Aquincum Museum Opening Hours

Tuesday to Sunday all year, closed every Monday, with two things that complicate it. The hours change with the season, and the Archaeological Park keeps different hours from the exhibitions inside it.

Add the winter weather rule and this is the most involved timetable of any museum in Budapest. This page has the full version, the holiday pattern, what shuts for the winter, the free days and when we would come.

Opening hours

Last entry is 17:30 from April to October and 15:30 from November to March. Staff begin closing the museum ten minutes later, at 17:40 and 15:40. In summer the park opens at 09:00, a full hour before the exhibition buildings, and the whole site shuts together at 18:00.

The end of the summer season has a quirk the museum flags itself. From the day the clocks go back until 31 October, the exhibition buildings out in the park, the House of the Painter and the Symphorus mithraeum close before sundown rather than at 18:00, while the main building stays open to the usual time.

What is open at Aquincum in winter

From 1 November to 31 March the Archaeological Park opens 10:00 to 16:00, and the museum states the condition plainly: “if the weather is dry and surfaces are not slippery”. On a wet or icy day the park may simply not open.

The two reconstructed buildings go onto a timetable of their own, on the same condition. The House of the Painter opens 11:00 to 11:10, 13:00 to 13:10 and 15:00 to 15:10. The Symphorus mithraeum follows ten minutes behind, at 11:10, 13:10 and 15:10. Ten minutes is enough to walk through each of them, but you have to be standing there when they open.

The exhibition buildings scattered through the park run a season and shut for the winter, reopening in spring. What stays open whatever the weather does is the main exhibition building, which holds the organ, the Visible Storage and In the shadow of the Roman eagle, and that is a good two hours on its own.

Free entry days at the Aquincum Museum

• 15 March, 20 August and 23 October: free to every visitor, on the three Hungarian national holidays. Expect company
• The last Saturday of every month: free to anyone under 26, whatever their nationality, and to up to two adult close relatives accompanying children under 18
• All year: free for children under 6, for disabled visitors and one companion each, for EEA citizens over 70, for residents of Óbuda-Békásmegyer in District III and that district’s school groups, for Ukrainian passport and refugee document holders, and for holders of the Budapest Card, an ICOM card or a press card

Hercules Villa opening hours

The Hercules Villa is a separate site in Óbuda, on Meggyfa utca, with Roman mosaics under and beside a school building. It is open Tuesday to Sunday, 10:00 to 18:00, from 5 May to 31 October, with last entry at 17:30 and a 16:00 close from the end of daylight saving time until it shuts for the year.

Two things to hold on to. The villa has its own ticket and the Budapest Card is not valid there. And the museum’s own holiday table gives its season as 1 April to 31 October, which does not match the dates on the villa’s own page. April is a gamble either way, so plan the villa for May to October and it is open under both versions.

The Baths Museum under Flórián Square and the Military Town Museum on Pacsirtamező utca are both closed to visitors, with no reopening date published.

Best times to visit

Time of day

From April to October, 09:00, when the park opens and the exhibitions have not. That first hour is the Roman streets with nobody in them, and it leaves the indoor rooms for the hottest part of the afternoon.

In winter, aim for 11:00. It puts you at the House of the Painter for its first ten-minute opening and the mithraeum for the one straight after, with the whole afternoon left for the exhibitions.

Arriving in the last hour gets you in but not round. The site takes two to three hours to do properly and the last entry is half an hour before closing.

Day of the week

Tuesday to Friday. The museum is shut on Mondays, holidays aside, and the three free national holidays are the busiest days of its year.

Weekends are quieter here than at almost any central Budapest sight, so a Saturday morning is no hardship if that is what your trip allows.

Season

April to October is the real season, and it is not a close call. The park opens an hour earlier, the exhibition buildings out among the ruins are open, and the painter’s house and the mithraeum are open all day rather than for half an hour in total.

May brings Floralia, the Roman spring festival, which is the museum at its liveliest and its most crowded.

Winter is for the indoor exhibitions, and worth it for them, but the park may be shut on the day you arrive and most of the site has no shelter.

How long to spend

Insider tips