Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam is one of the top Dutch art museums in the Netherlands and is well popular for the vast number of visitors it welcomes each year. The provision of booking online tickets is available but it is always best to arrive early in the morning or late in the afternoon to avoid the crowds. “The Night Watch” is the most famous painting. There are also other age masterpieces which include four by Vermeer, which are the most popular artworks of the Rijksmuseum. Most of the other galleries of the museum are quieter. Therefore, planning a visit around the period that The Gallery of Honor might be less busy can help you.
Even though the major attraction of the museum is the Dutch art from the 17th century, the works that are displayed in the museum range from the 1100s to the present. The second floor of the museum is completely occupied with art from the seventeenth century.
Tips on Enjoying the Art at the Museum
The number of visitors who are allowed to enter the museum is restricted. If you find queues waiting in four directions from the entrances to the ways out of arcades, a better plan might be to go for a coffee, shopping, or to other sites and return later.
Consider the option of booking a guided tour if you have plans to visit the museum during the peak time since a guided tour always allows priority access. Priority access allows the visitors to skip the long queues outside the entrance, but there will always be crowds inside the museum.
Tips on Avoiding Crowds at the Museum
There is not too much crowd at the Rijksmuseum between 11 am and 3 pm. The best plan is to avoid the day time by arriving at the museum early in the morning or late in the afternoon. The museum opens at 9 am, and at 3 pm. The last admission is at 4:30 pm.
Going straight to the second floor of the museum where the famous “The Night Watch” is showcased can be a good option. Going to see the Golden Age Paintings and the four Vermeers after that can help you to save your time. Start any planned tours itinerary only after seeing these famous works, even if it requires you to go back to the entrance.
The Night Watch has two security guards of its own to protect the painting, and they do not move the visitors. There are two similarly themed paintings on the sidewalls – the one by Bartholomeus van der Helst and Frans Hals – which can be enjoyed while the visitors bang into seeing the Rembrandt.
Buying Tickets for the Rijksmuseum
The arcaded gallery serves as the entrance for the Rijksmuseum, and this allows the cyclists and the pedestrians to move through the museum. The arcaded gallery was created as a historicist palatial town gate. You can see long queues waiting at this place to enter the museum with or without tickets. Keep in mind that only a guided tour that is booked prior will get priority admission to the museum.
The entry tickets cost €19 for adults whereas the entry is free for children. The tickets to the museum can be bought online, from the museum itself of from travel businesses and top hotels, where the price of the tickets would be the same. Tickets that are purchased in advance and are bought online are valid for one year, and it does not allow priority admission on any particular day. Even though the entry for children to the museum if free, they need a printout e-ticket that has a barcode.
Visitors having Dutch Museum Cards or e-tickets could proceed to see the collections after getting inside the museum, and you would not need to get separate tickets for this from the ticket desk. You can expect another queue after this if you need to use the free cloakroom.
Guided Tours to Skip the Lines in the Museum
The one and the only way to get immediate entry to the museum is by booking a guided tour to the museum. Make sure not to book the multimedia tours that are been sold on the standard page of the ticket. This can add an extra 5 Euros to the total price of the ticket, but this will be worthy of the priority access and wealth of knowledge it earns you during the Rijksmuseum tour. The inside of the museum is still going to be crowded even if you book a guided tour to skip the crowd outside, but it helps you to save the time you should be standing in the wind and weather to collect an entry ticket.