A guided boat tour of the Venetian lagoon costs 25 EUR per person on the cheapest regular service, Alilaguna's Linea Verde, which runs from Venice to Murano, Torcello and Burano with a multilingual guide on board and is free for children up to the age of five (Alilaguna, 2026). The same three islands reached on your own with an ACTV ticket cost 9.50 EUR for a single 75-minute journey or 25 EUR for the Venezia Daily Pass, which covers 24 hours of waterbus travel (ACTV, 2026). A private boat is the expensive end: the water taxi tariff published by the Comune di Venezia prices a single run between the historic centre and Murano at 60 EUR, and between the historic centre and Burano or Torcello at 115 EUR, before supplements (Comune di Venezia, 2011).
The choice is less about the boat than about what you want from the day. A guided excursion fixes the route and the timings and puts a commentary on top. A day pass costs the same 25 EUR and lets you stay on Burano until midnight. A charter costs several times either figure and buys you the departure time and the stops. The sections below give the published figures for each, the scheduled journey times, what the tours do and do not include, and the last boats back.
How much does a Venice boat tour cost?
The cheapest guided lagoon excursion with a published price is Alilaguna's Linea Verde, listed at 25 EUR and sold through the operator's own shop. It is a guided boat tour of Murano, Torcello and Burano with a multilingual guide, and children up to the age of five travel free. Alilaguna gives the length as about four and a half hours from the railway station and about five and a half hours from San Marco, the difference being the run down the lagoon at each end (Alilaguna, 2026).
Doing the same route yourself costs either more or less depending on how many journeys you make. A single ACTV ticket on the Rete Unica is 9.50 EUR and lasts 75 minutes, which covers one leg. Four legs on separate tickets therefore cost more than the Venezia Daily Pass at 25 EUR for 24 hours. The two-day ticket is 35 EUR, the three-day 45 EUR and the seven-day 65 EUR, and visitors aged 6 to 29 can buy a 72-hour Rolling Venice ticket at 27 EUR on top of a 6 EUR Rolling Venice Card (ACTV, 2026).
Alilaguna also sells point-to-point fares that are worth knowing if you only want Murano: San Marco to Murano is 10 EUR one way and 18 EUR return, and the airport to Murano is the same 10 EUR (Alilaguna, 2026).
Group tour, private charter or the vaporetto?
A group excursion buys a guide and a fixed timetable. A private charter buys the departure time and the stops, and in Venice the benchmark for that is the water taxi tariff, because licensed taxis are the boats most private trips are run on. The schedule published by the Comune di Venezia sets a fixed charge of 15 EUR at departure and 2 EUR a minute on urban runs, with 5 EUR for a pick-up away from a taxi rank and 10 EUR extra between 22:00 and 06:00. For fixed routes it prices the historic centre to Murano at 60 EUR a trip and the historic centre to Burano or Torcello at 115 EUR a trip, with 3 EUR for each bag beyond the first four and 10 EUR for each passenger beyond four (Comune di Venezia, 2011).
Those are the official figures, and they date from council decisions of 2011. The largest taxi cooperative now publishes different supplements on its own site: a 15 EUR night surcharge from 22:00 to 07:00, no charge for up to four suitcases and 5 EUR for each one from the fifth to a maximum of twelve, and no charge for up to four passengers and 10 EUR for each one beyond that, with a maximum of ten people per boat (Consorzio Motoscafi Venezia, 2026). Where the two disagree, the tariff sheet is the official document, so agree the total with the driver before you board.
The vaporetto is the third option and the one most visitors end up using, because line 12 reaches the same islands on the same water for the price of a day pass.
The Murano, Burano and Torcello route: what is included
Alilaguna's excursion includes the boat and a multilingual guide, and that is what the listing says it includes (Alilaguna, 2026). Admission to anything on the islands is separate. The Museo del Vetro on Murano charges 15 EUR full and 7.50 EUR reduced for children aged 6 to 14, students aged 15 to 25, over-65s and Rolling Venice holders, and children aged 0 to 5 enter free. If you expect to visit more than one island museum, the combined Island Museums ticket covering the Museo del Vetro, the Museo del Merletto on Burano and the Museo di Torcello is 20 EUR full and 10 EUR reduced, valid three months (Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia, 2026).
Glass demonstrations are the other thing to check. Tours commonly stop at a furnace showroom on Murano, where the demonstration is free and the showroom expects you to look at the stock afterwards. That is a commercial stop rather than a museum visit, and it is a different thing from the furnace courses booked through the glass school.
On the ACTV side, nothing is included beyond the crossing. Tickets must be validated at the start of each journey and again whenever you change vessel, which matters on this route because the Burano connection involves a change (ACTV, 2026). Alilaguna tickets carry one large bag and one piece of hand luggage, with 4 EUR for each extra piece (Alilaguna, 2026).
How long does it take and when is the last boat back?
On the ACTV timetable in force from 22 April 2026, line 12 leaves Venezia Fondamente Nove for the northern lagoon and reaches Murano Faro in about nine minutes, Mazzorbo in about 35 and Burano in about 41. The 10:00 departure, to take a mid-morning example, is timed to arrive at Murano Faro at 10:09, Mazzorbo at 10:35 and Burano at 10:41. The first departure of the day from Fondamente Nove is 04:20 (ACTV, 2026).
Coming back, the same timetable runs much later than most visitors expect. The last line 12 departure from Burano towards Fondamente Nove leaves at 00:10 and arrives at 00:53, and the one before it leaves at 23:10 and arrives at 23:53. Scheduled journey time on those evening runs is 43 minutes (ACTV, 2026). A guided excursion gives you none of that latitude: Alilaguna's listing puts the round trip at about four and a half hours from the railway station and five and a half from San Marco, and the boat leaves each island when the schedule says so (Alilaguna, 2026).
Torcello is the stop to watch. On line 12 several runs call there only on request, and the operator asks passengers joining at Torcello to telephone the freephone number at least 20 minutes beforehand (ACTV, 2026). Plan Torcello around a specific departure rather than assuming a boat will be along shortly.
Boat tours in winter
Lagoon services thin out in the colder months, and the operators publish the change rather than leaving you to discover it. Alilaguna's winter timetables for the Blue and Orange lines take effect on 28 October 2026, and the seasonal Red Line, which links the airport with Murano, the Lido and San Marco Giardinetti in summer, is suspended for the winter period (Alilaguna, 2026). The Linea Verde excursion is sold year-round through the operator's shop, with the boarding point, date, language and departure hour chosen at booking (Alilaguna, 2026).
ACTV line 12 keeps running, on seasonal timetables: the sheet quoted above took effect on 22 April 2026, and the operator publishes a new one when the service pattern changes, so check the date printed at the top of the timetable rather than a figure copied from a guide.
Two practical points apply from November to March. Daylight is short, so a four-hour excursion leaving in the early afternoon finishes in the dark, and Burano's painted houses are the thing most people come for. High water is the other factor: the lagoon crossings themselves are not usually affected, though the walk from the landing stage to wherever you are going can be, and the forecast is published daily.
Booking, tickets and cancellation
Alilaguna sells the Linea Verde excursion directly through its own shop, where you choose the boarding point, the date, the language and the hour. The published price is 25 EUR, with children up to the age of five free (Alilaguna, 2026). Buying from the operator rather than a reseller is the simplest way to be sure what the price covers, since resellers list the same lagoon routes at a wide spread of prices for products that differ in length, guide and stops.
For the do-it-yourself version, ACTV tickets are sold at Venezia Unica offices and machines at the landing stages, and the daily and multi-day tickets run on clock hours from first validation: 24 hours at 25 EUR, 48 hours at 35 EUR, 72 hours at 45 EUR and 168 hours at 65 EUR. Tickets cannot be bought on board trams or the People Mover, and app tickets for buses and trams are activated three minutes before boarding rather than validated (ACTV, 2026). Buying the pass before you reach the landing stage avoids the queue at Fondamente Nove, which is the busiest departure point for the northern lagoon.
For a private boat, agree the total before departure against the published tariff, including the night supplement and the charges for extra passengers and bags, and remember the ten-passenger limit the taxi cooperative states (Consorzio Motoscafi Venezia, 2026).
