You can chose between a Mobile ticket and a physical one, which is basically a card.

If you choose the physical card option, you have to collect your Vienna Pass from the Vienna Pass Service Center, which is located in the city center opposite the opera house. Or you can have your Vienna Pass shipped but only to an address within Austria.

Alternatively you can purchase the mobile pass, which can only bought online, but has the advantage that you can use it right after the purchase and you don’t have to pick it up at the service center.

Your pass will get activated when you use it for the first time. Your Vienna Pass has a barcode. And when this code gets scanned for the first time at an attraction, it will activate your pass.

After activation your Vienna Pass will be valid for 1, 2 3 or 6 days, depending on what you purchased. But be careful! The Vienna pass works on a calender day basis. That means, that each day is always counted from midnight to midnight, regardless of when you activated your pass on the day.

For examples: If you buy a 1 day pass and activate it at 3pm, your pass will still expire on the same day at midnight.

Or another example: if you buy a 3 day pass and you activate it on Monday 3 pm it will be valid until Midnight on Wednesday.

So my advice would be, start sightseeing and using your Vienna Pass right in the morning to get the most out of your pass.

One really cool thing about the Vienna pass, is that you get a fast track access at many popular attractions such as the Schönbrunn Zoo, the Albertina Museum or the Museum of Art History. This might save you sometimes hours of waiting time. You just show your pass and start your visit.

Having said that, some attractions do not offer this fast track service.

In the guide book as well as n the website of the Vienna Pass you can look up if a sight has restrictions to the priority admission. But to give you a few examples: At the state opera and the UNO city you have to have to pre-register for for a tour. And at the Sisi Museum in the Hofburg Palace as well as Schönbrunn Palace you need to pick up your ticket at the ticket counter where you will be also given an entry time.

Therefore, I would recommend picking up the ticket for Schönbrunn early in the morning. And then, with the Vienna Pass, visit the zoo and other attractions in Schönbrunn right away. Learn more about these attractions in this video and my Schönbrunn playlist!

With the Vienna Pass, you have unlimited access to the Hop-on-Hop-off sightseeing buses, which operate on 3 different lines connecting many of Vienna's most popular sights. And during the Summer months, there is an additional 4th line which goes up the Kahlenberg mountain, where you can enjoy the view over Vienna.

On board, you'll have free Wi-Fi and you can listen to commentary that describes the sights along the way.

The hop on hop off sightseeing busses are a really fun way to get around the city, but please note that in some cases the regular public transport, like the subway or the tram, might be faster. So it makes sense, to aditionally buy a ticket for the public transport. You can do that on the Vienna Pass website, when purchasing your Vienna pass. Or you buy it separately at a ticket automate or online. The price for the public transport ticket will be the same.

Also you can buy your public transport ticket in combination with a vienna pass on their website. But you could also buy it seperately later. The prices are the the same. More about the public transport in Vienna in my video!