Book now Drottningholm Palace Tickets: What to Know Before You Book
A plain guide to what your Drottningholm ticket includes, how all-day admission works, and the two tickets we book for you near Stockholm.
Drottningholm Palace rewards a little planning. Its calendar changes with the seasons, so this guide walks through exactly what your ticket covers, when you can use it and how we book it for you.
What your Drottningholm Palace ticket includes
Your Palace ticket is admission to the state rooms of Drottningholm, the 17th-century royal palace on the island of Lovön, about 10 kilometres west of central Stockholm. This is the historic heart of the site: a suite of Baroque and Rococo interiors that make Drottningholm Sweden's best-preserved royal palace of its era, and the country's first UNESCO World Heritage Site, inscribed in 1991. Inside, you follow a route through rooms built and decorated by the Tessin architects from the late 1600s onward. The grand staircase sets the tone, rising through painted ceilings and sculpture toward the state apartments. From there you reach Karl XI's Gallery, its walls given over to a martial cycle of paintings, and Queen Hedvig Eleonora's State Bedchamber, one of the most lavish Baroque interiors in northern Europe. The palace library and the connecting state apartments show how taste shifted over the following century, from heavy Baroque grandeur toward lighter Rococo detail. A ticket admits one person for a single dated visit to these interiors. You move through at your own pace; a free English audio guide in the Royal Palaces app explains what you are looking at. The palace is the King and Queen's home, with the southern wing reserved for them, so the visitor route covers the historic state rooms rather than the whole building. What the ticket does not include is worth stating plainly. The surrounding Baroque garden and the English landscape park are free to walk and need no ticket at all. The Chinese Pavilion in the park is a separate, seasonal admission that we can add for you as a combined ticket. And the Court Theatre in the grounds is run by a different organisation entirely; it is a wonderful thing to see, but it is not part of any ticket we sell. Knowing where those lines fall makes it easy to choose the right tier before you book.
All-day admission: no time slot to keep
Admission to the palace is valid for one visit on the date you choose, at any time during that day's opening hours. There is no entry time to keep and no window to miss: arrive when it suits your day, show your e-ticket at the entrance and stay inside as long as you like. That flexibility matters at Drottningholm, because most visitors travel out from Stockholm by metro and bus or, in summer, by boat, and journey times vary. What does need planning is the date itself. From May to September the palace opens daily, 10:00–17:00. From October to April it opens on Saturdays and Sundays only, 10:00–16:00, usually adding Good Friday and Easter Monday, and it closes for most of December before reopening daily from New Year's Eve to 6 January. Our booking calendar only offers days the palace is open, so a date you can select is a date you can visit. Plan to arrive with at least an hour in hand before closing so you can see the Reception Halls without hurrying.
Our two ticket tiers: Palace, or Palace plus Chinese Pavilion
We keep the choice deliberately simple. The real decision at Drottningholm is how much of the estate you want to see, and that comes down to two tiers. The first is Palace admission at our standard rate per person. It admits you, at any time during opening hours on your date, to the Baroque and Rococo Reception Halls described above: the staircase, the galleries, Hedvig Eleonora's bedchamber, the library and the state apartments. For many visitors, particularly those on a half-day trip from Stockholm who also want time in the free park, the Palace ticket is everything they need. The second is the combined Palace plus Chinese Pavilion ticket at the combined rate per person. This adds admission to the Chinese Pavilion, the Rococo pleasure palace set deeper in the park, on top of your Palace entry. It is the fuller Drottningholm experience, and the small step up in price buys a genuinely different building rather than more of the same. The combined ticket is available only when the Pavilion is open, which is a seasonal matter covered in the next section. Children aged 6 and under go free with an adult and need no ticket; everyone aged 7 and over needs one. The prices above are per person and are what our concierge service charges to arrange and secure your entry. Choosing between the two is straightforward. If your day is tight or you are content with the palace interiors and a walk in the gardens, take the Palace ticket. If you want to see the estate at its most complete and the Pavilion is in season, the combined ticket is the natural pick, and it saves you sorting out a second admission separately on the day. We will show you which options are available for your chosen date so the decision is made with real information rather than guesswork.
The Chinese Pavilion is seasonal — what the combined ticket adds
The Chinese Pavilion, Kina slott, is one of the loveliest surprises at Drottningholm, and it is also the part of a visit most shaped by the calendar. Built in the 1760s as a Rococo pleasure palace, it is a European vision of China set at the end of a tree-lined avenue in the park, a short and pleasant walk from the main palace. Its exterior gleams with painted and gilded detail, and its interiors were designed for royal leisure rather than state ceremony, which gives them a lighter, more intimate character than the grand rooms of the palace itself. The key thing to plan around is that the Pavilion opens only in summer. Unlike the main Palace, which welcomes visitors year-round on a schedule that thins out in winter, the Pavilion keeps a shorter season. When it is open, the combined Palace plus Chinese Pavilion ticket at the combined rate lets you see both buildings on the same visit. When it is closed for the season, that combined ticket simply is not offered, and the Palace ticket is the right choice. The Pavilion opens daily from June to August and at weekends in May and September, from 11:00 to 17:00, and is closed from October to April. Our booking calendar won't offer the combined ticket outside that season, so you can't buy a Pavilion visit for a day it is shut. Outside the season, plan on the Palace and the free park. If seeing the Pavilion matters to you, it is worth letting your travel dates lean toward the warmer half of the year. The walk out to it through the park is part of the pleasure, and pairing it with the state rooms makes for a full, unhurried day at Drottningholm rather than a quick look at a single building.
Visiting with children
Drottningholm is an easy palace to visit as a family. Children aged 6 and under go free when accompanied by an adult and don't need a ticket at all, so you only buy tickets for everyone aged 7 and over. Our tickets are priced per person; tell us the number of people aged 7 and over when you book and we buy the matching admissions for your date. Children under 12 must visit with an adult. A few practical points help the day go smoothly. Prams can't be taken inside the palace; they are left in the arcade at the entrance, which is unattended. Baby carriers are fine but, like bags and backpacks, must be worn in front of you inside the rooms. There are no luggage lockers at Drottningholm, so travel light. The palace offers activity trails for younger visitors, and the free park — with its fountains, avenues and, in summer, the walk out to the Chinese Pavilion — is the perfect place to let children run between the indoor sights.
Your e-ticket and how our concierge booking works
We are a concierge service: you tell us the visit you want, and we buy the tickets on your behalf and deliver them to you. We are not the palace's own box office and we make no claim to be; our job is to take the friction out of booking so you can focus on the day itself. The process is short. Choose your date on our calendar, which only offers days the palace is open, and the ticket you want — Palace admission, or the combined Palace plus Chinese Pavilion ticket in the Pavilion's summer season — for each person aged 7 and over. Once your booking is confirmed, we email your ticket as a mobile and print-at-home e-ticket. There is nothing to collect in person: you show the e-ticket on your phone, or bring a printout, at the entrance at any time during opening hours on your date. A few honest notes on terms. Each ticket is issued for a specific date, so sales are final once booked; refunds apply only if the palace itself cannot admit you. And we book strictly what the palace sells, so you will never be offered a ticket for a day or a building that is closed.
Beyond your ticket: the free park and the Court Theatre
A visit to Drottningholm is more than the ticketed interiors, and it helps to know what else is on the island so you can plan a full day. The most generous part is that the grounds are free. The formal Baroque garden, with its geometric parterres, and the more romantic English landscape park beyond it are open to walk without any admission at all. Many visitors pair an hour in the state rooms with a long, unhurried wander through the grounds, which is where the walk out to the Chinese Pavilion also begins. One building in the grounds deserves a special mention, with a clear caveat. The Court Theatre is an 18th-century theatre remarkable for keeping its original stage machinery still in working use, a genuine rarity in Europe. It is run by a separate organisation, with its own guided-tour tickets sold through its own channels. We do not sell or arrange theatre tickets, and nothing in our Palace or combined ticket covers it. We flag it here only so you can see it for what it is: a wonderful thing to look at from outside and, if it interests you, to arrange independently through the theatre itself. Getting to Drottningholm shapes the day too. In the warmer months, sightseeing ferries cross Lake Mälaren from Stadshuskajen by Stockholm City Hall to the palace jetty, a scenic cruise of about an hour that many treat as an attraction in its own right. Year-round, you can take the metro to Brommaplan and a bus to the Drottningholms slott stop right by the palace, roughly 30 to 45 minutes from the centre in total; buy bus tickets in the SL app, as none are sold at Drottningholm. If you are building a wider Stockholm itinerary, Drottningholm sits naturally alongside the Royal Palace in the Old Town, Stockholm City Hall and the Vasa Museum. Fix your Drottningholm date first, since the palace's calendar is the one thing you can't move, then arrange the flexible city sights around it.
Frequently asked
Do I have to pick an entry time for Drottningholm Palace?
No. Your ticket is valid for one visit at any time during opening hours on the date you choose — 10:00–17:00 from May to September, and 10:00–16:00 on open days from October to April. Arrive when it suits you and stay as long as you like.
What is the difference between your two tickets?
The Palace ticket at the listed rate covers the Baroque and Rococo state rooms. The combined ticket at the listed rate adds the Chinese Pavilion in the park, available only when the Pavilion is open for the season. Both are per person; children aged 6 and under go free and need no ticket.
Is the Chinese Pavilion always open?
No. The Chinese Pavilion is seasonal and opens only in the warmer months, while the main Palace welcomes visitors year-round on a schedule that thins out in winter. It opens daily from June to August and at weekends in May and September; our calendar won't offer the combined ticket outside that season.
Do children need a ticket?
Children aged 6 and under go free with an adult and need no ticket. Everyone aged 7 and over needs one, and children under 12 must visit with an adult.
How do I receive my ticket, and can I get a refund?
We email a mobile and print-at-home e-ticket once your booking is confirmed, so there is nothing to collect in person. Because each ticket is issued for a specific date, sales are final; we can refund only if the operator fails to honour a valid ticket, for example if the attraction cannot admit you.