Paris Louvre Museum Opening Hours

The Louvre Museum is one of the world's most important cultural institutions and France's most beloved museum. Within its walls it houses such famous works as Leonardo da Vinci's La Gioconda, Delacroix's Liberty Leading the People and the Venus de Milo, a relic from Ancient Greece.

Undoubtedly, the Louvre Museum is one of the must-see tourist attractions during your trip to Paris. But do you know its opening hours, the best time to visit it or how long it will take you to see it?

Don't worry, so that you can organise this visit in detail(by seeing how to get tickets or how to get to the Louvre), I'll tell you all about the opening hours of the Louvre Museum in this post. Keep reading!

The Louvre Museum is open every day from 9 AM to 6 PM except Tuesday, when it is closed for restoration, maintenance and installation of new works in the different rooms of the building.

In addition, the Louvre Museum is also open on special dates such as Christmas Eve (December 24th) or New Year's Eve (December 31st) but with shorter opening hours, from 9 AM to 5 PM.

What time is the latest time to visit the Louvre Museum?

At the Louvre, the last admission of visitors takes place at 5 PM, which is one hour before closing time.

However, if you want to get the most out of this cultural visit, my recommendation is that you don't go to the art gallery with so little time because the clearance of the rooms begins 30 minutes before closing time and to get an overall idea of all the art housed within its walls, it is not worth going in at that time because you will see practically nothing.

It is better to wait for another time when you have more free time to visit it at your leisure, so that you can get the most out of the price you have paid for tickets to the Louvre Museum.

The great thing about the Louvre's opening hours is that it's open every day of the year, including public holidays except those on Tuesdays (the only day the museum is closed), Christmas Day (25 December), New Year 's Day (1 January) and Workers' Day (1 May), which gives you plenty of time to plan your visit to one of the world's most important museums.

Keep the Louvre Museum's closing days in mind when preparing your trip to Paris if you plan to make cultural visits during your stay. In any case, if your holidays coincide with these days in December, January and May, don't worry, because Paris is a lively city where there are always plenty of things to see and do.

A standard visit to the Louvre Museum usually takes about 3 hours on average, but depending on how passionate you are about art and archaeology, you may want to spend more time viewing the Louvre's finest paintings in detail.

In that case, when you've been inside for a while and need to clear your head, you can take a break from this fascinating journey through art history by taking a break in one of the museum's cafés or restaurants.

This is not an easy question to answer. The Louvre is a huge museum with over 400 rooms displaying more than 35,000 works of art, so it all depends on your interests and how long you want to spend looking at each collection.

However, to get an overall idea of its most important collections, you'll need to spend at least 2 hours and 30 minutes there.

Although it is an ambitious plan, my advice is not to go to the Louvre Museum with the intention of visiting all of its spaces in a single day, as it is an almost unmanageable task given its size.

I don't recommend it because you'll be stressed from one room to the next, barely noticing the works of art in front of you and with a cultural binge that at the end of the day will probably not allow you to clearly remember everything you've seen. You have to enjoy the Louvre Museum slowly and calmly! And if you need to, or if you feel like it, you can always come back later to see what you've missed.

Of course! In this case, I recommend you take an express tour of the Louvre Museum where a guide will show you the essential works of the collection while explaining what you are seeing.

This is one of the most recommended guided tours of the Louvre Museum for travellers who don't have much time in Paris but don't want to leave without visiting the museum. It's the best option because you'll learn a lot on a guided tour and the time is always twice as long.

Actually, any time is a good time to visit this impressive treasure trove of fine art, but it is true that lunchtime tends to be less crowded. It's the ideal time to enjoy it if you don't like the crowds of tourists around certain works of art such as "La Gioconda", for example.

The Louvre is one of the most important tourist attractions in Paris, like the Eiffel Tower or Notre Dame Cathedral, and after all, there will always be large groups of people queuing to get in.

Especially on weekends and Mondays (the day when other Paris museums are usually closed) during the summer months and Christmas, when it is high season in Paris.

So if it fits in with your schedule, stay for lunch near the Louvre and go in during the lunch hour when there are fewer visitors.

It is much the same with children as with other visitors. The best time to go with them to the Louvre without the long queues taking their toll and getting tired before entering is on a weekday during lunchtime, when the crowds disperse for a bite to eat and the little ones will have a better chance to see the works of art up close and unhindered. Which as a parent always gives you greater peace of mind as you can keep track of your child at all times and make sure they don't get lost in the crowds.

On the other hand, if you only have a couple of hours to see the Louvre Museum with your children because of the way your schedule is organised, another option you can consider is to get up early with them to queue up before the doors open and enter first thing in the morning. This will allow you to leave the museum when there is a bigger crowd inside the museum around midday.

If you decide to wait to buy tickets to the Louvre Museum once you're in the city, you can expect huge queues at the ticket office which can last anywhere between 40 minutes and 2 hours, depending on how busy the day you've chosen to visit is. Add to that the security queue, which can add several minutes to the wait.

There is a way to avoid this, or at least reduce queuing times, and that is to buy your Louvre tickets online instead of at the ticket office and choose the "no queue" option to get in as quickly as possible. It's worth it!

A visit to the Louvre Museum is amazing, but the souvenir shop is no less so. There are several scattered throughout the complex but the main one is the Boutique du Louvre located in the hallway of the Grand Louvre.

Its opening hours are from 10 AM to 6:30 PM, every day of the week except Tuesday when the museum is closed. It is also closed on December 25th, January 1st and May 1st.

The opening hours of the other Louvre Museum shops are as follows:

• Salon Denon: 9:30 AM to 5:30 PM, every day except Tuesday. Denon Wing - First Floor - French Paintings Section
• Napoleon Stall: 9:30 AM to 5:30 PM, every day except Tuesday. Temporary exhibition room.
• Denon Stall: 9:30 AM to 5:30 PM, every day except Tuesday. Mezzanine Denon wing, under the Pyramid.

The Louvre Museum is located in Place du Palais Royal. After visiting the Louvre, you may want to discover other tourist attractions in the surrounding area. To organise your visit in detail, take a look at their opening hours.

• Palais Royal de Paris: Open until May 18th from 8 AM to 7 PM / From May 19th to June 8th from 8 AM to 9 PM / From June 9th from 8 AM to 10:30 PM.
• Musée d'Orsay: Open Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and weekends from 9:30 AM to 6 PM. Thursday from 9:30 AM to 9:45 PM. Closed on Mondays.
• Musée des Arts Décoratifs: Open Tuesday to Sunday from 11 AM to 6 PM. Closed on Mondays.