Beat the Assisi crowds

When is Assisi busiest in 2026?

Weekends, Italian holidays and feast days, all year; the anniversary has added about 9% more visitors on top.

The peak of the year has passed. During the exposition of the remains in February and March, more than 370,000 pilgrims booked slots at the tomb, and 3 and 4 October brought about 25,000 people through the basilica in two days. Over the first half of the year the Assisi area counted more than 850,000 overnight stays, about 9% up on 2025, most of the growth from Italians.

That shapes the rest of the Jubilee. Italian visitors come on weekends and holidays, often in parish coaches, and they come for Mass. Foreign day-trippers come on weekdays, in tour coaches from Rome and Florence. Where the two overlap (a Saturday in December, the Christmas holidays) the town is full.

Still to come before the Jubilee ends: the week around the World Day of the Poor (9 to 15 November) at Santa Maria degli Angeli, 8 December, Christmas to Epiphany, and the closing weekend of 9 and 10 January 2027. After that, February is the quietest month of the year, until Easter (28 March 2027) and the spring school trips.

What time do coach groups reach Assisi?

From late morning to mid-afternoon: day tours from Rome and Florence stop somewhere else first, and Italian parish coaches aim for a late-morning Mass.

Read the tour itineraries and the pattern is clear. Both big day tours put another town first. The Rome coach goes to Orvieto, then lunch by Lake Trasimeno, and reaches Assisi in the afternoon for Santa Chiara (30 minutes), Santa Maria Maggiore (20 minutes) and the basilica (1 hour). The Florence coach stops in Perugia first and arrives around midday. Coaches park below the basilica at Piazza Giovanni Paolo II, so the Lower Piazza and the Lower Church feel it first.

Pilgrim groups from Italian parishes and schools tend to arrive mid-morning and often book a Mass in the basilica. Between them, these groups fill the hours from about 10:30 to 16:00.

The fix is simple: be inside the basilica before 10:00, or come back after 16:00 when the coaches are heading home. If you walk the town in the middle of the day, start at the top (Piazza Matteotti or San Rufino) and work down; most groups walk the other way, up from the basilica.

Are weekdays or Sundays better for Assisi?

Weekdays, by a long way. Tuesday to Thursday is best; Sundays and holidays are the worst days for a guided visit.

On Sundays and holidays the basilica is first a church: Masses run all morning, and guided tours inside are not allowed. Your guide explains outside and you enter alone and in silence. Saturdays are busy with Italian visitors and guided entry stops at 16:00. Monday is fine. On Wednesday the Lower Church closes an hour early (18:00 in summer, 17:30 in winter), which matters only if you planned a late visit.

What is the best time of day inside the basilica?

At opening: the Lower Church and tomb from 06:00, the Upper Church from 08:30. Late afternoon is the second-best slot.

The official timetable is generous. The Lower Church and the crypt open at 06:00 every day, which makes an early visit to the tomb easy if you sleep in Assisi. The Upper Church, with the 28 scenes of the life of Francis traditionally attributed to Giotto, opens at 08:30. Be there at 08:30 and you get 20 minutes or more before the first groups.

The order we suggest for a self-guided morning: Upper Church at opening, then the Lower Church and the tomb, then up through the town to Piazza del Comune and Santa Chiara while the coaches are unloading below. In summer (April to October) the Upper Church stays open until 18:45 and the crypt reopens for personal prayer on Friday and Saturday from 21:00 to 22:00, the calmest hour in the building.

Want a guide? Guided tours inside run on weekdays from 09:00 to 17:15. Book the first slot of the day. Individual entry needs no ticket, but registration is recommended and guides must reserve, so early slots go first.

The first weekday hour with an official guide: Upper Church, Lower Church and tomb before the groups arrive.

★ 4.8 · 1 hour · from $46

Explore the basilica tour with an official guide → Tour details

How long is the queue for Carlo Acutis's tomb?

It ranges from a few minutes on a weekday morning to a long line on weekends and around his anniversary; go at opening or after 17:00.

The tomb of St Carlo Acutis in the Sanctuary of the Spoliation (the church of Santa Maria Maggiore) has become one of the busiest stops in town. The diocese counted more than 620,000 visitors in the first eight months of 2025, 121,000 of them in August alone, before his canonisation that September. The 20th anniversary of his death drew four days of events from 9 to 12 October 2026.

The sanctuary timetable: from 1 November to 31 March, 08:00 to 19:00 without a break; in summer from 07:00 most days (08:00 on Monday and Thursday). On Sundays and holidays visits to the church and the tomb stop from 10:30 to 12:30 for the 11:00 Mass. The weekday Mass is at 18:00, with the rosary at 17:30.

The church is small and the line moves past the glass tomb, so it is not a long visit once you are in. Coach tours from Rome bring their groups here in the afternoon. A first visit at 08:00 or a late one after 17:00 on a weekday is the way to do it. More in our Carlo Acutis guide.

Which feast days should you avoid or aim for?

Avoid 3 to 4 October, 1 to 2 August and the Christmas holidays unless you come for them; aim for ordinary weekdays in November, January and February.

Feast days are wonderful if the feast is why you came, and frustrating if you wanted to see the frescoes. Use this as a rough calendar for the rest of the Jubilee and into 2027:

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