Pinacoteca di Brera is the Milan's most famous and one of Italy's major art museums. It is housed in the beautiful building of the Palazzo di Brera along with the Botanical Garden, the Astronomical Observatory and Museum, the Academy of Fine Arts, etc. There is a vast, impressive collection on display, mostly religious art, spanning a large period of time, with masterpieces by famous painters, such as Caravaggio, Tintoretto, Bellini, Raffaello, Canaletto, Picasso, etc. You can take an audio-guide but there are info-plates for every drawing, both in Italian and English. As there are more than 30 rooms, you will need about 3 hours but there are benches to sit here and there. Furthermore, you can have some refreshment at the Caffe Fernanda. For those who love to draw, there are special places to "sit down and draw" with paper and pencils. The pinacoteca is closed on Mondays but it is free of charge every first Sunday of the month. If you are with kids, you can benefit from being charged as a family. Highly recommended! Enjoy it!

I visited the Pinacoteca di Brera twice during my visit to Milan in late December 2019 and early January 2020. The first time the ticket cost 12 euros and by the second time the price of the ticket had gone up to 15 euros. The information desk had no plan or information on the museum so I decided to take notes to document what I saw (the museum suggested the audioguide but I did not want to pay the extra money). Here are my notes on the various paintings - 1. Dead Christ by Mantegna 2. Saint Marks Square (in Venice) by Bellini 3. Discovery of the Body of Saint Mark by Tintoretto 4. Cena in Casa di Simone by Veronese (pay attention to the two dogs and cat fighting over food under the table) 5. the Restoration Lab 6. Bull's Head by Picasso 7. Marriage of the Virgin by Raphael 8. Dinner at Emmaus by Caravaggio 9. Last Supper by Crespi 10. The Last Supper by Rubens (pay attention to Judas and a dog) 11. Four paintings of Venice by Canoletto and Guardi 12. The Kiss by Francisco Hayez. I had a nice capuccino and rest in the museum's cafe. I think this is a great museum but information in English and other languages would enhance the experience as well as having a bookstore and gift shop (I did not see one). I definitely enjoyed my two visits to the Pinacoteca di Brera.

Quite pricey, large, not enormous (compared to the size of the city and to the fact we are in a 50+ UNESCO country, one would imagine an even larger collection). Not a large number of renowned paintings. The website with the descriptions that you can use as a guide is horribly slow and not user-friendly. Descriptions are two language and two levels (there's a nice description for kids for many works, that's quite nice). I don't understand the organization of the tour because after finishing the gallery you would like to go back to the lockers to retrieve your stuff but to do it you have to basically skip the queue of all those that are waiting to enter for the first time and you have to quarrel with them to explain why you have to go "back". All in all, a positive but slightly disappointing experience