Is the Dubrovnik Pass Worth It? Personal Review & Cost Savings
Visiting Croatia and wondering if the Dubrovnik Pass is worth it? The short answer is yes, assuming you want to walk the famous Dubrovnik city walls. You’ll save money and hassle with a Dubrovnik Pass, especially if you get a multi-day pass that includes a transportation ticket.
But I don’t expect you to just take my word for it, so I’ll share which one I purchased and show you the math for the others. We’ll also look at the full list of included attractions and what I think is worth your time (and what I’d skip) based on my experiences in Dubrovnik.
The unsung hero of the Dubrovnik Pass is the included public transportation pass. You can save even more money on your Croatia vacation by staying a little further out from the Dubrovnik Old Town and using the bus pass to get back and forth for a couple of days.
Let’s look at what’s included and a cost breakdown for each pass, what to see and what to skip, and important tips and restrictions to know to make the Dubrovnik Pass worth it for you. Here we go!
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Quick Answer: Is the Dubrovnik Pass Worth It?
Yes. From a money-savings perspective, the Dubrovnik Pass is worth it if you intend to walk the famous city walls. Visit the incredible medieval walls and one other included museum and you’ve already got a cost savings on each pass. The 3 day pass is the one I used and recommend for optimal cost savings. We’ll discuss that more (with numbers) below, or you can buy your official pass here on their website.
From a sightseeing perspective, it’s also worth it because it showcases some of the less famous spots in Dubrovnik and provides discounts for others. Everyone comes for the walls and Game of Thrones filming locations (“Shame!”), but there are other interesting sights to see with much smaller crowds.
What’s Included in the Dubrovnik Pass?
The Dubrovnik Pass is a city sightseeing pass that gives you free entry to up to 13 attractions in Dubrovnik for one low price. It’s like a combo ticket.
One pass also covers accompanied children up to age 7 for free. Children ages 8+ need their own Dubrovnik Pass.
The current list of included attractions is on their website, but at the time of writing it includes the following:
- Free one-time entry to the following sites:
- Medieval city walls
- Lovrjenac Fortress
- Rector’s Palace
- Maritime Museum
- Ethnographic Museum
- Marin Držić House
- Dubrovnik Natural History Museum
- Franciscan Monastery Museum
- Museum of Modern Art Dubrovnik
- Dulčić – Masle – Pulitika Gallery
- Pulitika Studio
- Archaeological exhibitions
- House Bukovac (3 day and 7 day passes only)
- 24 hour / 72 hour / 168 hour bus ticket (for the 1 day / 3 day / 7 day pass)
- Note: good for city lines 1-9 only, doesn’t include the airport or suburban lines to Mlini or Cavtat
- Discounts on activities and services in the following categories:
- Adventures and Activities
- Dubrovnik at Night
- Culture and Heritage
- Day Trips
- Food and Drinks
- Services
- Shopping
Many of the discounts are a token 10% off for walking tours or boat excursions, but some discounts are up to 30% off or more and worth it for attractions or services you were going to visit anyway. Our favorite was visiting Lokrum Island, included in the Culture and Heritage section of the Dubrovnik Pass discounts.
What to see and what to skip:
The Dubrovnik city walls and Lovrjenac Fortress have amazing views and are both worth a visit for photographers because they offer different views. Pick one or the other if you don’t care about photos.
I enjoyed the history at the Rector’s Palace, the Maritime Museum, and the archaeological exhibitions.
The natural history museum was small and could probably be skipped.
For walking tours, we recommend Free Spirit Tours in Croatia. We’ve taken their free walking tours in 4 different cities around Croatia, and they’ve been fun and informative every time. Read our full review of Free Spirit Tours here, but also remember that free walking tours are really pay-what-you-can tours.
Cost Breakdown for each Dubrovnik Pass option
Not all sightseeing passes are worth the cost, or rather, not worth it for the average traveler who doesn’t necessarily want to see everything included in the pass, especially if it doesn’t include the most famous thing everyone came to see in the first place.
The Dubrovnik Pass is a rare example of a sightseeing pass that’s worth it for almost every visitor. You don’t have to visit a lot of places to break even on cost, and it includes the big attraction you came to Dubrovnik specifically to see: the medieval walls.
Don’t forget, though, that your pass gives you free entry only once, not once per day. If you buy a 3 day pass, you still only get free access to the walls one time over those 3 days.
Let’s look at each pass option and when it will save you money.
The 1 Day Dubrovnik Pass – Obvious Yes
This pass is worth the cost for 99.9% of visitors at 40 euros per person. Visit the walls (35 euros) and use the included 24 hour bus ticket (5.31 euros) and you’ve broken even (actually, saved 31 cents) versus paying for them individually without a pass. Any other attractions and discounts are savings on top.
With only one day in Dubrovnik, this is usually enough. You might sneak in another one or two of the small museums before or after a walking tour, but you won’t have time to do much more.
The 3 Day Dubrovnik Pass – My Favorite
At 50 euros per person, the 3 Day Dubrovnik Pass is the best value of the three options, in my opinion, even though it’s the only one of the three that doesn’t automatically break even from visiting the walls and using the bus ticket. Let me explain why.
The 72 hour bus ticket (12 euros) and visiting the walls (35 euros) is 3 euros shy of breaking even, which means visiting just one of the other attractions or using a discount will create a cost savings. With 3 days in Dubrovnik, you have time to see several more attractions, creating a much bigger cost savings than if you were only here for 1 day and could only see 1 or 2 more sites.
You could check out the walls, take a walking tour, see a cool piece of local history at the Rector’s Palace and the Maritime Museum, take a day trip to Lokrum Island, and take a boat cruise around the harbor. The museums would be free and the tour, day trip, and harbor cruise would be discounted with the Dubrovnik Pass.
The 7 Day Dubrovnik Pass – Worth It
Depending on your travel style and what you want to see, a week in Dubrovnik alone may be overkill. The Old Town is the big tourist draw, and it’s small. But if you’re using Dubrovnik as a home base to see other sites nearby and the rest of the city, then a 7 day pass is probably worth it for you.
The 7 Day Dubrovnik Pass costs 60 euros per person. Visiting the walls (35 euros) and a 168 hour bus ticket (37.17 euros) accounts for 72 euros, so you’re already saving 12 euros per person. All the additional sites and discounts used are the cherry on top. With 7 days in Dubrovnik, you could see all the included sites and use most of the discounts.
Where to Buy and How to Use the Dubrovnik Pass
Buy the pass. Go to an attraction. Show your QR code at the front desk. Get free entry. It’s that simple.
You can buy a pass online or in person from a number of hotels, attractions, or tourist information centers in and near the Old Town. I highly recommend buying online so you have a digital copy of your pass that you’ll never lose and so you can scan the pass and get your bus ticket to get to the Old Town to start sightseeing.
One adult pass also covers accompanied children up to age 7 for free. Children ages 8+ need their own Dubrovnik Pass.
Using the pass is simple, but you should take a minute to create a loose plan for which sites you want to see so you’re not crisscrossing the city every time you choose something new to visit. Dubrovnik’s Old Town is packed like a can of sardines for most of the year. It makes it difficult to get anywhere quickly despite its small size. Most of the narrow streets turn into single-file lines of humanity slowly shuffling forward.
You can visit each included attraction only once. This is especially crucial information to know before visiting the walls, which operates on a one-way circuit. Once you’re up there, there is no shade and few restrooms. Choose wisely if you’d rather be up there during the day or for sunset. Here’s our experience walking the walls during the day.
Useful Tips for Using your Pass Wisely
- Keep a digital copy of your pass on your phone. You can buy the pass online and use their app. If you instead purchase the pass in person, they’ll print a paper copy with your QR code. Take a very clear picture of your pass QR code immediately, and use that instead.
- The passes are hourly, not calendar days, meaning the 1 day pass is valid for 24 hours from the time you first activate it. If you activate it at noon on a Thursday, it’s good through noon on Friday. Same thing applies for the bus tickets.
- You can only visit each attraction once, so make sure you have enough time to see everything before you enter.
- Check for cruise ships. There are nearly always cruise ships in port, often more than one, but you can guess when the bus loads of passengers will show up in the old town if you know when the ship docks. Time your visit to the walls to get there before them.
- Visit the walls first thing in the morning when they open. You’ll miss the worst of the heat and the crowds. Bring an umbrella for shade.
About the Author: Rachel Means
With six-figure student loan debt and only 10 PTO days per year, Rachel started traveling the world. A decade later, she’s paid off her loans, changed careers, and been to 42 US states and 17 countries. She’s an expert at planning and budgeting for travel and loves to help others do it, too! Read her full story here.
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