Everything you need to know
Guided tour details
To see current prices for each rate (adults, children, students, seniors and infants), select your preferred date in the booking calendar. The price shown in the calendar is always the final price.
If you book a reduced rate — child, student, senior or visitor with a disability — bring the document that proves it on the day.
The tour runs throughout the week, with several start times to choose from. Select your date in the booking calendar to see the times available on that day.
Bookings close ten hours before the start time.
The group meets in the old town, a few steps from the Cathedral.
C. Alemanes 31, Casco Antiguo, 41004 Seville · View on Google Maps
Please arrive about ten minutes early, so that the whole group can go in at the booked time.
A skip-the-line ticket to the Royal Alcázar, so you go in at your booked time instead of queuing at the box office.
A guided tour in English with an official guide through the palaces, halls and gardens of the complex.
Bring your original, physical ID or passport. Carrying it and showing it on the day is compulsory to get into the Alcázar, and a photograph of it on your phone is not accepted.
After booking you will be asked for the full name and ID or passport number of everyone in the party, because access to the monument is arranged in advance.
Comfortable shoes: the whole visit is on foot.
When the tour ends you can stay in the gardens for as long as you like, or walk back through the palace before leaving.
The tickets to the Alcázar are nominative and are bought in advance, so the amount corresponding to the tickets is not refundable under any circumstances.
For the rest of the price: cancel more than 48 hours before the start and you are refunded in full; between 48 and 24 hours before, half; less than 24 hours before, there is no refund.
Ways to visit
Choose how you visit
Everything on this page describes the guided tour. The same visit is also sold in other formats, each with its own group size, languages and price, and every one of them is booked right here.
Guided tour
From €39per adult
- GroupRegular group
- LanguagesEnglish
An official English-speaking guide takes you through the palaces, halls and gardens, with a skip-the-line ticket included. About an hour and a half.
Check datesAudio guide, at your own pace
From €32per adult
- GroupOn your own
- LanguagesEN / ES / FR / IT / DE, your choice
Entry ticket plus an audio guide you play on your phone, in the language you pick. No guide and no group, so you set the pace and stay as long as you like.
Bring your own headphones. This option is non-refundable once booked.
Small group, maximum 12
From €49per adult
- GroupUp to 12 people
- LanguagesEnglish or Spanish, chosen when you book
The same guided route, capped at twelve people, which makes it easier to hear the guide and to see what is being pointed at.
Private group
From €141per group
- GroupYour party only
- LanguagesEN / ES / FR / IT, chosen when you book
The palace with a guide for your party alone, priced per group rather than per person. One rate covers everyone, whatever the size of the party.
This one meets at C. Francos 19, a few streets away, not at the address above.
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Eduardo BallesterosSeville local and author of the guideThe guided tour
A royal palace still in use, a thousand years on
The Real Alcázar of Seville was declared a World Heritage Site in 1987, together with the Cathedral and the Archive of the Indies. It is one of the oldest royal palaces in Europe still in use: the upper floor is kept for the Spanish Royal Family when they are in the city, and everything else is open to visitors.
Where the palace comes from
Its origins go back to the High Middle Ages, and areas of Islamic art survive whose delicacy is still startling. What predominates, though, is Mudejar art and the Gothic style. In the 14th century King Pedro I ordered three Almohad palace buildings demolished so that a Mudejar palace could be raised in their place, attached to the Gothic palace of Alfonso X, to serve as the Royal House. Renaissance and Baroque elements were added over the centuries that followed.
Courtyards, halls and royal rooms
With an official English-speaking guide you walk through the halls, courtyards and rooms of the complex: the Courtyard of La Montería, the Courtyard of the Maidens, the Hall of the Admiral, the upper royal room and the Prince’s Garden. The guide explains what you are looking at as you go, which is the difference between seeing a beautiful building and understanding one.
The baths of María Padilla and the pond of Mercury
Two of the corners the route makes a point of reaching. The vaulted baths, below the palace, hold a sheet of still water that reflects the arches above it; the pond of Mercury sits where the palace opens onto the gardens. Both have stories attached, and the secrets and legends of the place are part of what is told along the way.
Gardens, and a setting you may recognise
The tour ends in the gardens, so the last part of the visit is spent among orange trees, hedges and fountains rather than hurrying towards an exit. These gardens and the vaulted baths beneath the palace have served as film and television locations — most famously as the Water Gardens of Dorne in Game of Thrones.
Important: depending on the monument’s own schedule, the weather and the pace of the group, the visit may vary in its content or in the order in which the spaces are seen. Your guide will organize the route in whatever way works best on the day.
Your questions answered
Frequently asked questions
Approximately one hour and thirty minutes, all of it inside the Alcázar and its gardens.
At C. Alemanes 31, in the old town beside the Cathedral. Come about ten minutes early so the group can go in on time.
Yes. Your booking includes a skip-the-line ticket, so there is nothing to buy at the box office and no queue for it.
Yes, and it has to be the original, physical document. Carrying it and showing it on the day is compulsory to get into the Alcázar.
After booking you will also be asked for the full name and ID or passport number of everyone in the party, because the tickets are nominative and access is arranged in advance.
The tour booked on this page is given in English.
The same visit also runs in Spanish, French and Italian, each on its own dates and with its own guide, so the calendar above shows only the English departures.
This is the regular group tour, and the number of people varies with the date and the time. If you would rather be in a group of no more than twelve, or have the guide to yourselves, see the other ways to visit further up the page.
No. This one covers the Royal Alcázar only.
The tickets are nominative and bought in advance, so the amount corresponding to the tickets is not refundable.
For the rest of the price: more than 48 hours before the start, you are refunded in full; between 48 and 24 hours before, half; less than 24 hours before, there is no refund.
Planning your visit to the Royal Alcázar
Practical questions about the monument itself, useful background before you travel.
A guided route through the main palaces and the gardens takes about an hour and a half. If you want to sit in the gardens afterwards, or go back to a room you liked, allow two to three hours in total. It is one of those places people leave later than they planned.
No. The Alhambra is in Granada, some 250 km away. Both grew out of Islamic royal complexes and both are World Heritage Sites, but they are separate monuments in different cities, and a ticket for one is no use for the other.
No single reign produced it. There are Islamic foundations from the High Middle Ages, the Gothic palace from the time of Alfonso X, the Mudejar palace ordered by Pedro I in the 14th century, and Renaissance and Baroque additions after that. Part of the pleasure of the place is seeing the joins.
Yes. The upper floor is kept for the Royal Family when they are in Seville, which is what makes the Alcázar the oldest royal palace in Europe still in use. Everything else is open to visitors.
Yes. The gardens and the vaulted baths beneath the palace stood in for the Water Gardens of Dorne. They look much as they do on screen, minus the crew.
You are in the middle of it. The Cathedral and the Giralda face the Alcázar across the square, the Archive of the Indies sits between the two, and the lanes of the Barrio de Santa Cruz begin immediately behind the palace walls.
