Madrid closes on Mondays. The Reina Sofía shuts on Tuesdays, the city museums and the Goya hermitage on Mondays, and the two royal convents on Mondays as well. The Royal Collections Gallery shuts on no day at all.
The Galería de las Colecciones Reales is the Patrimonio Nacional museum beside the Royal Palace of Madrid that opens all seven days, at €14, and is the only Patrimonio building in the city visited without a guide. It opens 10:00 to 20:00 Monday to Saturday and 10:00 to 19:00 on Sundays, the concession is €7, and the building is cleared 15 minutes before closing.
Is the Royal Collections Gallery open every day and what does it cost? The Royal Collections Gallery opens Monday to Saturday, 10:00 to 20:00 and Sundays and holidays, 10:00 to 19:00, with no weekly closure. The full ticket is €14 and the concession €7. The building is cleared 15 minutes before closing, and the average visit runs two hours.
No weekly closing day, which almost nothing here manages
The weekly calendar is the first thing to check, because it decides what a Monday in Madrid can contain at all.
| Museum | Weekly closure |
|---|---|
| Royal Collections Gallery | None |
| Royal Palace of Madrid | None |
| Prado Museum | None |
| Reina Sofía | Tuesdays |
| City-run museums | Mondays |
Underneath the published hours sits a detail that the organisation states and few listings carry: the building is cleared 15 minutes before closing time. A Thursday visit therefore ends at 19:45, not at 20:00, and a Sunday one at 18:45 rather than 19:00.
That single clause is worth more than it looks on a tight itinerary, because it moves the useful end of every day back by a quarter of an hour without appearing anywhere in the headline timetable.
Four dates close it completely, 1 and 6 January, 1 May and 25 December, and two close it in part: on 24 and 31 December it shuts from 15:00, with the box office closing at 14:00.
Fourteen euros, or twenty-four with the Palace
The full fare is, according to Patrimonio Nacional, €14, with a €7 concession for ages 5 to 16 — identity document or passport required from 14 — over-65s and students up to 25 with a current national or international student card.
The combined ticket is the calculation that decides the purchase. Together the Royal Palace and the Gallery cost €24 full and €12 reduced, while separately they are €18 and €14, adding up to €32. The saving is €8, or 25 %.
One practical trap sits inside that: the combined ticket is sold on the Royal Palace website, not on the Gallery’s, so looking for it on the wrong page finds nothing. The Palace’s own free-entry conditions, which differ from the Gallery’s, are in who gets into the Royal Palace free.
Tourist groups pay €10 with a €7 concession, and must number between 9 and 30 people. A guiding system is compulsory for every group except children under 8. The visit also accepts the Bono Cultural Joven, the Ministry of Culture’s youth voucher.
Those group figures matter for anyone travelling as an informal party: a group of eight cannot be one, because the floor is nine, and a party of thirty-one has to split. Below that floor everyone pays the individual €14, which is where the combined €24 ticket starts to look different again.
The free window is the Prado’s free window
The clash is exact. The Prado Museum opens free 18:00 to 20:00, Monday to Saturday, as set out in the Prado’s free evening hours, and the Gallery’s window is 18:00 to 20:00, Monday to Thursday. Same hour, same days, fifteen minutes apart on foot.
From Monday to Thursday that produces three overlapping free options in the centre: the Prado and the Gallery at 18:00, and the Reina Sofía from 19:00 to 21:00, which also closes on Tuesdays. The full picture is in Madrid’s free museums, and the arithmetic of how many days it takes to cover them all is in how many days for the free museums.
Choosing one means giving up the others that evening, and of the three the Gallery fits worst into two hours. The Prado survives a partial visit because its collection is walked room by room; the Reina Sofía starts an hour later, at 19:00, when the Gallery’s window has already been running for sixty minutes.
Two hours of museum inside a two-hour window
Free entry runs Monday to Thursday, 18:00 to 20:00, for EU citizens, residents or work-permit holders in that area and Ibero-American nationals, on proof of nationality. It is sold at the box office only.
It carries three conditions that no other free window in Madrid combines, and the Gallery publishes all three:
- It applies only to unaccompanied visits, so a paid guided tour cannot be taken free.
- Guided groups are not admitted at all between 18:00 and 20:00.
- The tickets exist only at the box office, with no online allocation to fall back on.
The arithmetic settles it. Patrimonio Nacional puts the visit at two hours, the window lasts two hours, and the clearance starts 15 minutes before closing, leaving one hour and forty-five minutes inside.
Two doors, and neither is the Palace door
Visitors enter from the Almudena esplanade gate, at the corner of Calle de Bailén, and groups from the Calle de Bailén gate opposite Calle de Requena. Neither is the Royal Palace entrance, although the two buildings adjoin, so a combined ticket still means walking to a second door.
The address is Plaza de Oriente, on the same esplanade as the Palace and the Almudena Cathedral.
The Royal Palace also sells a second combined ticket at the same €24, pairing itself with its own kitchens instead of with the Gallery, covered in the Royal Kitchen tour.
The Gallery is also the only Patrimonio Nacional building in Madrid walked without a guide. El Pardo, the Descalzas Reales and La Encarnación all require a booked guided session, covered in tickets for the Palacio Real de El Pardo.
Frequently asked questions about the Royal Collections Gallery
Is the Royal Collections Gallery open on Mondays?
Yes, and on every other day. It opens Monday to Saturday from 10:00 to 20:00 and Sundays and public holidays from 10:00 to 19:00, with no weekly closing day at all, which is unusual in Madrid.
How much is the Royal Collections Gallery in Madrid?
The full ticket is €14 and the concession €7, covering ages 5 to 16, over-65s and students up to 25 with a current card. A combined ticket with the Royal Palace costs €24.
Is the combined Royal Palace and Gallery ticket worth it?
It costs €24 against €18 and €14 bought separately, which add up to €32. That is €8 saved, and the combined concession is €12. It is sold on the Royal Palace website, not the Gallery’s.
When is the Royal Collections Gallery free?
Monday to Thursday from 18:00 to 20:00, for EU citizens, residents and Ibero-American nationals on proof of nationality. It covers unaccompanied visits only, and the tickets are sold at the box office.
Do you need to book the Royal Collections Gallery in advance?
Not for the free window, which is sold at the box office only and cannot be booked online at all. Paid tickets are sold online, and the combined Palace ticket only through the Royal Palace page.
How long does the Royal Collections Gallery take to see?
About two hours, which is the average visiting time Patrimonio Nacional publishes. The building is cleared 15 minutes before closing, so the last realistic entry on a 20:00 day is well before 19:45.
Open seven days, €14, a two-hour route and a free window that does not cover it.