Venice Marco Polo Airport to Padua
About 50 km west; the direct ATVO/Busitalia coach runs around €10–12, and the train via Mestre is a little cheaper again.
A university city older than most nations, with Giotto's frescoes in the Scrovegni Chapel, the first botanical garden in Europe still on its original site, and arcaded streets that keep the sun off.
Every way to get there
Our verdict: for Padua, a private transfer is the easiest door-to-door option (from €35). Travelling light on a budget? The bus is cheapest (from €10) but slower, with a change in the city.
What it costs for your group
The bus is charged per person, while a taxi or private transfer is one price for the whole car — so the more of you there are, the better door-to-door value looks.
| Group | Bus (per person) | Private transfer | Best value |
|---|---|---|---|
| Solo · 1 traveller | €10 | €35 | Bus |
| Couple · 2 travellers | €20 | €35 | Bus |
| Family of 4 · 4 travellers | €40 | €35 | Private transfer |
Which option should you choose?
| If your priority is… | Our pick | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Lowest price | Bus | From €10, though slower with a change in the city. |
| Speed & comfort | Private transfer | Door-to-door, fixed price, a driver waiting for you. |
| A group of 3–4 | Transfer or taxi | One flat fare splits cheaper than several bus tickets. |
| A late-night arrival | Transfer or taxi | Both run 24/7 when buses and the tram have stopped. |
By transport mode
Bus / shuttle
Around an hour on the motorway. The simplest option, and it lands you where the trams and city buses start.
Where to catch it: Direct coach from the airport to Padua's bus station beside the railway station, no change needed.
Best for solo & budget travellersTrain
More frequent than the coach and useful late in the day when coach departures stop. Trains to Padua run until close to midnight.
Where to catch it: Airport bus to Venezia Mestre, then any westbound regional or intercity train — Padua is the first major stop.
Best for budget travellers near a stationTaxi
Padua's centre is heavily pedestrianised with a ZTL; drivers know the permitted drop-off points, which are not always the nearest street to your hotel.
Where to catch it: Fifty-five minutes on the A4. Expensive for one, defensible for a family arriving late.
Best for small groups in a hurryCar rental
Worth it for the Euganean Hills and the spa towns at Abano and Montegrotto just south, which is why many visitors hire here rather than in Venice.
Where to catch it: Straight down the motorway with garages on the ring road; do not attempt to park inside the walls.
Best for travellers who want to explorePadua & Venice in photos
Buying tickets in Venice
Venice is the one airport here where you choose between road and water, and the two have entirely separate ticketing. By road, ATVO's express and ACTV's line 5 both run to Piazzale Roma in 20–25 minutes for about €12 single, €20 return — buy the return on arrival if you are flying home from the same airport. Piazzale Roma is where all wheeled transport in Venice stops for good; a vaporetto ticket beyond it is bought separately and is not cheap. By water, Alilaguna waterbuses leave from a dock about seven minutes' walk from arrivals at roughly €18, serving San Marco, Rialto, Fondamente Nove, Murano and the Lido — approximately hourly per line, between about 08:00 and 20:00, so check the last departure before counting on it. Large luggage can attract a small extra charge. For Mestre on the mainland, a separate bus runs for around €8, and trains from there into the island take ten minutes for about €1.50.
Taxi scams & safety in Venice
The real trap in Venice is not a dishonest fare, it is the bridges. There are around four hundred of them, most stepped, with no lifts or escalators anywhere in the historic centre — so a hotel three hundred metres from a vaporetto stop can mean two bridges with heavy cases. Ask your hotel which stop it uses and how many bridges lie between before you book any transport. Private water taxis are the only vehicles that can reach a hotel's own water entrance, at €190–280 and up; agree the price and the exact drop-off point before boarding, since night and luggage supplements are normal and the fare is not metered. Shared water taxis at around €39 a head are the sensible middle. Two specific things to decline: the "free transfer" offered near vaporetto stops for Murano, which is a glass-showroom sales trip rather than transport, and any suggestion that a hire car will be useful — it cannot pass Piazzale Roma, and garage parking there is charged by the day.
Getting from VCE to Padua
Padua has the oldest botanical garden in the world still on its original site, the anatomical theatre where dissections were first performed for students, and a chapel painted by Giotto in 1305 that changed what European painting could do. It is fifty kilometres from Marco Polo, reachable on a direct coach for about €12, and it is a university city rather than a museum.
Getting there directly
Busitalia and ATVO run direct coaches from the airport to Padua's bus station, beside the railway station, in about an hour on the motorway. Around €10 to €14 and no change. It is the simplest option and it lands you where the city's trams and buses start.
The train alternative
Airport bus to Venezia Mestre, then any westbound train — Padua is the first major stop, fifteen to twenty-five minutes further. Slightly more expensive and considerably more frequent, with services running until close to midnight. Use this if you land late, when the coach departures have stopped.
Booking the Scrovegni Chapel before you fly
This is the one thing to do in advance. Entry is by timed slot in groups of twenty-five, preceded by fifteen minutes in a climate-controlled antechamber to stabilise the humidity, and the visit itself lasts fifteen or twenty minutes. Slots sell out. Turning up hoping for a ticket does not usually work.
What is in the chapel
Giotto's fresco cycle of the lives of the Virgin and Christ, painted around 1305, covering every wall. The importance is not decorative: these are figures with weight and volume and human expression at a point when European painting had neither. The Last Judgement fills the entrance wall and Enrico Scrovegni is shown presenting the chapel — built, by most accounts, as expiation for his father's usury.
The university, and the theatre in it
Padua's university was founded in 1222 and Galileo taught here for eighteen years. Palazzo Bo contains the world's first permanent anatomical theatre, from 1594 — a steep wooden funnel of standing galleries around a dissection table. It is visited on a guided tour only and the tours book up, so arrange it early in your stay.
The botanical garden
Founded in 1545 for the teaching of medicinal plants and still on the same circular plan behind its original wall. It has UNESCO status and a palm planted in 1585 that Goethe wrote about. There is a modern glasshouse complex alongside it, which is well done and entirely beside the point.
Sant'Antonio, and who comes for it
The basilica holds the tomb of St Anthony of Padua and draws several million pilgrims a year — this is a working shrine rather than a monument, and the atmosphere reflects that. Donatello's bronze equestrian statue of Gattamelata stands outside it, the first large bronze horse cast in Europe since antiquity.
Prato della Valle and the arcades
One of the largest squares in Europe, elliptical, with a canal ring and seventy-eight statues around it. There is a market on Saturdays. The streets leading off it are arcaded, as most of central Padua is, which keeps the sun off in July and the rain off in November — a genuine practical advantage over Venice.
The ZTL, if you drive
The centre is heavily pedestrianised with a restricted zone around it. Park in the ring garages and walk. If you are being dropped by transfer, know that drivers stop at permitted points that are not always the nearest street to your hotel — confirm where when you book.
Where a car earns its keep
The Euganean Hills start immediately south, with the spa towns of Abano and Montegrotto built on thermal springs, the medieval walled village of Arquà Petrarca where the poet died, and Monselice and Este beyond. None of it is well served by buses, and it is the main reason people hire a car here rather than in Venice.
Staying here instead of Venice
Trains to Venezia Santa Lucia take under half an hour and run constantly, so Padua works as a base in the same way Mestre does — with the difference that Padua is a city worth being in on its own account. Hotel rates run well below the island and the restaurants serve a student population, which keeps them honest.
