Pompeii to cap daily tourist numbers at 20,000

The Roman archaeological site of Pompeii will limit the number of daily visitors to the site to 20,000 a day after a steep rise in visitors.

A record high 36,000 tourists visited the site on the first Sunday of October, when entry was free, local media reported.

The park’s management said on Friday that the site would cap its daily visitor number from 15 November.

Pompeii, the ancient city buried in an eruption from nearby Mount Vesuvius in AD79, is one of the best-preserved Roman sites anywhere in the world.

Nearly four million people visited the main Pompeii site in 2023, a third more than the previous year. Visitor counts had been climbing in the run up to the pandemic and in 2023 were above pre-Covid levels.

In October 2024, there were more than 480,000 visitors, putting the average at about 15,500 a day. The busiest month so far this year was May, when about 517,000 people visited, or some 16,700 a day.

The 20,000 cap is likely to only lead to tourists being turned away on a handful of occasions. A spokesperson for the park told Reuters that it had only exceeded 20,000 visitors when entry is free on the first Sunday of the month, as well as three or four fee-paying days.

Gabriel Zuchtriegel, the park's director, said that reducing the effects of human visitors at Pompeii was important for conservation and safety reasons.

The city was devastated by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, which preserved swathes of it almost intact under a layer of ash for over 1,000 years.

About a third of the site has yet to be excavated. It continues to be of huge interest to archaeologists, providing the most complete picture of daily Roman life anywhere in the world.

Earlier this year, archaeologists revealed frescos of mythical Greek figures including Helen of Troy and Apollo. The artworks were found in a banqueting hall with dramatic black walls and a mosaic floor made of more than 1 million white tiles.

Entry tickets to Pompeii start at €18 (£14.90; $19.30).