Palacio Real Madrid - How long does it take to visit?
 

Hello, just trying to plan some sightseeing in Madrid and I was wondering if the Royal Palace is worth visting and if so how long should we allocate to see it? Thank you...

I highly recommend the Royal Palace - went there last May and it was my second-favorite thing in Madrid, after the Prado. How long you should allocate might depend on your interests/who is in your group. We were a group of 30-somethings, and spent about 3 hours - we bought the audio guides which we thought were great. Very good descriptions, bits of history, and allowed us to go at our own pace (there were several school groups we kept bumping into but we could either let them pass or speed ahead, then listen to the audio guide). I would say we fully saw the interior rooms, and much of the Royal Armory, and then kind of sped through the Pharmacy. I think if we had kids with us we would have put the Armory first on the list of things to see.

I BELIEVE the guided tour in English is 90 minutes or so because the last time I waited for my nephew in the café.. I don't think it was longer than that.

Palacio Real is definitely one of the major Madrid highlights and we enjoyed it a lot. On average, it should be about 2-3 hours if you stop-read(hear)-go. Whatever you do, make sure you don't spend a lot of times in the overpriced shops you pass through to get in and out of main entrance.

I am not a "palace person"', but PR was worth seeing. We were very impressed by the Armory.
a couple of hours IMO

About 90-120 minutes. You can only visit a small portion of the Palace.

And walk by the area at night when the Palace is lit up.

We spent a little over 2 hours and felt we had seen everyting we wanted.

GG716, I too really enjoyed the Palacio Real. We visited on a lovely day in May and had time to linger on the large outdoor terraces. What impressed me the most were the gorgeous drapes, upholstery, and wallpaper (tapestries?)


In my view the palace in Madrid is in better condition than several others I have seen in Europe.