Sforza Castle with Kids: Free Entry, Mummies, Ramparts and the Rules for Each

The ticket rules for a family

A family of two adults and two children pays €20 for the museums. On the first Sunday of the month you pay nothing at all. Sforza Castle tickets can also be booked online, the free ones included: the castle calls those an ingresso omaggio. Tickets are not refundable, so book once your date is fixed. The full price list is on the visiting page.

Mummies first: the Egyptian gallery

The Galleria Antico Egitto has a renewed display. It holds mummies, sarcophagi and ushabti, the small funerary figures, plus finds from Achille Vogliano's digs in the Fayum in the 1930s. Look for the statue of the pharaoh Amenemhat III.

It is on the €10 ticket, so you pay nothing extra. The Corte Ducale lift reaches it, so your pushchair can come too. Two accessible toilets are at the end of the gallery. The castle's €5 audio guide does not cover this room, so tell the story yourself, or read up on the museums before you go.

The children's map

The castle prints a children's map of its museums. Ask for one when you collect your tickets and let your children pick the order. Eight museums is a lot for a seven-year-old; a map they hold themselves turns it into a hunt.

Up on the battlements, pushchair and all

The Merlate Panoramiche is an unguided walk along a stretch of the ramparts, rebuilt by Luca Beltrami from 1893. Groups of up to 25 go up every 20 minutes with a warden, Tuesday to Sunday, last entry 5pm. It is step-free by lift, and pushchairs are welcome.

The ticket is €10, with reduced and free rates, and it does not include the museums. If you want both, you are buying two tickets. Check the rate for each child on the FAQs before you queue.

Age limits on the secret routes

Ad Artem, the castle's concessionaire, runs all four and sells them on its own booking page. The guided battlement tour runs in any weather, because the walk is fully covered. The underground route follows the covered way of the Ghirlanda, a brick passage with a 2.80-metre vault and loopholes onto the old moat.

For a child under 8, pick one of the puzzle routes, since neither sets a minimum age. They run under the name Castello SottoSopra until 31 December 2026, and the events calendar has the details.

Stories that work on children

• The tower that blew up. The clock tower was a gunpowder store and exploded in June 1521. The one you walk under is from 1905.
• The horse on the stairs. Galeazzo Maria Sforza rode his horse up a staircase of low steps in the Corte Ducale.
• The elephant. The Portico of the Elephant, from 1473, is named for the animal in its fresco.
• The prison cell. The Torre di Bona had a cell with a spyhole door, and you can see it from the stairs.
• The armour and the instruments. The Armoury is room XIV of the Museo d'Arte Antica, and the music museum holds about 900 instruments.

The first two are in the Filarete Tower and the Corte Ducale, both free. Start there, while energy is high. Then take the ticket inside for the mummies.

Coming as a big family or a group?

If you are ten or more, you qualify for a group rate: 20% off for groups of 10 to 25. The catch is timing. Groups must buy in advance online, and groups also have to book an entry time for the Egyptian gallery. If your group has a guide, radioguides at €1.50 each are compulsory once you pass ten people. Book those details before you travel and your day runs as planned.

Coming on a Monday? The museums are shut, but the courtyards and the park are not. Make Monday your outdoor day, with the towers, the elephant and the park, and save the mummies for Tuesday.

Bags, pushchairs and lifts

Travel light. The Pietà Rondanini museum has lockers in its atrium, and the Rocchetta lift carries you to the music and decorative arts museums. The Corte Ducale lift reaches the picture gallery, the furniture museum and the Egyptian gallery. One room, room 20 of the Pinacoteca, is reached only by six steps. If someone in your party needs one, two wheelchairs can be borrowed at the Museo d'Arte Antica desk against an ID document. The accessibility guide measures every ramp.

When they have had enough: the park

Parco Sempione opens behind the castle, 47 hectares of English landscape garden and free to enter. Inside it you find the Acquario Civico of 1906, Gio Ponti's Torre Branca at 108.60 metres, and the Ponte delle Sirenette, Italy's first iron bridge, from 1842. The castle map shows the way out the back.

Would a tour help?

With young children, a fixed-time group tour is a gamble. Two options fit a family better. A private walk from Piazza Castello, from $97, runs two hours, or three with two scoops of gelato each on the full option. It is your group only, it takes pushchairs and wheelchairs, and it spends 20 minutes at the castle without museum tickets, so add the free children's tickets yourself.

The other is the reserved ticket with an app guide, from $23. The commentary plays on your own phone, so your children can listen or not. Bring headphones, because they are not included.

A family plan that works

Collect the free tickets, head for the mummies, then take the lift up to the battlements before 5pm. Finish in the park with an ice cream. Fares that fit round a family morning are on Sforza Castle Tours.

Fares that suit a family

Milan: Private Walking Tour with Duomo, Castle and Gelato

A private walk from Piazza Castello, two hours or three with gelato.

From $97 per person

Check Availability

Milan: Sforza Castle Entry Ticket with Digital Audio Guide

Reserved museum entry and an app commentary in six languages.

From $23 per person

Check Availability