Best Things to Do in Milan Right Now
Milan is at its best when you stop queueing for monuments and start doing things in it. The single strongest new option is the Highline Galleria, a 250 m walkway across the roof of the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II at about 40 m up, reopened on 6 February 2026 and priced at €12 general, €10 reduced. Nearly every visitor walks through the Galleria. Almost nobody knows you can now walk on top of it. For the guided version and the other rooftop options, compare Milan tours .
Rooftop walkways and towers with a view
The Highline runs along the arcade’s roofline with panoramic platforms, planting and installations added in the 2026 redesign, and the guided version is the one that explains what you are standing on. Children from age 6 are admitted. Times and availability sit on the official Highline page .
Over in Parco Sempione, Torre Branca is Gio Ponti’s steel tower of 1933, €9 full and €6 reduced, with a lift to a small platform above the park and the Castello. Its opening days swing hard with the season, roughly Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday in winter and more days plus evening shifts in summer, so confirm the day on the Museo Branca listing before you plan an evening around it.
Thermal baths inside the Spanish city walls
QC Termemilano, Piazzale Medaglie d’Oro 2 in Porta Romana, is built into Milan’s 16th-century Spanish bastions: pools, saunas and steam rooms threaded through the fortification, plus a converted tram carriage used as a sauna. The five-hour “Escape” slot starts around €54 and a full day around €64. It opens Monday to Thursday 09:00 to 23:00, Friday to midnight, Saturday 08:30 to midnight and Sunday 08:30 to 23:00. Details are on the QC Termemilano site , and evening slots go first.
What can you do on the water near Milan?
Milan is flat, landlocked and has no coast inside 180 km, but there is real water. Scheduled guided battello cruises leave the Darsena and run the Naviglio Grande and Naviglio Pavese past the church of San Cristoforo and the Vicolo dei Lavandai, the surviving covered washhouse where Milan’s laundresses worked. Roughly €19 adult, €10 for children aged 5 to 10, free under 5, with aperitivo-on-board variants costing more. You can book a Navigli cruise ahead in spring, summer and at weekends.
Further out, the Idroscalo rowing lake sits beside Linate, and the Parco Lombardo della Valle del Ticino runs guided descents of the Ticino from Vigevano: about 6 km in two hours, flat water, sold for families and first-timers. Park information is at parcoticino.it .
Drinking Milan properly
Milan gave the world Campari, founded here in 1860, and the Negroni Sbagliato, invented by accident at Bar Basso on Via Plinio 39 when a barman reached for prosecco instead of gin. The Aperol Spritz, which gets attached to this city constantly, comes from Padua. Bar Basso has traded since 1947 and opens Wednesday to Monday 09:00 to 01:15, closed Tuesdays.
Camparino in Galleria, at the arcade’s Piazza Duomo corner, is where the Milanese aperitivo ritual effectively began and has reopened after restoration. It is expensive for what it is and worth it once, for the room and the position. See the Camparino site for hours.
Aperitivo itself is a band rather than a price: about €8 at a plain neighbourhood bar, €10 to €15 typically, up to €20 on a rooftop, roughly 18:00 to 20:00.
Eating without the tourist tax
Risotto alla Milanese is the saffron risotto and nothing else. Ossobuco, braised veal shank, is a separate dish that is usually served alongside it, and a menu listing the two together is offering you both, not defining one. Cotoletta alla Milanese is the bone-in breaded veal cutlet.
Eataly Milano Smeraldo at Piazza XXV Aprile 10 fills the shell of the old Teatro Smeraldo with a market, restaurants and cooking courses across several floors. Treat it as a good food hall, not a local ritual. 10 Corso Como is free to walk into, with a courtyard café, bookshop, gallery and roof terrace.
Getting around, and the ticket that no longer exists
ATM withdrew the disposable paper ticket on 1 January 2026. Machines do not sell one and old ones are not accepted. Tap a contactless card, phone or watch at the gate, or buy a RicaricaMi card for €1.50 and load fares onto it. A single urban fare is €2.20 for 90 minutes with unlimited transfers, a day is €7.60, and contactless tapping applies that same daily cap automatically. Two people cannot travel on one RicaricaMi at once.
A MilanoCard is a transport pass with 10 to 30 percent discounts attached. It does not include the Duomo, the terraces or the Last Supper, so buy it for the transport or not at all.
Verdict on where to spend a spare afternoon
If you have one free half-day and no ticket booked, take the Highline at €12 over the Duomo terraces at €16 to €26. You get the same rooftop instinct, a view of the cathedral rather than a view from it, and no stairs. For what the terraces do buy, see the Milan sightseeing guide ; for routes on foot, the walking tours page ; and the three-day Milan itinerary fits these around the fixed bookings.
Staying near Porta Venezia or Porta Romana puts Bar Basso and the baths within walking distance, and you can check hotel rates from there.
Book a Saturday QC Termemilano evening slot at least a week out, because the late Friday and Saturday sessions sell before the daytime ones do.