Hungarian State Opera tours: 12,000 HUF for the English tour at 13:30, 15:00 and 16:30, with a short concert at the end

💡 The Short Version: The English-language tour is 12,000 HUF (about £28) per person, runs daily at 13:30, 15:00 and 16:30, lasts 60 minutes and ends with a short concert by Opera soloists on the grand staircase. Tickets are released one week ahead, at the box offices or online. There are no tours during performances, and when the auditorium is closed for a rehearsal the route changes. The English tour was 9,000 HUF in January 2025. Or book a tour: GetYourGuide’s Opera House guided tourad (from £28) is priced the same as the Opera’s own.

The tickets, compared

Prices are from the Opera’s OperaTour page, converted at about 434 HUF to the pound. The operator is the Hungarian State Opera, and its own site is opera.hu: look-alike ticket sites turn up in search results.

• The price rose by a third. The English tour was 9,000 HUF in January 2025, and the Hungarian tour 5,000 HUF.
• Private tours can be booked from 9:00 to 13:00 every day for at least 15 tickets, at least a week ahead. A concert on its own is 45,000 HUF.
• Other languages: the Opera runs tours in Italian, Spanish, German, French, Greek and Hungarian on request.
• The Budapest Card does not cover the tours.

How to buy

• Online or at the box offices: tickets are available one week in advance. The Opera’s ticket site is jegy.opera.hu.
• Without a booking: the Opera says visitors who like to decide on the spot can try to join a group at the meeting point in the entrance hall.
• Meeting point: the information desk in the entrance hall.
• Groups: a group is limited to 30.

The Opera House on Andrássy út. Photo: Dennis G. Jarvis, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0.

Tours worth paying for

The Opera’s own tour already includes the concert, so most visitors need nothing else. Prices are GetYourGuide’s lowest “from” prices, per person.

The Opera House guided tour

From £28 · 4.5 stars from 2,176 reviews · 1 hour

Budapest: Opera House Guided Tourad costs the same as the Opera’s 12,000 HUF ticket. The Opera releases its own tickets one week ahead, and GetYourGuide’s calendar shows the dates it offers.

A tour with a live concert

From £48 · 4.5 stars from 11 reviews · 1 hour

Budapest: Tour of the Budapest Opera House with a Live Concertad costs about £20 more than the Opera’s tour, which already ends with a short concert, so the extra buys nothing the Opera lists.

A concert in a church instead

From £51 · 4.6 stars from 1,696 reviews

Budapest: Classical Music Concerts in St Stephen’s Basilicaad is the alternative evening. The St Stephen’s Basilica guide lists the organ concert too.

What to see

The Opera House is a Neo-Renaissance palace designed by Miklós Ybl, open to opera and ballet for more than 130 years. It reopened on 12 March 2022 after a refurbishment of nearly five years. The tour’s route varies, because the auditorium is closed during rehearsals, but these are the parts the house itself presents:

1. The limestone façade on Andrássy út.
2. The foyer, decorated with Italian marbles.
3. The grand staircase, where the short concert takes place on the landing, with costumed opera scenes.
4. The auditorium, a horseshoe-shaped hall of three storeys.
5. The Royal Box, in the middle of the grand circle, and the royal staircase that Franz Joseph I and Queen Elisabeth used.
6. The salons, among them the Bertalan Székely Parlour, with a frieze of The Four Seasons, and the Red Parlour.

The horseshoe auditorium, with its tiers of boxes. Photo: Andrea Puggioni, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0.

What to skip: nothing: the tour is one fixed hour. If you want to hear a whole opera, book a performance instead.

See a performance instead. The Opera sells performance tickets on opera.hu and at its box offices. Online purchases are by credit card only, and prices are in forint. Standing-room tickets go on sale two hours before an evening performance and one hour before a morning performance, and the view is limited from the standing places and some seats.

Hours, rules and getting there

• Photography: allowed for non-commercial purposes, without flash or tripods.
• Rehearsals: the auditorium is closed to visitors during rehearsals, and the tour then goes to other areas.
• Getting there: the Opera House is on Andrássy út, on metro line M1. Budapest public transport has the fares.

The House of Terror is a short walk along Andrássy út, and St Stephen’s Basilica and the Dohány Street Synagogue are the other sights within walking distance. For the rest of the city’s bookings, see what to book before you go to Budapest. 3 days in Budapest and Budapest in one day build the plan round the bookings. To sleep nearby, where to stay in Budapest compares the areas, and where to eat in Budapest lists places to eat. The Budapest Card does not cover the Opera. The Hungarian Parliament is the other tour to book ahead, and Budapest’s thermal baths compared covers a bath for the afternoon.