Experience the best of Ancient Ostia

This semicircular Roman theatre is one of Ostia Antica’s best-preserved public buildings. Rebuilt under Commodus and Septimius Severus, it still preserves its stone seating tiers, which visitors can climb for views across the archaeological park. The theatre shows how entertainment and public gatherings were central to life in this ancient port city.

Located behind the theatre, Piazzale delle Corporazioni was a commercial centre lined with offices of merchant associations. Its black-and-white mosaics depict ships, symbols, and goods connected to trade across the Mediterranean. The square reveals Ostia’s importance as Rome’s harbour city and shows how commerce shaped everyday life in the ancient town.

The Baths of Neptune are a large bath complex just off the Decumanus. Their best-known feature is the set of black-and-white mosaics showing Neptune and marine creatures in an open-air courtyard. These floors are among Ostia's most memorable in situ artworks, still seen where Romans placed them rather than moved into a gallery. The complex also helps explain how bathing, decoration, and social life were woven into the everyday rhythm of the port city.

This was Ostia's central civic square, surrounded by public buildings and dominated by the remains of the Capitolium, a temple dedicated to Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva. Walking through the area reveals the city's municipal heart, where religious and administrative functions met. It matters because it anchors the urban plan and shows that Ostia was not only a working harbor but also a fully developed Roman center with its own political and ceremonial spaces.

The Insula of Diana is one of Ostia’s best-preserved examples of Roman apartment housing. Visitors can see multi-story brick architecture, internal courtyards, and street-level commercial spaces that reveal how ordinary residents lived in a dense urban environment. It offers a rare look at everyday domestic life beyond Ostia’s temples and public monuments.

The Museo Ostiense displays statues, portrait busts, inscriptions, funerary reliefs, and decorative objects discovered during excavations at Ostia Antica. Located inside the medieval Castle of Julius II complex, the museum provides additional context about the people, beliefs, and daily life of the ancient port city.