Città del Vaticano

Vatican City runs on the same electrical system as the rest of Rome, since it draws its power from Italy. Bring a European-style adapter if your devices use a different plug shape.

Italian is Vatican City's working language, and Latin remains its official language for law and ceremony, one of the only places in the world where Latin still has a real legal role. English is spoken at ticket counters and by most staff who deal with visitors, so getting around as an English speaker is easy.

Tap water is safe to drink throughout Vatican City, and free drinking-water fountains are dotted around the grounds and inside the Vatican Museums. The Vatican Pharmacy runs a public counter near St. Peter's Square, so basic medicine is available without leaving the country. For anything more, pharmacies in Rome's Borgo and Prati neighborhoods just outside the walls are just as close, and several stay open late.

Vatican City has no border control or passport checks of its own. Crossing from Rome into St. Peter's Square or the Vatican Museums is unrestricted and does not require showing a passport. Anyone allowed into Italy under the Schengen rules can visit Vatican City freely; there is no separate Vatican visa.

Visa and entry requirements change frequently. Verify current requirements with the official immigration authority or your country's embassy before travel.

Vatican City enforces a strict dress code, and guards do turn people away. Cover your shoulders and knees to enter Saint Peter's Basilica or the Vatican Museums, no tank tops, shorts above the knee, or bare midriffs, for men and women alike. Keep your voice down and remove hats inside the basilica and its chapels.

Photography without flash is allowed in most areas, but it is forbidden inside Sistine Chapel, guards enforce this strictly. During a papal audience or Mass, dress and behave as you would for any church service.

Vatican City follows its own calendar of religious and state holidays alongside the ones observed in Italy. The Vatican Museums close on these days and on Sundays, except for the last Sunday of each month, when entry is free and the museums are far busier than usual.

Shops and the post office keep shorter hours than central Rome, and much of daily life pauses for Mass on major feast days.

Vatican City is small enough to see entirely on foot, and there is no public transport inside its walls.

• By metro: Rome's Metro Line A stops at Ottaviano-San Pietro, a 10-minute walk from St. Peter's Square.
• By bus: several Rome city bus routes stop right outside the Vatican walls, near the metro station and the Vatican Museums entrance.
• On foot: most sights sit within a 15-minute walk of each other; comfortable shoes matter more than any transport plan, especially for the queue outside the Vatican Museums.

Vatican City sits entirely inside Rome, so getting there really means getting to that part of Rome.

Vatican City has no restaurants open to the public outside the Vatican Museums, which run several visitor cafés, a self-service restaurant, and a small pizzeria for ticket holders. Beyond the museums, almost everyone eats in Rome, in the streets around Borgo and Prati just outside the walls. What you find there is Roman cooking: thin, crisp pizza al taglio sold by weight, and trattorias serving the city's classic pasta dishes.

Breakfast in the neighborhood is a quick espresso and a cornetto at the counter, standing up, the way most Romans do it. Lunch and dinner run later than in northern Europe, and a full restaurant meal comes in courses: a starter, a pasta dish, then meat or fish. Look for carbonara, cacio e pepe, and amatriciana on nearly every nearby menu, supplì as a fried snack, and gelato for something sweet.

Vatican City is a single walled city-state with no towns or districts of its own. Everything beyond St. Peter's Square and the Vatican Museums is Rome, the city that surrounds it on every side. Most visitors stay in Rome and treat Vatican City as a half-day or full-day excursion from there, often combined with nearby Castel Sant'Angelo and the Borgo and Prati neighborhoods just outside the Vatican walls.