Upper Belvedere Skip-the-Line Guided Tour Vienna

The Upper Belvedere palace

The Belvedere was built in the early eighteenth century as the summer residence of Prince Eugene of Savoy, the military commander who became one of the richest men in Europe. The Upper Belvedere, completed in 1723 on the hill above the gardens, was designed as a palace for receptions and festivities, and its long facade with green copper roofs and its reflecting pool make it one of the most beautiful baroque buildings in the world.

Together with the historic centre of Vienna, the palace is part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. On this Belvedere Palace tour your guide explains how the building was conceived to impress foreign visitors, from the sculpted atlantes in the Sala Terrena to the grand staircase. The Upper Belvedere is open daily; the tour starts at 14:45, while the private option offers start times from 10:00 to 16:00.

The Marble Hall

At the centre of the palace lies the Marble Hall, two storeys high, with red marble pilasters, gilded stucco and a ceiling fresco celebrating the glory of Prince Eugene. Its tall windows look out over the gardens toward the spire of St Stephen's Cathedral and the city skyline.

This hall also has a central place in modern Austrian history: on 15 May 1955 the Austrian State Treaty was signed here, restoring the country's full independence after the Second World War, and the foreign ministers presented it to the crowd from the balcony. Your guide tells this story in the very room where it happened, one of the most memorable moments of the tour.

Klimt's The Kiss and Vienna around 1900

The star of the Upper Belvedere is The Kiss, painted by Gustav Klimt in 1908 at the height of his "golden period", with real gold leaf on canvas. The Belvedere holds the largest collection of Klimt paintings in the world, including Judith and portraits of Viennese society women, and your guide reveals the ancient stories and symbols hidden in the patterns.

Nearby hang the intense, expressive works of Egon Schiele and Oskar Kokoschka, who pushed Viennese art in new directions in the years before the First World War. Seeing Klimt's The Kiss at the Belvedere is the main reason many visitors come, and arriving with a guide and a timed ticket means you reach the room calmly instead of queuing at the counter.

From the Middle Ages to the modern era

The permanent collection of the Upper Belvedere spans eight centuries of art, from Gothic altarpieces and baroque masterpieces to French Impressionism and the art of the twentieth century. Among the international works you can see paintings by Vincent van Gogh and other European masters, alongside the expressive character heads of the eighteenth-century sculptor known for his studies of human faces.

Exhibitions in the Upper Palace change regularly, so the exact route may vary, but your guide always focuses on the highlights. Temporary exhibitions, the Lower Belvedere and Belvedere 21 are not part of this tour. If you want to continue after the tour, you can stay in the museum on your own and explore at your own pace.

The Belvedere Palace Gardens

Between the Upper and Lower Belvedere stretches one of the finest baroque gardens in Europe, laid out on terraces with fountains, cascades, clipped hedges and stone sculptures of sphinxes and mythological figures. From the upper terrace you enjoy a classic view of Vienna, with the gardens descending toward the city centre.

The tour ends with a 30-minute guided walk and photo stop in the gardens, which are free to enter. The best time to visit the Belvedere gardens is from spring to autumn, when the lawns and flower beds are green and full of colour; in winter they are bare and not lit after dark. In extreme weather the outdoor part may be shortened, but the indoor tour always takes place.