5 Inspiring Virtual Museum Tours

(Updated on 02/01/2024)

Previously I wrote about visiting the world’s great art galleries from the comfort of your own home. I had intended on combining both art galleries and museums in one post but there were so many amazing virtual tours to choose from that I decided to split them into multiple posts. Categorising was difficult as many of the great museums also house extensive art collections as you will find in the list compiled below. To view the virtual tours click on the text highlighted in blue and a separate tab will open for viewing. Enjoy.

Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Rijksmuseum is a State Museum, founded in 1798 in The Hague; moving to Amsterdam in 1808. The museum’s first home in Amsterdam was the Royal Palace, and later the Trippenhuis. It has been in its current building since 1885. The Rijksmuseum is the largest museum in the country, displaying 8,000 objects of art and history. The million object collection (not all on display) contains artefacts from 1200 – 2000. Along with historic curiosities, the museum houses an extensive collection of Dutch Golden Age paintings, by artists such as Rembrandt, Vermeer and Frans Hals.

The Rijksmuseum App-based virtual tour is excellent, easily navigated and allows the viewer to listen to audio commentaries for many of its paintings and artefacts. The museum is most famous for being home to Rembrandt’s pinnacle work, The Night Watch (1642). Look out for this masterpiece in the tour, there is a brilliant historical significance commentary, with close-ups of details and secrets hidden within the painting. It may interest you to know that ‘The Night Watch’ is not a night scene at all. It was incorrectly named in the 18th Century due to layers of dirt and varnish darkening the work.

The British Museum, London

The British Museum is among the largest and most comprehensive collections of human history, art and culture in existence. It is home to 8 million works, many collected during the era of the British Empire. The collection spans the story of human culture from the very beginnings to present, covering 2 million years. The British Museum was the first public national museum in the world, opening its doors to the public in 1759, in Montagu House which stood on the same site as the current building.

The British Museum holds many outstanding and significant archeological and ethnographical pieces, including the Rosetta Stone, the Elgin Marbles, the Sutton Hoo Helmet along with Chinese ceramics from the Ming and other dynasties. Look out for these objects as you tour the museum.

Google Arts and Culture British Museum tour is also excellent and worth a look.

Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, Washington DC

The Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History is the largest of the Smithsonian Institutions 17 museums and galleries. The National Museum of Natural History is steward to a collection of 145 specimens and artefacts. The Smithsonian’s mission is to promote understanding of the natural world and our place in it; believing that natural history holds the key to earths future. The museum opened in 1910 and is the size of 18 football fields. The collection is home to one of the most extensive collections of animals preserved in Formaldehyde in the world.

One of the highlights of the museum is the Janet Annenberg Hall of Geology, Gems and Minerals, home to the cursed Hope Diamond; a 45 carat blue diamond. It is said that the Hope Diamond brings tragedy and misfortune to all who own or wear it. It is said that the 1/4 billion dollar diamond has brought suicide, murder, failed marriages, deaths of children, drug addictions and insanity to those who have owned or come into contact with the exquisite jewel.

The Vatican Museum

‘The Vatican, the Museum of Museums’ is one of the most visited museums in the world. Even in the midst of a global pandemic, 2020 saw 1,300,000 visitors, which was an 81% drop compared with 2019. The Vatican Museum not only houses extensive collections of art, archeology and ethno-anthropology gathered by Popes over the centuries; it also contains some of the Palace’s most extraordinary and artistically significant rooms. The Vatican Museum contains roughly 70,000 works, with around 20,000 on display for public viewing. The exhibits run through 4 miles of halls and corridors, with artefacts ranging from Egyptian mummies, ancient busts, old masters and modern paintings.

One of the highlights of the museum is the Sistine Chapel, containing Michelangelo’s famous ceiling frescoes (1508-12) and his Last Judgement (1536-41). On a busy day the Sistine Chapel can be shared by over 2000 people, which makes the virtual tours particularly nice because you are able to view the splendor with no one else in the room. Don’t forget to look at the superb wall frescoes, though often overlooked, were painted by a Renaissance team (1481-82) including Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, Pinturicchio, Perugino and Luca Signorelli. I am particularly fond of Botticelli’s ‘Temptations of Christ’.

The State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg

The State Hermitage, formerly the residence of Tsars, is now the second largest museum in the world. It was founded in 1764 when the Empress Catherine the Great acquired an impressive collection of paintings. It is now home to over 3 million acquisitions, with only around a third on display. It boasts the largest collection of paintings in the world, with works by Titian, Caravaggio, Renoir, Van Gogh, Monet, Rembrandt, Kandinsky, Picasso, Leonardo da Vinci, Matisse to name a few. Egyptian antiquities, classical antiques, prehistoric art and the extraordinary Diamond Room, displaying priceless gems once owned by the Romanov family also make up the collection housed throughout 6 historic buildings (5 of which are open to the public).

The virtual tour of this incredible museum is exceptionally well done and really does make me want to visit in person one day to explore further.

I had a lot of fun writing my posts on virtual tours I have explored some of the greatest collections of art, artefacts and specimens in the world, all from the comfort of my own home. To view my previous post exploring the worlds greatest art galleries click here.