Kilmainham Gaol

PricingFree with English Heritage membershipEH memberFree entryNon-member€8

EH members go freeInfo

Free entry for English Heritage members

This place is cared for by the Office of Public Works, which runs Ireland's national heritage sites as Heritage Ireland. English Heritage members are entitled to free entry to all OPW sites from the first year of membership. Show your current membership card at admissions.

Bring the card itself: joint and family memberships admit the named holders only.
Guided sites may run tours at set times; unguided sites are free to everyone.
Prices here are in euro.

More information

Entry

Non-member prices

Adult€8.00

Child (12 to 17) or student (18+)€4.00

Senior (60+)€6.00

Family (2 adults and 2 or 3 children aged 12 to 17)€20.00

Pricing details

Timed tickets online only, the same price as at the gaol; no walk-up tickets. Children under 12 are free but need a ticket; visitors with disabilities and their carers are free and email the gaol instead of booking online. English Heritage members choose the free English Heritage Card User ticket for their timed slot and show the card on arrival. Free for English Heritage members showing a valid card, from the first year of membership (every OPW site; the named members on the card). Heritage Card holders free.

Children 12 to 17 and students 18 and over with valid student ID; children under 12 free with a ticket. Free for English Heritage members showing a valid card, from the first year of membership (every OPW site; the named members on the card). Heritage Card holders free.

OPW's senior rate as sold on its booking site. Free for English Heritage members showing a valid card, from the first year of membership (every OPW site; the named members on the card). Heritage Card holders free.

OPW's family ticket as sold on its booking site. Free for English Heritage members showing a valid card, from the first year of membership (every OPW site; the named members on the card). Heritage Card holders free.

ParkingPay to park

No car park at the gaol: OPW directs drivers to the Irish Museum of Modern Art car park at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham (enter by the East Gate on Military Road), €3 for up to three hours, a five-minute walk via Richmond Gate. Not a Trust car park, so membership does not cover it.

Parking details

The gaol has no parking. OPW's museum site points drivers to the Irish Museum of Modern Art and Royal Hospital Kilmainham car park, entered by the East Gate on Military Road (from the west you cannot turn right into Military Road, so loop through Kilmainham village), a five-minute walk to the gaol along West Avenue and through Richmond Gate, which opens at 11am on Sundays. IMMA's tariff: €3 for up to three hours, €5 for four, €10 for six and €15 beyond, by coin or card at the machines. Limited coach parking on Inchicore Road. Public transport is easier: Dublin Bus 60 from Wellington Quay or Heuston, G1 and G2 from Spencer Dock or Wellington Quay, the Luas red line to Suir Road, or Heuston station about ten minutes' walk through the Royal Hospital grounds; a DublinBikes stand is outside the gaol.

Driving pin: the IMMA car park behind the Royal Hospital, 496 m east of OPW's pin on the gaol.

About

Kilmainham Gaol opened in 1796 as the new county gaol for Dublin and closed in 1924, one of the largest unoccupied gaols in Europe and a monument to more than a century of Irish nationalism. Leaders of the rebellions of 1798, 1803, 1848, 1867 and 1916 were held here, among them Robert Emmet, Anne Devlin and Charles Stewart Parnell, beside thousands of ordinary men, women and children; fourteen men were shot in the Stonebreakers' Yard in May 1916, and Joseph Plunkett married Grace Gifford in the chapel the night before his execution. Volunteers restored the ruin from 1960 and the museum opened in 1966. The hour-long guided tour starts in the old courthouse, now the visitor centre, visits the chapel, the cold echoing corridors and cells and the great skylit East Wing of 1861, and ends in the yards before the museum. Reviewers praise the guides and warn that timed tickets sell out every day, so book online as soon as they are released.

Check today’s timesSee all times

Kilmainham Gaol09:30 – 17:15timed guided tours 09:30 to 16:15, booking essential

Opening times may change at short notice.

Open all year except 24 to 27 December. The courthouse visitor centre opens daily at 9.30am according to the gaol's own site (OPW's page says 9am) and closes at 5.15pm; the museum opens 10.30am to 5.15pm from October to March and 10.30am to 5.45pm from April to September. Entry is by guided tour only with timed tickets booked online, released at midnight Irish time 28 days ahead and sold out most days; cancellations are released online between 9.15am and 9.30am each morning. Tours leave every 15 to 20 minutes from 9.30am, the last at about 4.15pm; arrive 15 minutes early (30 minutes for the last two tours to see the museum first), as latecomers are not admitted. Allow 90 minutes in all. Groups of 10 or more and wheelchair users email the gaol rather than booking online; a ground-floor tour can be arranged.

Part of the tour is outdoors and the gaol is unheated and very cold in winter, so dress warmly; there are worn, slippery steps with handrails, narrow corridors and uneven yards, and the tour is not recommended for children under 6. Buggies, wheelie bags and large luggage cannot come on the tour. The courthouse visitor centre has Brambles cafe on the first floor, a book and gift shop, toilets and a lift, none of which need a ticket; tickets can be printed at reception. Photographs allowed; no eating on the tour. The gaol is a national monument and marking its walls is an offence. The Royal Hospital Kilmainham and the Irish National War Memorial Gardens nearby are separate OPW places.

Photo: The granite front of Kilmainham Gaol on Inchicore Road, behind its railings, with the Irish tricolour by the old main door. CraftyCaedus, CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kilmainham_-_Kilmainham_Gaol_-_20190806101847.jpg. Licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0. Resized and cropped for display; derivatives retain the source licence.