Paris · With kids

Paris with kids: things to do

By Ramya ChinnaduraiPublished 13 October 2026Updated 13 October 2026

Book Cité des enfants before you book a hotel breakfast. The two rooms at Cité des sciences run as 90-minute sessions, they sell out on rainy weekends, and the door staff will refuse an adult who arrives without a child in the right age band. That booking is the spine of a Paris family day. Everything else can stay loose.

Prices and hours below were taken from official pages on 13 October 2026. Seasonal or conflicting figures are omitted.

Two science rooms, not one museum ramble

Cité des enfants 2 to 6 is a booked session of one hour 30 minutes. Each parent and each child needs a ticket. Full price was 15 euros, reduced 12 euros. An under-2 who comes with a child aged 2 to 6 needs no ticket. Adults without a child in that band are not admitted. Read that twice if you planned to send one parent ahead to hold a table.

Cité des enfants 5 to 10 is a different room at the same prices. Same 90 minutes. Same rule: you enter with a child in the band. Do not mix a 3-year-old and an 8-year-old into one session and hope. Buy the room that matches the child who will actually play.

Cité des sciences sits at Parc de la Villette, not next to Notre-Dame. Budget the metro time. After the session, the park is the reset: grass, a snack, no second indoor ticket.

Paris je t'aime also lists Philharmonie des enfants for ages 4 to 10 (1,000 square metres, five thematic worlds), a Palais Garnier children's multimedia guide at 6.50 euros recommended for ages 6 to 13, and a Musée Grévin discovery tour for ages 7 to 12. Those are extras, not the first morning.

Under-18s and the Louvre question

National museums are free for under-18s. Some also open free on the first Sunday of the month. That is the fact that changes a Paris budget. It does not make the Louvre a playground.

The Louvre confirms under-18s are free with proof of ID. Book a time slot even when you pay nothing. Hours listed: Monday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday 09:00 to 18:00; Wednesday and Friday 09:00 to 21:00; closed Tuesday. Last entry is one hour before closing. Walk in with one room in mind (the moat, the courtyard, one gallery) and walk out. A three-hour loop through the Italian paintings is how a six-year-old learns to hate museums.

The Tuileries Garden is free and sits on the same page as the Louvre hours: 07:00 to 21:00 in April, May, September and October; 07:30 to 19:30 in January to March and November to December; 07:00 to 23:00 in June to August. Use it as the decompression after 45 minutes inside.

If you want a museum that is actually built as a pause, the Petit Palais permanent collections are free for everyone. Under-18s are also free for temporary exhibitions. The closed inner garden is the useful bit: a secure sit-down without buying a café seat.

Tickets on metro, RER, bus and tram

RATP is blunt. Children under 4 travel free on metro, RER, bus and tram if they do not occupy a seat. From 4 to under 10 they pay half fare. From 10 they pay as an adult.

The Ticket Métro-Train-RER from 1 January 2026 was 2.55 euros full and 1.30 euros reduced. The reduced single includes children aged 4 to under 10. It covers metro, RER, suburban train and the Montmartre funicular for up to two hours without leaving the network.

If you will ride every day, look at Paris Visite for ages 4 to 9: 15.30 euros for 1 day, 22.70 for 2, 31.90 for 3, 39.00 for 5. It also covers airport links, Orlyval, Disneyland Paris and Versailles. Add it up against singles before you buy. A family that walks the centre and takes two metro rides does not need a five-day pass.

Pushchairs on the metro are possible and not always kind. Buses are often simpler for a nap. RER platforms can have long tunnels. If you are going to Versailles or the airport, that is a different ticket conversation than a hop from Louvre-Rivoli to Châtelet.

A shape that does not punish anyone

Morning: Cité des enfants if you have a 2-to-10-year-old, or Petit Palais plus the Tuileries if you do not. Afternoon: one short Louvre slot on a day it is open, or a walk along the river and an early supper. Leave Disneyland and Versailles for a day that has nothing else on it.

Paris rewards the family that books one hands-on room and treats the rest of the city as streets and gardens. It punishes the family that stacks three famous interiors and a late dinner.

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