Palio di Siena: the dates and how to watch

The Palio runs twice a year in Piazza del Campo, on July 2 and August 16, with ten of Siena's seventeen contrade in each race, three bareback laps, and free standing room in the middle of the square.

Two fixed dates, ten contrade each

July 2 is the Palio di Provenzano and August 16 the Palio dell'Assunta, and neither date moves for weather, weekdays or anything else. Ten of the seventeen contrade run in each race, so a contrada does not appear in every Palio, and the Comune di Siena is the organizer.

The race itself is three laps of the piazza, ridden bareback. Everything else in the day is the run-up.

Free in the middle, paid at the edges

The center of Piazza del Campo is free to stand in, with no ticket and no reservation, and it is the only part of the square that is. The stands built around the perimeter and the windows and balconies of the private palazzi are the paid options, sold privately rather than by the city.

Free is not the same as easy. You enter the middle hours before the start, you stand, and you stay until the race is over, because the square is closed once it fills.

The Corteo Storico is the long part

Over 600³ costumed participants take part in the Corteo Storico, which leaves Piazza del Duomo in the early afternoon and works its way to the Campo before the race. It is the reason people are in position from the middle of the day.

The race that follows takes minutes. Anyone who turns up for the start has missed the part that takes the day.

Nobody can date the origin

There is no certain origin date for the Palio, and the Comune di Siena says so itself, which is unusual candor about a civic institution's own signature event. Races known as palii alla lunga were being run in the early fourteenth century, and the race closed the mid-August feast of the Assumption.

The word itself comes from pallium, the length of precious cloth awarded to the winner. That is still the prize: a painted banner, not money.

If you are in Siena for the race

In 2026 the marble floor of the Duomo is uncovered from June 27 to July 31 and from August 18 to November 15, which puts both Palio dates inside a window when the inlaid panels are visible. The uncovering is titled Il Sommo Bene and marks the eighth centenary of the death of Saint Francis on October 3, 1226⁴.

Watching the race for nothing is explained further in the Palio is free from the middle; the floor has its own page in a floor you can see twice a year.

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