My wife, mother-in-law and I used this company. We were running about 3 minutes late, even though…read morethe messaging we received was very clear to be early. My mother-in-law is elderly and getting around with her took more time than expected. Still, we arrived at the staging area and the staff was still very pleasant and accommodating. You can tell they were getting us to hurry because they know the area would be overrun with other tour groups. They really wanted us to have the best time and experience there. And they sat us in a very good spot for the Wednesday audience with the Pope. I would definitely recommend this company.

Great tours! We did the Colosseum and Vatican tour. The Colosseum tour was with Ferdinando and his…read moreknowledge and passion for what he was showing us was obvious. He is definitely highly recommended. He is an archaeologist as well so he had a lot of fascinating things to share with us. We actually ran into him on three separate occasions in Rome by chance and he was great to talk to each time. The Colosseum tour we took also included the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill (both even more fascinating than the Colosseum in my opinion). The Vatican tour was with Claudia and she was equally as knowledgeable and fun! She obviously knew the folks she needed to to get around in this massive complex without having to wait for anything. The "no-line" entry most tours get has lines here. She had the hookup to get us even past those lines. The tour starts through the Vatican Museum and it was very crowded at the time we were there. She fought to make room for us to get in front of the masses to get a close look at all the things she wanted us to see. It was great to see her genuinely care about our experience. Just about every other tour group we saw in this places had at least 30 people in them. Both tours we took with Real Rome Tours had less than 10. We all had an equal opportunity to experience these beautiful sights with great knowledgable folks who even stuck around to answer any questions we had. They also give great recommendations on restaurants and other places you need to see while in Rome. Gerard was also a pleasure dealing with while booking our tours. He is well organized and gave us a great alternative when we wanted to do the Colosseum Underground tour that wasn't available. It worked out perfectly for us. I couldn't recommend Real Rome Tours any more.

Our family of four joined another six people on the Testaccio 15-year anniversary tour and lucked…read moreout with Edma as our guide - not shown on their web site, so don't know how we got her. She was instantly personable, funny, thoughtful, and energetic without being nutty. We had a great first stop that ended up being a restaurant (Masto) we were delighted to return to later in the week and the owner happened to be there and we had a wonderful time with her again, and enjoyed the dinner just as we had the tasting. The stops were great, the walking easy, the food good, and Edma was a fountain of local geography and food culture information. We all felt like we got great value and were happy with the experience!

Would give them less than 1-star if I could. Booked the Trastevere Twilight Food Tour in Rome for…read moremy 2 children and I. At the time of booking, we informed them of the food allergies we had and we were permitted to book the food tour anyway. One of my children and I had severe food allergy to various fruits. When we checked in for the food tour we were advised we could not participate due to our allergies. After some significant back and forth they would only refund 2 of the 3 of us stating that the third would. it be refunded as she did not have any food allergies and she could go with the group and another adult that was with us who was going on the food tour and despite her severe food allergy, was permitted to go. My child is 12 and was not going to go without her mother and sister. it is wholly unacceptable that the company refused to refund the $150 US that we paid for the 12-year old who did not go on the food tour and them trying to force us to send her with someone else who was not her parent. Would not recommend this company!

We booked an early morning Vatican tour with What a Life Tours for our trip to Rome last month, and…read moreit was an A+ way to explore the world's smallest country. We could've visited on our own, as many obviously do, but it was great to have a skilled guide to put all that marble and history in context. We'd already paid to come to Rome and set aside a morning to see Vatican City. The added value we got out of the tour far outweighed the incremental expense. I found the tour on Get Your Guide, where it was highly rated with thousands of reviews, and I liked that it was a small group situation, with a maximum of ten participants. We received strict instructions to arrive before 7:45 at the What a Life office, within walking distance of the Vatican. We checked in and got assigned to our tour group, with an amazing guide named Giulia. She set us up with audio devices that let us hear her through our earphones even when she was just whispering--a cool bit of tech I'd never encountered before, but saw again twice more before leaving Italy. We arrived in time to enter the Vatican Museums right at 8:00, the start of visiting hours. Our tickets allowed us to skip the line, which was nice in mid-November, but no doubt doubly nice during peak season. Giulia was fantastic, so smart and informative and funny. She knew how to corral us, and I got the sense that she could work very easily under much worse conditions. She let us know how lucky we were to see the Vatican on such a quiet morning. There were plenty of people, but the crowd was apparently nothing compared to the crush of summer or early fall. The Vatican is so grand it was almost overwhelming, and it was extremely helpful to have a guide to keep us oriented. She gave us so much insight into what we were seeing, pointing out the highlights and offering a running commentary with a dry wit that was all Giulia. In the Gallery of Maps in the Vatican Museums, she showed my husband where he could find the village his family came from, painted on a 16th-century Fresco. She also prepared us well for the Sistine Chapel, where visitors are not allowed to talk, using down moments to tell us about the chapel and its artwork, with the aid of a well labeled print-out. The tour was three hours long and encompassed the museums, the Sistine Chapel, and St. Peter's Basilica. We could've spent several more hours in the museums alone, but we saw a lot, moving at a pretty brisk pace. The tour was very well calibrated. I can't think of a single thing I would have changed. I thought about booking our Colosseum tour through What a Life (would've saved me a review) but saw that the one they offered had very few ratings, compared to the thousands they had for the Vatican. I'm curious what their other tours are like, and have more confidence in the company overall after going on this one. If you're visiting the Vatican, in any case, What a Life Tours is a top notch provider. We saw and learned so much in those three hours, and had a truly wonderful time.

We did the early entry (7:45 am) tour with Jeannette. She was amazing. Her knowledge was expansive…read moreand being an art historian made it even more amazing. She not only covered the immense history of the Vatican, but her knowledge of the artists and their works was very helpful. I would not hesitate to recommend her and thus company. It was limited to a group of ten made it so easy to stay together and not lose anyone.

Alessandro is a fantastic guide! So knowledgeable and fun. I can't recommend him and and this tour…read morecompany enough for a hypogeum tour of the Colosseum.

I wish I could give a lower score than 1. I am. Not sure why the gave such positive reviews. The…read moreliteral only thing we wanted to do in Rome was a tour we booked with this company. I booked it 8 months ago and they changed it to a non acceptable excursion one week before. They claimed that they had no control but not sure why they couldn't have figured it out months ago that they overbooked, maybe I could have figured out another excursion to do but now with one week to find something, of course it is impossible.

Want a guided tour for low cost? This one is technically Free. This is a great way to be educated…read moreabout the sites rather than just showing up for a picture without any reference. Our tour guide, Laura, was informative and a trooper on a rainy day that included many who defected from our group once the wind kicked in. You get to stop at Rome's top sites. When it's over, you donate whatever is on your heart. The guides work on donations only. My only complaint is that after two hours, the tour stops, and you're pretty far from where you started. So we got lost trying to get back, eventually giving up and hailing a taxi. Book your ticket online, and be directed to the meeting point. Highly recommended.

After being denied by another tour company for not having reservations, I contacted this one to…read moremake sure we didn't need one for their 4:30PM evening Colosseum tour and luckily we didn't. The meeting point is NEAR the spanish steps in front of the statue by the Versace building. Our tour guide was Fredricka (sp?) and she is a TRUE local Italian! She took us all around the city, stopped at the Trevi Fountain, Victor Emmanuel Monument, the Forum of Cesar and towards the Coloseum. We ended the tour right around sunset at the Colosseum which made for AMAZING photo ops! Fredricka is SUPER knowledgeable about the city and its history that everyone in our group was extremely impressed by her tour! She even recommended a small cute little local restaurant to us nearby that we would have NEVER found because it was so hidden from the main busy street. Definitely do the city tour with this company and if you get Fredricka, that's a bonus!

We did the Rome in a Day Tour with Vatican, Colosseum & Historic Center with Walks and it was…read morephenomenal. With an early start we were able to see several of the key sites including the colosseum and Vatican City. Our guides were amazing and so knowledgeable.

I booked a tour for our family with Walks of Italy (also called "Walks & Devour Tours") for the…read morePrivate VIP Colosseum Tour with Roman Forum & Palatine Hill. DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES!!!! First of all, we booked our tour for four people months in advance, and reserved an 8:30am slot (as the morning is the best time for this tour in late May, as Rome gets hot fast). A few months later, I was informed that our start time had been moved to 10:00am, with no options to rebook at a different time for the days we would be in Rome (5 days in late May 2026). We received instructions on where and when to meet our guide, for this small group (basically, our family) VIP tour. On the day of the tour, we arrived early at the designated location, but our guide was not there. An employee at a nearby cafe insisted that "the tour groups meet down those steps" and pointed to the pathway to the entrance of the Colosseum. We went down the steps and looked around but could not find our guide. When we returned to the designated area (still before the 10am start time), a guide from another company told us our guide had been there but had left a few minutes prior. We went looking for the guide "with the green WALKS sign" but could not find him/her. I tried calling the customer assistance number provided in the email but was put on eternal hold. More than an hour later I was finally able to speak to a customer service representative, who said "because you missed your guide, there is nothing I can do for you" (or words to that effect. Because our guide had our tickets/passes to get into the Colosseum and Palatine Hill, we had no way to even visit the Roman Forum. I logged into the government-run website to see if there was any way we could purchase scheduled-entry tickets for the Colosseum sometime later when we were still in Rome, and the only tickets were for late on our last afternoon, when we had already scheduled a "Small Group VIP Tour of the Vatican Museums" with Walks & Devour. I purchased these tickets, knowing that we could end up having another Walks & Devour Guide disappear/no-show leaving us to miss pretty much everything we had come to Rome to see. When I tried to cancel our VIP Vatican Museum Tour, I was told that we had already passed the refund window. When I explained what had happened, the customer service rep said there was nothing she could do. DO NOT BOOK ANY TOURS WITH WALKS & DEVOUR!!!!

Fantastic tour of the Vatican museum and colosseum,we booked for full day tour in Rome.worth it…read moreWe recommend around city time / city Rome tours.

From the owner: Come and visit Italy with us !read more

Did skip the line tour but half of the 3 hours was waiting in line and getting into the museum so…read morereally only a 90 min tour.

We did the Vatican City Skip the Line Tour for St Peter's Basilica/the Museums/Sistine Chapel and I…read morethink it was totally worth it. The normal line to get into the museum would've taken 3 hours otherwise, and then you have to wait again to enter the Basilica unless you have skip the line tickets, at which point you can use an entrance that leads directly into the church. Our tour guide Lara was wonderful and did a good job of checking in to make sure everyone in the group was together (it was quite hectic inside). She also referred to us as "my family" which I thought was adorable. I would recommend bringing water bottles and prepping to walk a lot. You'll also be looking up at the ceilings quite a bit, so you may need to stretch your neck out.

We had an amazing tour with Maria Claudia through the Vatican City in July! She was so…read moreinformative, pleasant, and a real trooper guiding us in 100 degree weather! She was also very thorough and accommodating. We even watched her swoop up an injured bird in her hands to rescue it from getting trampled by tourists. Overall, an unforgettable day! Later the same day we did a Coliseum and Ancient City tour with Gabriella, who gave the same awesome informative type tour, and did it with a fab attitude in the humid heat. Overall, I would say this is a great company!

I booked a Colosseum guided tour through LivTours for my family during a long planned trip to Rome,…read moremeant to celebrate my son's graduation from Lehigh University and my daughter's high school graduation. Instead of a memory to celebrate, we left with one none of us will forget for the wrong reasons. LivTours guides do not give guests individual paper tickets. The guide holds all admission on an electronic ticket and hands each guest a small sticker as the only proof of entry. On an extremely hot day, my sticker came loose. Our guide walked ahead with two other guests to the bookshop and, by her own account, only glanced back and saw our group heading toward the exit. She never confirmed we actually made it out and never checked that each of us still had proof of admission. When I reached the exit checkpoint, staff asked for my ticket. I had none, because LivTours never gave me one. I was told it was illegal to be in that area without a valid ticket, pulled aside, and questioned. The police were called. I stood there while my wife and children watched and had to step in to try to help me. My wife eventually pulled up our purchase receipt on her phone, and that is the only reason I was allowed to leave. LivTours admitted in writing that the guide saw our group heading toward the exit and left without confirming we made it out. She did not secure our exit. She did not check that everyone in the group actually cleared the checkpoint before she walked off with two other guests to the bookshop. Making sure a group actually exits a controlled site, not just watching them walk in that general direction, is a basic responsibility of a tour guide, especially one holding the only ticket that gives that group the right to be there in the first place. As an African American man in a foreign country, being publicly stopped, questioned, and detained by police in front of my family was humiliating in a way that is hard to put into words. This was supposed to be a trip celebrating my children's accomplishments. Instead they watched their father get pulled aside like a criminal because a tour guide walked away without making sure we had what we needed to leave. A LivTours representative called me shortly after and told me directly that a refund would be issued. Weeks later, after I put the complaint in writing, LivTours reversed course completely. They now claim the tour was "completed as planned" and that the incident was outside their control. Their own emails contradict that. They admit their guide saw us walking toward the exit and left without confirming we got out safely. They admit they do not provide physical tickets to guests. Those two facts together are exactly why this happened, and it happened because of how LivTours operates, not because of anything my family did. I would not recommend LivTours for any tour requiring facility exit past a checkpoint. Ask directly whether you will receive an individual physical ticket before you book, and get it in writing. Reggie

Only rated a 3 because the of office staff. The guide was great. The man in the office argued our…read moretour time was 830. The voucher clearly said 8; arrive 15 minutes early. My husband and I were early, as was our guide. Still he would not let us leave until 830. The guide apologized for the office clerk. I do not appreciate LIARS. As there are many efficient tour companies in Rome, I would not recommend and will be advising our US tour company.

Easy to book. Everyone was so pleasant. Our tour guide ( sorry forgot his name) was Great, very…read moreknowledgeable!! I chose the Spanish guide for my parents, and it was great!!! Guide: Spanish speaking,