Last Updated on October 20, 2023 by Tori Pines
Wondering what to pack for your Italy Vacation? Packing for any trip is very important but for some reason I feel like Italy is extra important to bring the right things! Especially if you are planning a super busy schedule with several stops and different types of locations. The items you pack (or don’t pack) in your bags can make or break some vacations! I’ll help you make sure you don’t miss a thing in your suitcase!
Now before I give you all the juicy details about what to pack for Italy vacation, I have to let you know about all of the other resources I offer! I have detailed daily journals from our trip to Italy. If you read along with me it will almost feel like you’re there too. For super detailed tips about destinations, check out what to know about Rome, or a guide to visiting the Tuscany Hot Springs, or even the most colorful island in Venice! All of my Italy content will help you plan the perfect getaway.
What is crucial to pack for Italy vacation
Power Bank – Portable Charger
When planning what to pack for your Italy vacation, you’ll need to start with the absolute most critical item that should be on your list. A power bank is a portable charger that allows you to charge your phone (and other devices) on the go! With long days sightseeing in Italy, we used this thing constantly and carried it on us at all times! Between frequently using navigation and taking tons of photos, our phones died super quickly each day. This power bank from Amazon is perfect, fits in my purse and charges your phone probably 6 times before dying so you don’t even have to recharge it often. If you only buy one thing for your next Italy trip, buy this!
Medium-Sized Cross Body Bag
Many people say that pick pocketing is common in Italy, and it probably is! The streets and attractions are usually packed, and perfect for a pick pocketer to target. I felt very safe with a cross body and always kept it around the front of me just to be safe. I never felt nervous about it, but in ANY city I think you should be a little on guard with your things!
A medium-size will hold your passports and CDC cards, wallet, phone, portable battery and charging cord, collapsible water bottle, medicine, and any tickets you’ll need for the day. I personally love my Vera Bradley bag, and it is the perfect brand to buy for travel. They use zippers on most bags for added security, have beautiful patterns, colors and fabrics, and they stand the test of time! I have owned Vera Bradley for over 20 years, and I have never worn through a single one. The quality is top-notch and you will be investing in a product that lasts you years to come.
It is also a good idea to consider bringing an anti-theft bag instead. If you are nervous about being pick-pocketed, you can travel safely with this Travelon cross body instead. I have it and love it! This is an awesome tem to consider when planning what to pack for your Italy vacation.
Teema Towel
Now this one could depend on what exactly you are doing on your trip, but we take our Teema towel on every vacation. Teema towels are turkish towels that fold up super small, are thin and super soft. They are perfect for vacation because you can use them for a million things!
Obviously it is great for a beach towel, if you go to any of the hot springs, go on a boat ride, used as a picnic blanket and especially great to use on planes and trains as a blanket!! I love these towels and highly recommend this brand specifically. We also have a cheaper one from Amazon and it is much rougher fabric, and not as big as the Teema…and to us Teema is 100% worth the extra money!
Keds Sneakers
When planning what to pack for Italy vacation, the most important piece of your attire will be your shoes. Everyone’s feet are different, so make sure you test out different shoe options before you go and be extremely particular about the shoes you bring. Most places in Italy will require lots and lots of walking. In Rome we walked about 15 miles per day!! In Positano we walked hundreds of stairs to climb up and down.
The point is, comfortable shoes are a must. I like to look pretty and also be comfortable on vacation and my perfect shoe is a pair of Keds sneakers. They are the most dainty and feminine sneaker that I have found and look adorable with dresses. I wore them every single day on our 11 day trip to Italy, because they were what I was feeling best in. Comfortable and cute. They come in tons of different colors, and will last you a super long time. I can’t explain how highly I recommend these shoes!!! You can buy them from Amazon or directly from the Keds site.
Collapsible Water Bottle
Clearly reusable water bottles are good for the environment but collapsible bottles also mean you don’t have to hold a water bottle all day. When you want water, fill it up to drink then collapse it again and put it back in your bag.
With all of the free and delicious water from the fountains in all the Italian cities, these bottles were perfect. The fountains really are everywhere, the water is clean and completely safe, and in our experience the water was very cold as well!
Bluetooth Headphones
If you’ve read any of my other posts about Italy, you’ll know I love using the FREE Rick Steves Audio Tours! He offers a ton (26 to be exact!) of amazing audio tours throughout several cities and attractions in Italy. To use these tours, you will need Bluetooth headphones to connect to your smartphone. I personally love these Beats headphones because they are very high quality, will last a long time and are connected with a cord in the back so they are much harder to lose than Airpods, especially when traveling all around the country! But, there are a bunch of other great options on Amazon.
These Bluetooth headphones will also be useful to listen to music and stream TV on trains or while waiting in lines. You need to make sure you bring the regular old-fashioned kind for the airplane to watch movies, as they don’t always have headphones available for you. In fact, on our flight home from Italy they made an announcement saying they did not have any.
International Driving Permit
If you plan to drive at all, make sure you get an international driving permit. We got ours at our local AAA office, and you don’t even have to have a AAA membership to get one there! They ended up being about $30 per person including the photo being printed there. They are only $20 if you bring 2 official passport photos with you.
Euros
We were in Italy for 11 days, and brought 300 Euros with us and took out an additional 150 when we were there. We pretty much only used euros when we absolutely had to. Some small stores and restaurants only took cash, or some had large minimums to use a card. We also used it for tips, and some taxi rides. I got ours from our bank about 2 weeks before we left which was an extremely easy process. We ordered it on the bank website and then picked it up at our local branch.
Extra Duffle Bag
Italy has an incredible amount of souvenirs to bring back home with you. Going into our trip I was not sure what the best way to get the things we bought back home. I ended up bringing along an extra duffle, rolled up in the suitcase, to pack our purchases in and carry onto the plane home. It ended up working perfectly. The only thing I would have done differently, would be to bring a larger one so we could have brought home even more clothes, shoes, and olive oil!! I adore my Vera Bradley duffle bags, they are so pretty, durable and roll up pretty small. No matter the size you decide on, you will not regret getting one of their bags, they will last you forever because they’re such good quality!
Outlet Converter
While technically you can get away with an adaptor for most items, a converter will also change the voltage. This is necessary for things like hair dryers and curlers. Italy uses 220v, while the US uses 110v. This means that if your electronic item doesn’t have a built on voltage converter, it will fry it. To be safe, and to cover all my bases, I got one converter with 6 outlets and used that for everything. That being said, the nicer hotels typically have USB plugs in the outlets by the bed so you may not even need it to charge your phones, but I would not count on that. This is definitely crucial when planning what to pack for Italy!
Wine Bottle Bubble Wrap
We bought a pack off Amazon, not intending to bring wine home, but more for olive oils or limoncello. We ended up getting two bottles of wine from our hotels that we didn’t drink so the bubble bags came in super handy. They worked perfectly and nothing broke! They’re extremely easy to use, pack flat so they take up basically no room until you inflate them. Also, it comes in a large pack so you will have plenty for all of your return trips to Italy, because I promise…you will be planning a return trip before you even get home.
International Phone Plan
I have never bought the sim cards that many people mention, so I cannot compare. But we paid for the international pass through T-Mobile and it worked perfectly!!! It was $50 per phone and would have lasted 1 month. We had perfect service the whole time and never ran out of our 15g of data, even with a ton of streaming and navigation. I was thrilled with how easy it was to use. You can also get 10 days for $30 instead!
What Clothing to Pack for Italy Vacation
Women’s attire:
A huge part of what to pack for an Italy vacation involves what you will be wearing! So, spend some time crafting the perfect wardrobe for your dream trip to Italy.
Okay so obviously I love a long sundress. I thought they were perfect for this trip and I would not change what I wore even a bit. They were comfortable, most covered my shoulders and knees, (which is important if you want to go inside churches) were flowy and had room to stretch if I ate a lot of pasta (which obviously I did).
Dress Code
If you didn’t already know, all churches in Italy require everyone to have their shoulders and knees covered. That means no tank tops, shorts, or short dresses. The trick for wearing dresses when walking as much as you will in Italy, is to wear spandex workout shorts underneath. I could not have walked all those miles in the heat without them or my thighs would have chafed. They are a lifesaver when wearing dresses. And the kind I wore had pockets which is an extra plus to safely hold your passport or money! Buy the High Waisted Running Shorts here.
Most of my favorite dresses are from Amazon. I have a whole collections of my favorites saved, so you’re sure to find a few you like! I hunted for these dresses for probably a year because I wanted to find exactly what I liked and would be comfortable in!! Everyone feels good in different things, so make sure you find clothes that you feel confident and comfortable in.
My favorite one I actually have in two colors, above in yellow and below in green. It is called a “wrap” style dress which means it can adjust to fit you perfectly, making it extremely flattering for everyone. It is light and flowy, perfect for warmer days, but also covers your shoulders and knees, perfect for if you spontaneously pass a beautiful church along your daily walk. I managed to find it on Amazon, so you can buy it in many colors!
Women’s Footwear
For shoes, like I mentioned above, I wore white Keds every. single. day. I also use Vionic arch inserts and that combination let me walk over 10 miles and my feet didn’t hurt at all!! That being said, everyone’s feet are different, so make sure to test out shoes before you go, pick comfort over style and definitely don’t pack too many pairs! I promise you don’t need them. I would have been okay with just the one pair; that’s all I wanted to wear!
For more details, read my other post, about What to Wear in Italy!
Men’s Attire:
My husband, Austin, wore khakis or jeans almost every day with either a plain t-shirt, polo, or button-down. The general rule of thumb is no logos, but if you do, make them a more neutral logo, like the Levi shirt he wore in the photo below, not sports teams or anything that shouts, “Hey, I’m American!!!” He balanced comfort with not looking like a tourist.
As it gets warmer into the summer I would definitely recommend more shorts and short sleeves/polos as it can be super hot, but make sure you always at least have one pair of long pants for churches and fancier dinners! He definitely fit in with the locals pretty well, and the tourists definitely stuck out like sore thumbs. We definitely giggled a little every time we saw a typical tourist in their logo shirt, cargo shorts, visor and fanny pack. Sometimes I swear they TRY to dress like a tourist! At the end of the day, I encourage you to try to look nice but prioritize your comfort.
How to Pack for Italy Vacation
Okay, so now that you have all of the essentials for your trip, you’ll have to actually pack it! When planning what to pack for your Italy vacation, you’ll have to figure out what to pack it all in. We each took a checked suitcase and a backpack. If you can get away with it, I strongly encourage you to bring a carry-on sized suitcase instead. The old Italian cobblestone streets are NO JOKE. They are extremely uneven and bumpy, and suitcases do not do well on them.
We learned this the hard way…. My suitcase wheel broke in Rome, our FIRST stop on our Italian adventure. It was rough, and happened because my suitcase was so heavy! Now, to avoid this all together you would definitely bring a duffle bag instead, but I hate carrying them so I still personally prefer a suitcase. Whatever you bring, be thoughtful about it and don’t just wing it.
Luggage
Now, most people will still bring a checked bag, especially if you will be traveling more than a week. I don’t take my own advice about bringing a carry-on, so I suppose I can’t expect you to either! Just be sure to invest in a really good quality suitcase. Vera Bradley has never failed me before, so I will be buying one of their 26″ suitcases called the Hardside Large Spinner Luggage. It has strong wheels, lots of pockets inside and locks! Plus they come in beautiful floral patterns like the one above and simple solids as well. You can buy it on Amazon or directly from Vera Bradley’s Website.
Hard suitcases are important to me when checking a bag as it keeps everything safer, but when bringing a carry-on I actually prefer the soft suitcase rolling duffle style because I feel like you can fit a lot more in them. I encourage you to try Vera Bradley’s Recycled Lighten Up ReActive Foldable Rolling Duffle Luggage for a carry on! It is a duffle with lots of space, but also has wheels! Win-win! You can buy it on Amazon or directly from Vera Bradley’s Website.
Packing Cubes
Just as important as your luggage, is using packing cubes!! Packing cubes help you fit more into your bags, by condensing the clothing and pressing it super small. They also help organize your luggage so it is not a mess at all times thrown around your hotel room. They have been extremely worth the purchase for me, and I don’t travel without them!
I use the Tripped Travel Gear packing cubes, a line created by some of my favorite Youtubers, Tim and Fin. If you have never heard of them, definitely check them out. Their videos are fun, beautiful and packed with awesome travel tips and inspiration! Their packing cubes are really great quality, and they even have some in super pretty designs like the ones shown above! They sell many different items including a travel backpack which folds up into a tiny little pouch.
A Travel Backpack
Last on your list for what to pack for an Italy vacation? A great backpack for traveling. I have 3 main things that I look for in a backpack after all of the trips we have taken and learned our lesson the hard way. The first thing a travel backpack should have is a strap on the back to attach to your suitcase, we pack our backs heavy so being able to roll it on your suitcase is a life-saver for our sore backs. Next is a wet pouch to throw a wet swimsuit in, or clothes if you got caught in the rain, these pouches allow you to throw something wet (or something that might leak) in and not have to worry about your bag or anything in it getting wet.
Lastly, my backpack has to have a back pocket, to keep things like money and passports safe as they sit against your back and make it nearly impossible for a pick pocketer to get to! The bag shown above crosses off all three of these needs, it’s a Large Travel Backpack from Amazon.
And just like that, you’re ready for your Italian adventure!! Please consider each item on this list of what to pack for an Italy vacation, as I think they are extremely important for you to pack. I don’t want you to learn the hard way when you show up without some of these important items. The more you plan and think through the details now, the more you can relax and have fun on your vacation, knowing that you have everything that you will need!
Read all of my post about What to Wear in Italy and the rest of my Italy Travel Planning posts to help you prepare for your upcoming vacation!