Hungarian State Opera House

The Hungarian State Opera House is one of the great nineteenth-century theatres of Europe, and the jewel of Andrássy Avenue. It was designed by Miklós Ybl, the leading Hungarian architect of his age, and built between 1875 and 1884, in a period when Budapest was rapidly becoming one of the capitals of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and wanted buildings to match. From the outside, it is restrained and elegant, a neo-Renaissance facade with loggias and statues of composers, but inside it is all gilt, marble and painted ceilings. The grand staircase rises in a sweep of marble to the foyers, and the horseshoe-shaped auditorium, with tiers of boxes in red and gold, is crowned by a ceiling fresco by Károly Lotz, one of the painters who decorated the building alongside Bertalan Székely and Mór Than. The acoustics are famous. Gustav Mahler was its director from 1888 to 1891, and the house has been the centre of Hungarian opera and ballet ever since. After almost five years of restoration, the building reopened on 12 March 2022, with its decoration cleaned, its stage machinery modernised and its original splendour restored. The Opera and the Hungarian National Ballet stage a busy season across the main house and the larger Erkel Theatre, with a quiet period in late summer. There are two ways to see the building. The daily English-language guided tour lasts an hour and ends with a short performance by young soloists of the Opera on the staircase landing; in 2026 it costs 12,000 HUF. Or you can buy a ticket for a performance, where prices range from tens of thousands of forints for the best stalls to a few thousand for restricted-view seats and standing places, which is often less than the tour.

Tour or performance? If you are in Budapest on a night when there is a performance you would enjoy, book it: there is no better way to experience the building than with the lights down and the orchestra playing, and the cheapest seats and standing places give you that for less than the price of the tour. The tour, on the other hand, takes you into areas you would not see as a spectator, explains the architecture and history, and includes a short live performance at the end, so it suits visitors who are in town on a dark night or who do not want to commit to a full evening. English tours run several times a day, usually in the afternoon; tours in other languages can be arranged on request. Tours do not run during performances, and the auditorium may be closed during rehearsals.

Working the visit: buy tickets on the official Opera website or at the box office on Andrássy Avenue, which accepts forints only; be wary of unofficial resellers. There is no formal dress code, but many Budapest operagoers dress up, and smart clothes make the evening feel special. Coats and bags go to the free cloakroom. The Christmas season brings The Nutcracker, which sells out early; book well ahead for December. For the cheaper seats, read the seat descriptions carefully, as some have very limited views of the stage.

Make it an evening. The Opera stands on Andrássy Avenue, a few minutes from the Basilica and Deák Ferenc tér, with its own stop on the M1 Millennium Underground. Nagymező utca, Budapest's theatre street, is just across the avenue, with bars and restaurants for a drink before or dinner after. By day, the tour pairs well with a walk up Andrássy Avenue to the House of Terror and Heroes' Square.