The Grand Canal is 3,800 m long, 30 to 70 m wide and at most 5 m deep. It crosses Venice from north west to south east in a reversed S, is crossed by four bridges, and has 45 smaller canals, the rii, branching off it (Treccani, 2026a). Venetians call it the Canalazzo. Probably an old river bed, it is the main navigation channel in the centre of the city (Madricardo et al., 2019).
The cheapest way to travel its full length is a scheduled waterbus. On the timetables in force from 14 September 2026, line 1 calls at sixteen landings between Piazzale Roma and San Marco Vallaresso and takes 44 minutes; line 2 calls at eight and takes 33 minutes to San Marco Giardinetti (ACTV, 2026a, 2026b). Both run every twelve minutes in the daytime and both accept the same 9.50 EUR 75-minute ticket (ACTV, 2026c), so one ride down the canal costs less than a coffee-and-cake stop at the end of it.
This page sets out the two waterbus routes and what each one skips, the 2026 fares and the arithmetic of a pass, the five gondola crossings that still work as ferries, the four bridges, and which museums the landings actually serve.
How long is the Grand Canal and how deep is it?
The canal is 3,800 m long, between 30 and 70 m wide, and at most 5 m deep. It divides the city into two unequal halves on a reversed S course from north west to south east, is crossed by four bridges, and feeds 45 minor canals known as rii (Treccani, 2026a). The local name is the Canalazzo, and the course is probably an old river bed.
Five metres is the maximum rather than the average, and the floor is uneven. High resolution bathymetry of the lagoon found large elongated scours on the Grand Canal bed, up to 40 m long, 15 m wide and 1.5 m deep, cut by the propeller wash of waterbuses at the landing stations and documented there for the first time (Madricardo et al., 2019). The same survey notes that the scours reach 1.5 m at stops used by one line as often as at the busiest ones, and suggests that the erosion stops where it meets the caranto, the consolidated alluvial layer the whole city is founded on.
The Grand Canal has never been dredged. The survey recorded the highest density of litter on the floor of any part of the lagoon here, 1,161 items per km2 against a survey-wide average of 7.5 (Madricardo et al., 2019).
Which vaporetto goes down the Grand Canal: line 1 or line 2?
Line 1 is the slow one and the one to take. On the timetable in force from 14 September 2026 it calls at Piazzale Roma, Ferrovia, Riva de Biasio, San Marcuola-Casinò, San Stae, Ca' d'Oro, Rialto Mercato, Rialto, San Silvestro, Sant'Angelo, San Tomà, Ca' Rezzonico, Accademia, Santa Maria del Giglio, Salute and San Marco Vallaresso, then continues to San Zaccaria and the Lido. Piazzale Roma to Rialto takes 22 minutes in the daytime pattern and to San Marco Vallaresso 44 minutes (ACTV, 2026a).
Line 2 skips most of it. Between Piazzale Roma and San Marco it stops only at Ferrovia, San Marcuola-Casinò, Rialto, San Tomà, San Samuele, Accademia and San Marco Giardinetti, reaching Rialto in 16 minutes and Giardinetti in 33 (ACTV, 2026b). It is the faster boat, and it is also the one that goes the long way round by the Giudecca canal on its other leg.
One detail catches people out: line 2 only runs the upper Grand Canal in the middle of the day. On the current timetable San Marcuola, San Tomà, San Samuele, Accademia and Giardinetti are served from about 09:30 until roughly 20:00, and early or late line 2 boats turn at Rialto instead (ACTV, 2026b). Outside those hours, line 1 is the only Grand Canal service.
What it costs to travel the Grand Canal in 2026
A single standard 75-minute Rete Unica ticket is 9.50 EUR and covers the whole waterborne urban network from first validation (ACTV, 2026c). A 44-minute line 1 run from Piazzale Roma to San Marco fits inside it with time to spare, so one ride down the canal costs 9.50 EUR and a there-and-back pair of rides costs 19.00 EUR.
Above two rides, passes win. The Venezia Daily Pass is 25.00 EUR for 24 hours, and the multi-day tickets are 35.00 EUR for 2 days, 45.00 EUR for 3 days and 65.00 EUR for 7 days. Travellers aged 6 to 29 can buy the 3-day ticket for 27.00 EUR with a Rolling Venice card, which itself costs 6.00 EUR at any Venezia Unica office (ACTV, 2026c). Holders of a Venezia Unica card activated for waterborne services pay 1.50 EUR for the same 75 minutes, or 2.00 EUR for 100.
There is also a cheap way to cross rather than travel. A carnet of ten traghetto tickets costs 10.00 EUR and each one is valid on line 1 only, through the Grand Canal, from one stop to the one immediately after (ACTV, 2026c). That makes a one-stop hop 1.00 EUR instead of 9.50 EUR. Tickets must be validated at the pontoon before boarding, and every change of service needs a fresh validation.
Crossing the Grand Canal by gondola: the traghetto da parada
Four bridges over 3,800 m leaves long stretches with no crossing, which is why the traghetti da parada still run. These are working gondolas, rowed standing, that shuttle passengers from one bank to the other and nothing more. Municipal water-traffic rules treat them as a separate category and allow them to operate around the clock, solely for that service and for reaching their night moorings (Comune di Venezia, 2015).
Seven crossings are marked on the municipal list and five were working as of February 2025: Santa Sofia, Riva del Carbon, San Tomà, Santa Maria del Giglio and Punta della Dogana, with San Marcuola and San Samuele closed. The reported fare is 0.70 EUR for holders of a Venezia Unica card and 2.00 EUR for everyone else. Published hours were 09:00 to 18:00 at Dogana and Santa Maria del Giglio, 08:30 to 19:00 on weekdays at San Tomà and Santa Sofia with shorter weekend hours, and 09:00 to 12:00 on weekdays only at Carbon (il Nord Est, 2025).
The official municipal page for these fares and hours could not be reached when this page was checked, so treat the figures above as the most recent reported ones and expect short-notice closures. A crossing takes two or three minutes. For a proper gondola ride, with a tariff, a route and a station, see the gondola pages linked below.
The four bridges over the Grand Canal
Going down the canal the bridges are the Ponte della Costituzione, the Ponte degli Scalzi by the station, the Rialto bridge and the Ponte dell'Accademia (Treccani, 2026a). Only the Rialto carries shops.
The Rialto is the oldest of the four in its present form and the one with the documented back story. In December 1587 the Senate appointed three provveditori sopra il Ponte and invited designs; wooden schemes, single-arch stone schemes and triple-arch stone schemes were all submitted within days. On 20 January 1588 the Senate settled on a single vault, and on 1 February it put Antonio da Ponte in charge of the works. He devised a stepped pile foundation, driving each pier's piles in three groups to increasing depth towards the middle of the canal, both to give the arch an inclined seat and to spare the neighbouring buildings. The vault was closed during 1590 and the shops were begun to his design (Petrecca, 1986).
The fourth bridge is the youngest by three centuries. Santiago Calatrava's crossing between Piazzale Roma and the station was built between 2004 and 2008 and opened as the Ponte della Costituzione (Treccani, 2026b).
The Rialto is also a traffic bottleneck. Municipal rules forbid two craft wider than 3.5 m from passing each other beneath it (Comune di Venezia, 2015).
Where to stand on the boat and when the light is best
Line 1 boats have a small open well at the bow, a covered saloon, and open standing space at the stern. The bow is the view everyone wants. It takes a small standing crowd and no more, and it empties and refills at every landing, so the reliable tactic is to board at Piazzale Roma or Ferrovia, where the boat starts nearly empty, rather than at Rialto, where it does not.
If the bow is full, stand at the stern rather than sit inside. The saloon windows are low, salt-marked and split by pillars, and the palace fronts are best seen looking up. Both ends of the canal are termini, so there is no penalty in riding one way and walking back.
The canal runs north west to south east (Treccani, 2026a), which means the two banks take the sun at different times. Travelling down towards San Marco in the morning puts the light across the left-hand bank; late afternoon lifts it onto the fronts along the right. The last hour before sunset is the one worth planning around, and it is also when the boats are quietest, because the day-trip crowds have started back towards Piazzale Roma and the station.
Avoid the 08:00 to 09:30 window in either direction. That is the commuter and school peak, and the bow is closed off by standing passengers.
Which palaces and museums the landings serve
The landings are the point of line 1: each one puts you at the door of a building on the canal. Prices and hours below were checked in September 2026.
San Stae serves Ca' Pesaro, the International Gallery of Modern Art, which also holds the Museum of Oriental Art on one ticket at 15.00 EUR full and 7.50 EUR reduced. It opens 10:00 to 18:00 from 1 April to 31 October and 10:00 to 17:00 from 1 November to 31 March, closed Mondays (Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia, 2026a). The Museum of Palazzo Mocenigo, a short walk from the same landing, keeps the same hours, the same Monday closure and the same 15.00 and 7.50 EUR tickets (Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia, 2026b).
Ca' Rezzonico serves the Museum of 18th Century Venice, again 15.00 and 7.50 EUR, 10:00 to 18:00 in summer and 10:00 to 17:00 in winter, closed Tuesdays (Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia, 2026c).
Accademia serves the Gallerie dell'Accademia, at 20.00 EUR full, 2.00 EUR for EU citizens aged 18 to 25 and free under 18 (Gallerie dell'Accademia, 2026). It is also the landing for the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Palazzo Venier dei Leoni, open daily 10:00 to 18:00 with last entry at 17:00 and closed Tuesdays, at 17.00 EUR for adults, 14.00 EUR over 70 and 9.00 EUR for students under 26 (Peggy Guggenheim Collection, 2026). San Samuele, a line 2 stop only, is the landing for Palazzo Grassi.
