won't find |
|---|---|
| travel ideas by theme and area | a basket or a payment system |
| calendars of events and festivals | real-time availability for museums |
| pages on hill towns, parks and attractions | customer support for bookings |
| offers from private operators, with links | cancellation terms of its own |
It is a site designed for browsing and choosing, not for completing a purchase.
How the Offers section works
The Offers section is the part that comes closest to a booking platform, but only on the surface. Each listing is a proposal from a private operator, with a description and an indicative price; the button takes you to the operator's website, where you book and pay. From that moment on, price, cancellation and support are the operator's responsibility.
An example: the portal lists Sightseeing Experience's "Tuscany Experience", the coach trip from Florence to Pisa, Siena, San Gimignano and the Chianti, "from €65". It is the operator's own product, and the operator was recently acquired by Busitalia, part of the FS group. According to secondary sources, the same tour costs less on the operator's website, and the cancellation terms shown on the different listings don't match. The lesson: the price in the listing is a guide, and what counts is the price you see at the moment of payment, on the seller's own website.
Where the portal is at its best: events and places to visit in Tuscany
- Events. The event pages are among the most useful: for the Viareggio Carnival, for example, they give the dates of the following season's parades well in advance.
- Passes and entry rules. Some practical pages are clear, such as the one on the passes for the Santa Maria del Fiore complex in Florence: it explains that there is no ticket for the Dome alone and that the Dome requires a fixed date and time.
- Borghi and ideas. The themed lists, such as the one of "magical" borghi, the hill towns and villages of the region, are a good way to discover places off the usual routes, from Montecarlo to Buonconvento.
- Reliable trivia. The portal points out, for instance, that the scenes of New Moon set in Volterra were actually filmed in Montepulciano.
Where you need a second source
A regional portal cannot follow every museum and every town council in real time. For opening hours, prices and compulsory booking, the right source is still the site's own website. A small but telling example: for the Cascate del Mulino at Saturnia the portal gives 37.5 °C, which is the temperature at the spring, inside the paid thermal complex; by the time the water reaches the falls it has travelled a couple of kilometres, and the Comune di Manciano gives about 37 °C. Nothing serious, but it shows how to use the portal: to get your bearings, not as the final word.
When to go straight to the source, or to a reseller
- For a museum or monument: use the site's official ticket office. In Pisa, for example, that is the Opera della Primaziale; in Siena, the Opera della Metropolitana.
- For an organised trip: compare the operator's website with the platforms. If you book through a platform, cancellation and support go through the platform, and they are often easier to manage.
- For an event: buy from the organiser named in the listing.
A method that works: use Visit Tuscany to choose the area and the time of year, then open the official website of each place you want to see for opening hours, rules and prices, and only at the end decide whether to buy direct or from a platform. The portal saves you time in the first stage, not in the third. If you find a detail that doesn't match between the portal and the site's own website, trust the latter: whoever runs the entrance sets the rules.
If you have already settled on the classic day trip from Florence to Pisa, Siena and San Gimignano, this guide's partner platforms sell it from €49 on GetYourGuide and from €64 on Tiqets; these prices are subject to change, and we check them regularly.
Pisa, Siena & San Gimignano: Day Trip from Florence + Wine Tasting
(18 reviews) from €64
Book on Tiqets
Florence: Pisa, Siena and San Gimignano Day Trip with Lunch
(11,722 reviews) from €49
Book on GetYourGuideAt which stage of your trip it helps
Visit Tuscany is the right read while you are still choosing where to go, especially if you are interested in events, hill towns and nature. It is no use to anyone who has already decided and wants to book: it sends you elsewhere anyway, so you might as well go there straight away.
A note on transparency: tickets.toscana.it is also a guide, but an independent and unofficial one. We earn commissions from Tiqets and GetYourGuide when you book through our links. Visit Tuscany doesn't, and it is only fair to say so.
Other useful pages
To start choosing: things to do in Tuscany, the borghi and day trips. Among the reviews: Sightseeing Experience, Tiqets and GetYourGuide.