Tuesday to Sunday, 10:00 to 18:00, every week of the year. The museum has no summer or winter timetable and no late evenings, and it is shut every Monday. The Museum Garden in front keeps its own, much longer day.
The complications are last entry at 17:00, a handful of holidays that close the doors, and four exhibitions inside that have been shut for rebuilding since December 2025. This page has the full timetable, the holiday pattern, the free days, what is open inside and when we would go.
Opening hours
Museum
| Monday | Closed |
| Tuesday | 10:00-18:00 |
| Wednesday | 10:00-18:00 |
| Thursday | 10:00-18:00 |
| Friday | 10:00-18:00 |
| Saturday | 10:00-18:00 |
| Sunday | 10:00-18:00 |
The ticket office closes at 17:00, the exhibition rooms start closing at 17:30 and the building closes at 18:00. Parts of the museum can be shut for events or rebuilding.
Museum Garden
| Monday | 05:30-21:00 |
| Tuesday | 05:30-21:00 |
| Wednesday | 05:30-21:00 |
| Thursday | 05:30-21:00 |
| Friday | 05:30-21:00 |
| Saturday | 05:30-21:00 |
| Sunday | 05:30-21:00 |
Free to walk into, and open on Mondays when the museum itself is closed.
Last entry is 17:00, when the ticket office closes, and the museum lets people into the exhibitions until then and not after. Staff begin closing the rooms at 17:30, and the building shuts at 18:00.
Which exhibitions are open at the Hungarian National Museum
Four of the nine permanent exhibitions have been shut since 2 December 2025: the Coronation Mantle, the Seuso Treasure, the Széchényi Hall and the Open Storage. The museum describes them as “temporarily closed due to renovation works” and has published no reopening date for any of them.
Five are open, and together they are still most of the museum. On the first floor, the archaeology exhibition On the Border Between East and West fills ten rooms. The second floor holds both halves of History of Hungary, from the foundation of the state to 1990. The Roman Lapidary sits under the southern courtyard, and the Medieval Lapidary on the ground floor.
The museum’s exhibition list marks anything that is shut, and the museum itself asks visitors to check that what they plan to see is open before they come. If the Coronation Mantle is the reason for your trip, check that list first.
Coin Cabinet hours at the Hungarian National Museum
The Coin Cabinet is a research department, not an exhibition, and it is not open to the general public. It grew from the roughly 2,500 coins in Count Ferenc Széchényi’s founding gift of 1802 and now holds more than 300,000 registered objects. A selection is on show in the History of Hungary rooms and in temporary exhibitions.
Its research service and public consultation hours are Monday and Thursday, 09:00 to 15:00. Those Monday hours are not a way into the museum on its closed day. The service is for researchers and people with a query about the collection, so contact the museum before going.
Free entry days at the Hungarian National Museum
- 15 March, 20 August and 23 October: free for all visitors, on the three national holidays
- The third Saturday of every month: the permanent exhibitions are free to anyone under 26, and to one or two parents or close relatives accompanying at least two under-18s, as long as they are Hungarian or other EEA citizens
Best times to visit
Time of day
Soon after 10:00. It gives you the most time before the 17:00 cut-off, and the museum is at its calmest.
On an ordinary day the museum is quiet at almost any hour, so the clock matters more than the crowd. Arrive by 15:00 if you want the second floor properly, and treat 16:00 as the last arrival worth making.
Day of the week
Tuesday to Friday, when nothing special is on. Monday is out, public holiday or not.
If you are a Hungarian or other EEA citizen and either under 26 or bringing two or more children under 18, the third Saturday of the month is your day, because the permanent exhibitions cost nothing.
Season
The hours are the same all year, so the season changes only what happens around the building.
The free national holidays are the busiest days. On 15 March a queue forms before the doors open and the state holds its national commemoration in front of the museum. For a weekend in mid-May the Museums’ May Festival takes over the museum and its garden. Between Christmas and New Year, check the dates in the closures box above.
How long to spend
About an hour
History of Hungary Part II on the second floor, from 1703 to 1990, with 1848 and the fall of communism in it.
Two to three hours
Every open permanent exhibition at a steady pace: the archaeology floor, both history halves and the two lapidaries.
Half a day
Add whatever temporary exhibition is on, and a break in the cafeteria before the second half.
Up to six hours
Every caption read, room by room, on both floors. The explanations are long, and reading them all is how a visit stretches this far.
Insider tips
Arriving at quarter to five gets you in, not round
At 16:45 you can still buy a ticket, but the rooms start closing 45 minutes later. That is one exhibition at a jog, and the second floor alone takes longer than that.
A popular temporary show can keep longer hours
The museum has stretched the day for a show in demand. In July 2026 it kept a big temporary exhibition open until 20:00 on its final weekend, selling tickets until 19:00. Extensions like that are posted on the museum’s news page, and they can cover the one show only.