# UNESCO World Heritage sites, region by region

> Lombardy holds 10 of Italy's 62 World Heritage sites, Tuscany and Veneto 9 each, Molise and Valle d'Aosta none. The method for shared sites is declared.

URL: https://myitalia.it/best/unesco-sites-by-region
Last updated: 2026-09-02

Lombardy hosts 10 of Italy's 62 World Heritage properties, more than any other region, ahead of Tuscany and Veneto with 9 each, while Molise and Valle d'Aosta host none at all.

## The criterion, and the rule for the shared sites

A region appears once in this table for each of the 62 inscribed properties that has a component on its territory. Under that rule the 62 Italian properties generate 86 site-region pairs, because 8 of them straddle boundaries and 54 do not.

The rule is stated because it is the whole argument. Assign every property to a single lead region instead and the total drops to 62 pairs, with a different order at the top. Neither rule is wrong; a ranking that does not say which one it used is.

## The table: 18 regions with sites, 2 without

Lombardy is the only region in double figures.

| Region | Sites hosted |
|---|---:|
| Lombardy | 10 |
| Tuscany | 9 |
| Veneto | 9 |
| Campania | 7 |
| Emilia-Romagna | 7 |
| Sicily | 7 |
| Lazio | 6 |
| Friuli-Venezia Giulia | 5 |
| Piedmont | 5 |
| Puglia | 5 |
| Basilicata | 3 |
| Umbria | 3 |
| Liguria | 2 |
| Marche | 2 |
| Sardinia | 2 |
| Trentino-Alto Adige | 2 |
| Abruzzo | 1 |
| Calabria | 1 |
| Molise | 0 |
| Valle d'Aosta | 0 |

## Lombardy's ten, and why four of them are borrowed

Lombardy's 10 are Santa Maria delle Grazie with Leonardo's Last Supper, the rock art of Valcamonica, Crespi d'Adda, the Sacri Monti of Piedmont and Lombardy, Monte San Giorgio, the Rhaetian Railway in the Albula and Bernina landscapes, Mantua and Sabbioneta, the Longobard sites, the prehistoric alpine pile dwellings and the Venetian defense works.

Four of those are serial properties shared with other regions: the Sacri Monti, the Longobard sites, the pile dwellings and the Venetian works. Count only the properties that lie inside one region and the top three become Tuscany 8, Lombardy 6, Veneto 6. That is the arithmetic behind the disagreement between two apparently authoritative lists.

## The eight properties that belong to several regions

Eight Italian properties have components in more than one region, and they are the reason the count needs a declared method.

| Property | Regions | How many |
|---|---|---:|
| Ancient beech forests | Abruzzo, Basilicata, Calabria, Emilia-Romagna, Lazio, Puglia, Tuscany | 7 |
| Longobards in Italy | Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Lombardy, Umbria, Campania, Puglia | 5 |
| Prehistoric pile dwellings of the Alps | Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Lombardy, Piedmont, Trentino-Alto Adige, Veneto | 5 |
| Via Appia Regina Viarum | Lazio, Campania, Basilicata, Puglia | 4 |
| The Dolomites | Veneto, Trentino-Alto Adige, Friuli-Venezia Giulia | 3 |
| Venetian works of defense | Lombardy, Veneto, Friuli-Venezia Giulia | 3 |
| Italian style tiered theaters | Marche, Umbria, Emilia-Romagna | 3 |
| Sacri Monti of Piedmont and Lombardy | Piedmont, Lombardy | 2 |

Abruzzo and Calabria appear in this table and nowhere else: their single site each is a share of the beech forests, which means the only World Heritage property in either region is a set of forest stands, not a town or a monument.

## Molise and Valle d'Aosta have nothing on the list

Two Italian regions held no World Heritage property in 2026: Molise and Valle d'Aosta. That is a statement about the list and about which nominations were filed, not about what is on the ground.

Molise is the closer call. Its territory includes part of the Abruzzo, Lazio and Molise national park, but the beech stands inscribed in 2007 do not include the Molise section, so the region counts zero. What Molise does share is intangible: transhumance, which is on the [other UNESCO list](/best/intangible-heritage) entirely.

## Two caveats before you quote this table

Two lines in this mapping are weaker than the rest. The regional attribution comes from the Italian ministry's own site records, completed with open data where the ministry sheet is missing or generic. The Aeolian Islands sheet says only Tyrrhenian Sea; the Dolomites and Monte San Giorgio sheets have no region field at all.

The two newest inscriptions, the Sardinian domus de janas of 2025 and the tiered theaters of 2026, had no published ministry sheet when this mapping was built. Their regional attribution is therefore the weakest line in the table, and it is the first thing we will recheck.

## FAQ

### Which Italian region has the most UNESCO sites?

Lombardy, with 10 of Italy's 62 World Heritage properties in 2026, ahead of Tuscany and Veneto on 9 each. Four of Lombardy's ten are serial sites shared with other regions, so the lead depends on how shared sites are counted.

### How many Italian UNESCO sites cross more than one region?

Eight of the 62. The largest is the ancient beech forest site, with Italian components in seven regions. The Longobard sites and the alpine pile dwellings cover five regions each, the Via Appia four, the Dolomites three.

### Which Italian regions have no UNESCO site?

Molise and Valle d'Aosta, the only two in 2026. Molise holds part of the Abruzzo, Lazio and Molise national park, but none of the inscribed beech forest components falls inside its share of the park boundary.

### Why do different sources give different numbers per region?

Because of the eight shared sites. Counting each shared site once per region gives 86 site-region pairs from 62 properties. Assigning each site to one lead region instead gives 62 pairs and a different order at the top.

### Does Sicily have more UNESCO sites than Sardinia?

Yes, by a wide margin: Sicily holds 7 and Sardinia 2, and none of Sicily's seven is shared with another region. Sardinia's are Su Nuraxi di Barumini, inscribed in 1997, and the domus de janas funerary tradition, added in 2025.

## Sources

| Fact | Source | Confidence | Valid until |
|---|---|---|---|
| Classifica delle regioni italiane per numero di siti UNESCO ospitati, contando ogni sito transregionale in tutte le regioni interessate: Lombardia 10, Toscana 9, Veneto 9 (2026) | [UNESCO World Heritage Centre](https://whc.unesco.org/en/statesparties/it/); [Ministero della Cultura - Ufficio UNESCO](https://unesco.cultura.gov.it/projects/); [Wikidata (query SPARQL su P1435=Q9259, P17=Q38, P757, P131)](https://query.wikidata.org/sparql) | medium | 2027-08-31 |
| La Lombardia e' la regione italiana che ospita piu' siti UNESCO: 10 dei 62 (2026) | [UNESCO World Heritage Centre](https://whc.unesco.org/en/statesparties/it/); [Ministero della Cultura - Ufficio UNESCO](https://unesco.cultura.gov.it/projects/); [Wikidata (query SPARQL su P1435=Q9259, P17=Q38, P757, P131)](https://query.wikidata.org/sparql) | medium | 2027-08-31 |
| Molise e Valle d'Aosta sono le uniche due regioni italiane senza alcun sito UNESCO del Patrimonio Mondiale (2026) | [UNESCO World Heritage Centre](https://whc.unesco.org/en/statesparties/it/); [Ministero della Cultura - Ufficio UNESCO](https://unesco.cultura.gov.it/projects/); [Wikidata (query SPARQL su P1435=Q9259, P17=Q38, P757, P131)](https://query.wikidata.org/sparql) | medium | 2027-08-31 |
| Otto dei 62 siti UNESCO italiani sono transregionali, cioe' hanno componenti in piu' di una regione (2026) | [UNESCO World Heritage Centre](https://whc.unesco.org/en/statesparties/it/); [Ministero della Cultura - Ufficio UNESCO](https://unesco.cultura.gov.it/projects/); [Commissione Nazionale Italiana per l'UNESCO](https://www.unesco.it/it/unesco-vicino-a-te/siti-patrimonio-mondiale/antiche-faggete-primordiali-dei-carpazi-e-di-altre-regioni-deuropa-sito-transnazionale-in-italia-13-faggete/) | medium | 2027-08-31 |
| I 62 siti UNESCO italiani mappati sulla regione (o sulle regioni) che li ospitano: 54 ricadono in una sola regione, 8 sono transregionali (2026) | [UNESCO World Heritage Centre](https://whc.unesco.org/en/statesparties/it/); [Ministero della Cultura - Ufficio UNESCO](https://unesco.cultura.gov.it/projects/); [Wikidata (query SPARQL su P1435=Q9259, P17=Q38, P757, P131)](https://query.wikidata.org/sparql) | medium | 2027-08-31 |

## Image

https://media.myitalia.it/media/nature.val-d-orcia.1600.jpg
Author: Greymouser. License: CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0).
Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cipressi_Val_d%27Orcia.jpg

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