Milan is one of the largest air hubs in Southern Europe: three of its airports annually serve nearly 40 million passengers. Therefore, it is not surprising that for many travelers, acquaintance with Italy begins precisely with Milan. BlogoItaliano already wrote about what to see in the city itself here. But, nevertheless, for most tourists coming to Italy, Milan is only an intermediate stop. Including on the way to Florence.
The most popular destinations for tourists starting a trip to Italy from Milan are Rome, Venice and Florence. Details on how to get to the first two cities, BlogoItaliano already wrote before:
- How to get from Milan to Venice and / or from Venice to Milan
- How to get from Milan to Rome and from Rome to Milan
However, trips are no less in demand. from Milan to Florence. Moreover, the city is very well located exactly on the road to Rome.
By the way, if this is your first time traveling to Italy, we recommend that you sign up for our free e-mail Course with many valuable tips and useful life hacks for this country.
From Milan to Florence by train
Even before the new express trains “ran” along the route Milan Florence, the train was rightly considered the best way to travel between cities. Now the situation has even improved: the new Frecciarossa high-speed trains reduced travel time to a minimum, almost leveling the attractiveness of other transport alternatives.
Frecciarossa - by the way, the fastest fast train in Italy - overcomes distance from Milan to Florence (as from Florence to Milan) in 1 hour and 40 minutes (2019). On the way from Milan, the train makes a stop in Bologna, and the next one is the Santa Maria Novella station in Florence.
Between 6 a.m. and 9 a.m. from Milan Milano Centrale train station in the direction of Florence, about 15 trains run. Therefore, if you arrive in Milan early in the morning and do not make grandiose plans, it is quite possible to plan the first night in Florence.
Frecciarossa - fastest fast train in Italy
Fast ticket pricetrain Milan-Florence starts at about 25 Euro (2019), and the most convenient site for checking schedules and purchases at the beginning of 2019 is the Omio.ru link. Its main advantage is that it displays the schedule of all the main railway operators in Italy, and not just the main one, and thus helps to find tickets cheaper.
Another cool feature of Omio is the opportunity to get a 10 Euro discount on Italian train tickets by simply registering in the service by a special invitation link. The discount is available for new users of the service for their first purchase worth more than 40 Euro. In more detail about how this works, we wrote in a separate article.
Old and new trains at Milano Centrale Station
Please note that the rule applies on Italian railways: the closer to departure, the more expensive the ticket costs. Prices reach a peak directly on the day of departure, so tickets are always best taken in advance.
In addition, the advance purchase of an online ticket allows you to be sure that it is already assigned to you (which is especially true during the holiday season), eliminates the need to lose time at the ticket office, and also communicate with local English-speaking staff that are not always English-speaking.
To get a better idea of how the purchase of tickets at the station looks like just before the train leaves, watch our video:
Buying an online ticket for the Milan-Florence route is an extremely simple procedure and rarely takes more than 15 minutes. You only need a bank card, and the ticket itself arrives at the specified e-mail in the form of a PDF file. It remains only to print and take with you to the station.
Please note that some online resources issue tickets for fast trains without a location. In this case, it is necessary at the station go to the box office and make an additional reservation. In most cases, this is a separate paid service.
Another nuance: if the place and time of departure are not indicated on the ticket, then it is necessary separately punch in a special composter before entering the platform. As a rule, this is true for Regionale class trains.
Regional train tickets are often issued without a seat.
For tickets for fast trainsmanufactured by Omio.ru, the wagon, the place and time of departure of the train are indicated, and therefore no additional manipulations at the station are needed. The main thing is to print a ticket and keep it with you. Control will be required, and a ticket will come in handy.
Finally, for your convenience when booking tickets, pay attention to the names of the stations in Milan and Florence, since there are several in each city, and not all are equally convenient:
- Milano Centrale is the main train station in Milan. Most flights to Florence depart from here.
- Santa Maria Novella - Florence's main station is within walking distance of all the main attractions.
| Check schedule and availability of tickets ››› |
From Milan to Florence by car
If you are going to explore the secluded corners of Tuscany, starting from its capital, the decision to rent a car can be very successful - this will allow you to see much more. However, in order to get from Milan to Florence, it can be called controversial. Milan is not very conducive to driving, as, in fact, is the historical center of Florence. Not to mention the headache associated with parking.
Auto helps diversify vacation memories
Nevertheless, many travelers prefer to get acquainted with Italy precisely by car, and therefore some features of the service can be helpful.
Car rental in Italy is cheaper than in most EU countries. However, often car rentals try to compensate for the “cheapness” with hidden payments, which are not obvious at first glance. This may be related to insurance, rental of additional equipment, etc.
In order not to overpay for a rented car, it is better to book a car as early as possible and with the help of a large specialized online resource for comparing car rental prices. On such sites, all conditions of various companies are reduced to a single view, which allows you to compare all conditions and select the optimal ones in a few clicks.
The engine for such a “search engine” was recently developed by the creators of the famous hotel search engine Booking.com. The new car rental service is called Rentalcars.com and allows you to compare prices at once at all the major car rentals presented in each city. For example, car rental prices in Milan start from 8-15 Euro per day:
Distance from Milan to Florence - about 305 kilometers. In the absence of incidents on the roads, it can be overcome in 3 and a half hours. The optimal route practically repeats the Frecciarossa train route - from Milan via Parma and Modena to Bologna, and then, turning south, to Florence.
In addition to, in fact, the cost of renting a car and the cost of gasoline, to the budget of the trip should also be added the fare for toll sections of motorways. For the Milan-Florence route at the beginning of 2019, it will be about 33 Euros.
| Check car availability and current prices ››› |
From Milan to Florence by bus
Another way to get from Milan to Florence is to use the bus. The route carries out more than 10 flights per day, and the travel time in the absence of transfers will be about 4 hours. Buses from Milan leave from several stations in the city, so you should be careful when booking.
Several bus companies operate from Milan to Florence
The main stations in Milan (and the surrounding area) are located at Malpensa Airport, as well as in the city itself - at San Donato and Sesto S.G. In Florence, buses arrive at the station at Piazzale Montelungo - not far from the main station of the city.
You can check the current schedule and check ticket prices on this page.
From Milan to Florence by plane
If you are not interested in Milan and want to fly to Florence immediately upon arrival, then with planes, too, is not so simple. There are 3 airports in Milan, and 1 small one in Florence, which is a 15-minute drive from the city. However, due to the short distance and many alternative ways to get there, there are no direct flights between them.
There is, of course, the opportunity to fly with transfers, but the options that the metasearch engine gives you are not very pleasant: from 4 hours on the road with the cost of the cheapest ticket - from 90 Euros.
It is possible that over time the situation will change. In any case, you can always repeat the search yourself. For these purposes, the Aviasales meta-search engine is ideally suited, which online monitors the ticket situation in more than 720 global airlines and allows you to immediately redeem the most successful offers.
Routes in Florence and Milan
As a rule, travelers spend 1 day in Florence and Milan and often miss many important sights. In each city there are too many of them to have time to cover all the most important for a short visit to an unfamiliar area. Even if the trip is preceded by a week of preparation.
During short trips, travelers often miss many important sites.
An ideal way to get to know the city is with a guide. There are reviews on BlogoItaliano, both about the Russian-speaking guide in Florence and about the guide in Milan. But if the guide goes beyond the budget, then at the end of 2017, we developed the author's one-day itineraries in Florence and Milan for 1 day.
This is a comprehensive solution that contains all the most important thing so that travelers take the maximum from each city.
Here is what you will find inside:
- A well-thought-out walking route, covering about 25 main attractions of each city. Both the most popular and little-known, but no less interesting
- A route map on Google maps and tags for maps.me so that you can transfer the map to your smartphone and use it without the Internet
- PDF version to print and take with you
- Recommendations on applications with free audio tours that fully replace the guide
- The main viewing platforms in each city so that you have cool photos
- Detailed mode of operation of all the main places in Florence and Milan
- How to get on free and budget excursions
- What to try with food and where to find these places for tips from local guides
See a detailed description of our itineraries in Florence, Milan and other Italian cities on this page.
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- La Scala: the most famous opera house in Milan
Photos by: Marco Stellini, Raworth, warrenharmon, blogoitaliano.com
