Vatican City, May 20, 2021 / 12:00 pm
The number of visitors to the Vatican Museums fell by 5.6 million from 2019 to 2020 due to nearly five months of closure amid Italy’s COVID-19 lockdowns.
The Vatican Museums are consistently among the most-visited museums in the world.
More than 6.8 million tourists and art enthusiasts visited the Vatican’s art galleries in 2019, making the Vatican Museums the third most-visited museum worldwide, according to The Art Newspaper’s annual report.
The Vatican Museums confirmed for CNA May 20 that the total number of visitors in 2020 dropped to 1.3 million, an 82% decrease from the year prior.