6 cities · 19 museums · 2 free
The best museums in France are the Louvre, Musée d'Orsay and Musée du Quai Branly – Jacques Chirac. World Museum Guide covers 19 museums in France across 6 cities, with admission prices, opening hours and highlights for each. 2 have free standard admission.
Visitor information last reviewed 30 June 2026. Check the official museum site for current details.
| # | Museum | City | Admission | Time needed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Louvre | Paris | €22 for EEA visitors | 3–5 hours |
| 2 | Musée d'Orsay | Paris | €16 online | 2–4 hours |
| 3 | Musée du Quai Branly – Jacques Chirac | Paris | €14 | 3–4 hours |
| 4 | Musée Picasso Paris | Paris | €14 | 2–3 hours |
| 5 | Musée Rodin | Paris | €14 | 2–3 hours |
| 6 | Bourse de Commerce – Pinault Collection | Paris | €15 | 1.5–2 hours |
| 7 | Fondation Louis Vuitton | Paris | €16 | 2–3 hours |
| 8 | MUCEM — Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilisations | Marseille | €11 | 3–4 hours |
| 9 | Musée Carnavalet | Paris | Free | 3–4 hours |
| 10 | Musée de Cluny – Musée National du Moyen Âge | Paris | €12 | 2–3 hours |
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for art lovers & history enthusiasts
The Louvre is the world's largest art museum and a historic monument in Paris, France. A central landmark of the city, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the city's 1st arrondissement.
€22 for EEA visitors · ⏱ 3–5 hours · Closed Tuesdays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for art lovers & first-timers
The Musée d'Orsay is a museum in Paris, France, on the Left Bank of the Seine. It is housed in the former Gare d'Orsay, a Beaux-Arts railway station built between 1898 and 1900.
€16 online · ⏱ 2–4 hours · Closed Mondays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for world culture enthusiasts & art lovers
Opened in 2006 at the initiative of President Jacques Chirac, the Quai Branly brought together the ethnographic collections of the former Musée de l'Homme and Musée des Arts d'Afrique et d'Océanie.
€14 · ⏱ 3–4 hours · Closed Mondays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for modern art lovers & picasso enthusiasts
After Picasso's death in 1973 his heirs paid France's inheritance taxes with works from his personal collection. That extraordinary trove formed the foundation of the Musée Picasso, which opened in the restored Hôtel Salé in 1985.
€14 · ⏱ 2–3 hours · Closed Mondays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for sculpture lovers & garden enthusiasts
Rodin gifted his entire collection to the French state in 1916 on the condition that it be displayed in the Hôtel Biron, the eighteenth-century mansion where he had been working. The museum opened in 1919 and remains one of Paris's most beloved small institutions.
€14 · ⏱ 2–3 hours · Closed Mondays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for art lovers & contemporary art
Opened in 2021, the Bourse de Commerce is the Paris home of the Pinault Collection. Tadao Ando inserted a 29-metre concrete cylinder inside the historic glass-domed rotunda, creating a striking dialogue between the old and new.
€15 · ⏱ 1.5–2 hours · Closed Tuesdays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for art lovers & first-timers
The Fondation Louis Vuitton opened in 2014 in a building designed by Frank Gehry — 12 immense 'sails' of curved glass suspended over a white structure, creating an effect that Gehry described as a cloud of glass. The building sits at the edge of the Bois de Boulogne and is widely considered one of the most beautiful contemporary buildings in France.
€16 · ⏱ 2–3 hours · Closed Tuesdays
Marseille, France
Art Museum · Best for history enthusiasts & architecture enthusiasts
Designed by Rudy Ricciotti, MUCEM opened in 2013 in a cube wrapped with a delicate concrete lattice that filters Mediterranean light. A footbridge links it to the seventeenth-century Fort Saint-Jean.
€11 · ⏱ 3–4 hours · Closed Tuesdays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for history enthusiasts & paris lovers
Founded by Baron Haussmann in 1880, the Musée Carnavalet occupies the Renaissance Hôtel Carnavalet and the seventeenth-century Hôtel Le Peletier de Saint-Fargeau. It reopened in 2021 after a major refurbishment.
Free entry · ⏱ 3–4 hours · Closed Mondays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for medieval art lovers & history enthusiasts
The Musée de Cluny opened in 1843 in the late-medieval Hôtel de Cluny, built atop the Gallo-Roman Thermes de Cluny. A major refurbishment completed in 2022 added a contemporary entrance pavilion.
€12 · ⏱ 2–3 hours · Closed Mondays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for impressionist art fans & art lovers
The Orangerie was built in 1852 to shelter the Tuileries Garden's orange trees. In 1927 Claude Monet's Nymphéas — eight vast canvases of water lilies — were installed in two specially designed oval rooms, an environment Monet called 'the illusion of an endless whole'.
€12.50 · ⏱ 1–1.5 hours · Closed Tuesdays
Toulouse, France
Art Museum · Best for medieval art lovers & romanesque sculpture fans
Established in 1795 in the cloisters of a former Augustinian monastery, the museum is one of the oldest in France. The medieval architecture frames a remarkable collection of Romanesque sculpture from the great cloisters of Toulouse.
€5 · ⏱ 2 hours · Closed Tuesdays
Lyon, France
Art Museum · Best for art lovers & french art fans
Founded under Napoleon in 1801, the Musée des Beaux-Arts occupies the seventeenth-century Palais Saint-Pierre. Its galleries trace European art from antiquity to the twentieth century across more than seventy rooms.
€8 · ⏱ 3–4 hours · Closed Tuesdays
Paris, France
World Heritage & Culture · Best for art lovers & history enthusiasts
The Musée Guimet holds the finest collection of Asian art in Europe — 45,000 objects spanning India, China, Japan, Korea, Southeast Asia, Central Asia, and the Himalayan region. Founded in 1889 by industrialist Émile Guimet, the museum moved to its present neoclassical building on Place d'Iéna in 1945 when France's Asian collections were consolidated under one roof.
€14 · ⏱ 2 hours · Closed Tuesdays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for impressionist art fans & monet enthusiasts
Originally the home of art historian Paul Marmottan, the museum opened in 1934. Monet's son Michel bequeathed his father's personal studio collection in 1966, transforming the institution into the principal Monet museum.
€14 · ⏱ 1.5–2 hours · Closed Mondays
Versailles, France
Art Museum · Best for history enthusiasts & garden enthusiasts
The Palace of Versailles was the seat of French royal power from 1682 until the Revolution of 1789. Louis XIV, the Sun King, transformed a hunting lodge into the largest palace in Europe to project the absolute authority of the French monarchy — a statement of power that inspired royal courts across the continent for a century.
€21 full-day passport · ⏱ 4–6 hours · Closed Mondays
Lille, France
Art Museum · Best for art lovers & history enthusiasts
Created by Napoleon's 1801 decree to bring great art to the regions, the Palais des Beaux-Arts opened in Lille in 1809. Its current Belle Époque building dates from 1892 and underwent a major renovation in the 1990s.
€7 · ⏱ 2–3 hours · Closed Tuesdays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for art lovers & first-timers
The Petit Palais — the 'small palace' — was built for the 1900 Universal Exposition in Paris, facing its grander neighbour the Grand Palais across Winston Churchill Avenue. Designed by Charles Girault, the building is a Belle Époque masterpiece of iron, stone, and mosaic, built around a semicircular courtyard garden that remains one of Paris's hidden oases.
Free entry · ⏱ 90 minutes · Closed Mondays
Paris, France
Art Museum · Best for art lovers & first-timers
Designed by Renzo Piano, Richard Rogers, and Gianfranco Franchini, the Centre Pompidou turned the museum building inside out — exposing pipes, ducts, and escalators on its colourful facade. It opened in 1977 and remains one of the most influential pieces of late twentieth-century architecture.
Closed for renovation
The best museums in France are the Louvre, Musée d'Orsay, Musée du Quai Branly – Jacques Chirac, Musée Picasso Paris and Musée Rodin, ranked by visitor numbers and collection strength.
World Museum Guide covers 19 museums in France across 6 cities — 2 with free standard admission.
2 of 19 museums in our France guide have free standard admission: Musée Carnavalet and Petit Palais. Special exhibitions can still be ticketed.
