Should I visit the Louvre or the Musee d'Orsay?

Choose the Louvre for the greatest hits of world art and the famous building. Choose the Musee d'Orsay for Impressionism and a museum you can enjoy in an afternoon. With two days, do both.

How much are guided tours of these museums?

A Louvre masterpieces tour with reserved access starts from £55, a fuller Louvre tour from £84, and a Musee d'Orsay skip-the-line tour with an expert guide starts from £60.

Which museum is less crowded and tiring?

The Musee d'Orsay. It is large but focused, and most visitors can enjoy it in two to three hours, whereas the Louvre is vast and can be exhausting.

What is the best order to visit both?

Many visitors prefer the Musee d'Orsay first because it is manageable, then the Louvre with a guide on a separate day so its size does not overwhelm them.

Louvre vs Musee d'Orsay: Which Museum Should You Visit?

The overwhelming giant or the manageable masterpiece? Here is how to choose between Paris's two great museums, or fit both in.

Updated: 25 July 2026

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The grand hall of the Musee d'Orsay in Paris

The short answer: if you want the greatest hits of world art and a bucket-list building, choose the Louvre. If you want Impressionism, Monet, Van Gogh and a museum you can actually finish in an afternoon, choose the Musee d'Orsay. If you have two days and any love of art, do both, because they tell two different halves of the same story.

The Louvre: vast, iconic, exhausting

The Louvre is the biggest and most famous art museum in the world, home to the Mona Lisa, the Venus de Milo and the Winged Victory of Samothrace. It spans antiquity to the mid-19th century, housed in a former royal palace so large that seeing even the highlights is a workout. It is unmissable, but it can overwhelm, and most visitors leave having walked more than they looked.

Because of its scale, a guide pays off here. A Mona Lisa and Louvre masterpieces tour with reserved access starts from £55, and a fuller Louvre museum tour with the Mona Lisa and iconic masterpieces starts from £84, both cutting through the maze so you spend your energy on art rather than navigation.

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The Musee d'Orsay: focused and joyful

The Musee d'Orsay is the antidote to Louvre fatigue. Set in a beautiful former railway station across the Seine, it holds the world's finest collection of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist painting: Monet, Renoir, Degas, Cezanne and Van Gogh, all under one soaring glass roof. It is large enough to feel like an event but small enough to enjoy in two or three hours without collapsing.

A Musee d'Orsay skip-the-line tour with an expert guide starts from £60, which gets you past the entry queue and adds the stories behind the paintings that shook the art world. For many visitors, d'Orsay is the more purely enjoyable of the two museums.

Visitors viewing paintings inside a grand Paris museum

How to choose

First time in Paris, want the icons: the Louvre, guided, from £55.
Love Impressionism, hate museum fatigue: the Musee d'Orsay, from £60.
Short on time and energy: d'Orsay is the easier, more satisfying single visit.
Serious about art with two days: both, ideally on separate days.

Doing both without burning out

If you tackle both, split them across two days rather than cramming them together. A common winning order is d'Orsay first, because it is manageable and puts you in the mood, then the Louvre with a guide so the giant does not defeat you. Both museums reward skip-the-line or reserved access; the entry queues at each can swallow a chunk of your day in peak season.

The verdict

There is no wrong answer, only the right fit for your trip. The Louvre is the essential, epic, tiring landmark; book it guided from £55 so it stays a pleasure. The Musee d'Orsay is the focused, beautiful, beatable one; book the skip-the-line tour from £60 and enjoy the greatest Impressionists in the world without the exhaustion. With two days, do both and see how the story of art turns from marble kings to shimmering light.

Check live prices for the Musee d'Orsay skip-the-line tour →