Visit museums in St Petersburg for free
Take out your calendar! Although museums in Petersburg usually charges an entrance fee, this is not always the case. Many museums have free days when anyone can visit. So, to visit museums in St Petersburg for free, see the calendar below. This list includes the famous Hermitage, but also 9 other museums (!) so you will definitely find something for you that you have not seen yet.
February 9 – Fyodor Dostoyevsky Museum
February 10 – Pushkin Apartment Museum
April 18 – Pushkin Apartment Museum
May 18 – Hermitage, Russian Museum, Pushkin Apartment Museum, Fyodor Dostoyevsky Museum, Novy Museum
June 6 – Pushkin Apartment Museum
November 11 – Fyodor Dostoyevsky Museum
December 7 – Hermitage
Sometimes, free entry is based on a specific weekday:
Museum of the History of Religion – First Monday each month
Kunstkamera – Third Tuesday each month (September to April)
Zoological Museum – Third Tuesday each month
Naval Museum – Last Wednesday each month
Hermitage – First Thursday each month
Museum of Political History of Russia – Second Sunday of October
Enjoy the museums!
PS: since Petersburg is popular with tourists, there will be many visitors on these free days. To avoid crowds and have the best visitor experience, the best time to visit museums in St Petersburg for free is early in the day, when they have just opened, which varies between around 10.30 and 12.00. Russians (and most people!) don’t tend to go to museums in the morning, so take the opportunity! Also, summer is high season, so it is even better to visit these museums from September to May.
Is this free even for foreigners?
Unfortunately, no. But some of our students, whose level of Russian was high enough to pass as Russian, passed for free. And some took a Russian friend with them and thus avoided communicating with the ticket office staff.