Miklós Ybl's neo-Renaissance house of 1884, with acoustics rated among the best in Europe and tickets that cost very little.
Miklós Ybl built it between 1875 and 1884, and Franz Joseph paid for a good part of it on the condition that it not be larger than the Vienna opera. Ybl obliged on size and then made it more richly finished than Vienna, which is a very Budapest solution to a constraint.
The horseshoe auditorium seats about 1,200 and is generally placed in the top handful in Europe for acoustics, behind La Scala and the Palais Garnier. The ceiling fresco is by Károly Lotz, the bronze chandelier weighs three tonnes, and the royal staircase was designed so that the aristocracy could be seen ascending it, which was rather the point.
Gustav Mahler was music director here from 1888 to 1891. Otto Klemperer had the post in the 1940s.
Going to a performance
This is the best way in. The Opera runs a full season of opera and ballet from roughly September to June, and prices start remarkably low — a seat in the upper gallery can cost less than a restaurant main course. The view from the cheapest seats is partial; the sound is not.
Dress is smart but not formal in practice. Doors close on time and latecomers wait for an interval.
The tour
Guided tours run daily in several languages and take you through the foyer, the staircase, the royal box and the auditorium, usually ending with a short live vocal performance. It is well done, but as noted, it is not cheap relative to a ticket.
The building’s recent history
The house closed in 2017 for a five-year restoration and reopened in 2022 with the gilding, frescoes and stage machinery renewed. During the closure the company played at the Erkel Theatre, which is much larger, much plainer and still in use for bigger productions — check which house your ticket is for, because they are a twenty-minute walk apart and people get this wrong.
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