Trenitalia Changes

Trenitalia is still the train company most visitors to Italy end up using, but it is a different outfit from the one that confused everybody with half-explained reservation rules fifteen years ago. It now runs the country's regional trains and one of its two high-speed networks, it has a private rival on the fastest routes, and it sells tickets that mostly live on your phone. Here is how it works in 2026, and what that means when you plan a trip around it.

Who runs what

Trenitalia belongs to Ferrovie dello Stato (FS), the state rail group. A sister company in the same group, RFI, owns and maintains the track, so when a line closes for engineering work it is RFI's work and every operator on that line is affected, not only Trenitalia.

On the high-speed lines Trenitalia competes with Italo, a private company that has run trains since 2012. Italo sells its own tickets, has its own app, and a Trenitalia ticket or rail pass is no good on an Italo train. On Milan to Rome, Rome to Naples and Rome to Florence the two companies between them run a fast train every few minutes at busy times, and the competition is the main reason fares have fallen. Compare both before you book; I'd take whichever train fits my schedule and not worry about the brand.

In Lombardy, regional trains are run by Trenord, a Trenitalia joint venture with its own tickets. That includes the Malpensa Express to the airport.

The trains, fastest to slowest

• Frecciarossa ("red arrow"): the high-speed trains, up to 300 km/h, on the Turin, Milan, Venice, Bologna, Florence, Rome, Naples and Salerno corridor. They come in four service levels, Standard, Premium, Business and Executive, not simply first and second class.
• Frecciargento and Frecciabianca: the older fast brands. Frecciabianca survives on only a few routes, such as Rome to Pisa and Genoa.
• Intercity and Intercity Notte: the slower long-distance trains, and the overnight trains from Milan, Rome and Naples down to Sicily.
• Regionale and Regionale Veloce: local trains with no reservations, the ones you take to Pisa, Lucca, the Cinque Terre or Lake Como.

The old Eurostar Italia (ES) brand and the IR and Diretto categories you will see in older guidebooks no longer exist.

How tickets work now

This is where the "changes" really add up, and the rule of thumb is simple: fast trains are priced like airline seats, and regional trains have fixed fares.

Frecce and Intercity tickets are for one named train and include a reserved seat. Trenitalia sells them at three main prices: Base (fully flexible, the most expensive), Economy and Super Economy (cheaper, sold in limited numbers, with stricter change rules). The earlier you book, the more cheap seats are left. To give you a sense of the spread: for a Tuesday in early October, searched in mid-September 2026, Frecciarossa seats from Milan to Rome ran from about 38 to 86 euros depending on the departure. You don't need to print or stamp these tickets. Show the PDF or the booking code in the app when the conductor comes round.

Regional tickets cost the same whenever you buy them (Florence to Pisa was 9.80 euros in 2026), so there is nothing to gain by booking weeks ahead. You have three ways to pay:

• A paper ticket from the machines or the ticket office. This is the one you still have to validate in the small green-and-white machines at the station before you board. Forget, and you pay the fare plus a fine on board.
• A digital ticket from trenitalia.com or the Trenitalia app. It is tied to the train you picked and validates itself at departure time, and you can switch to another train free until yours leaves.
• Tap&Tap: in several regions you can skip the ticket altogether and tap a contactless Visa, Mastercard or Amex on the validator before you board, then tap the same card again at your destination. It covers journeys within Tuscany, Piedmont, Veneto, Sardinia and Liguria (except inside the Cinque Terre), plus a list of lines around Rome, Naples, Bari, Palermo and Trieste, and the Leonardo Express to Fiumicino airport. Forget the second tap and you are charged the highest fare in the region. It only sells full-price, second-class single tickets for one adult per card, so families still need regular tickets.

Buying online with a foreign card is routine now, on both trenitalia.com and italotreno.com. The Trenitalia app is the one I'd install before you go: it holds your tickets, shows platform numbers, and gives live delay information.

Strikes

Italian rail strikes haven't gone away. There were national transport strikes affecting Trenitalia in July and again in early September 2026. The difference is that they are announced in advance and the law requires a minimum service. On strike days Trenitalia guarantees regional trains in the weekday peak bands, 6:00 to 9:00 and 18:00 to 21:00, and publishes a list of long-distance trains that will run regardless. A train already moving when the strike starts will normally finish its trip if it can reach its destination within an hour.

Before any train-heavy trip, check the Transport Ministry's official strike calendar (in Italian, filter by "Ferroviario") and Trenitalia's strike page. If a strike lands on your travel day, move the journey to the day before or after or take one of the guaranteed trains, and if your train is cancelled you are entitled to a refund. More on that in my guide to train strikes in Italy.

Works, delays and what you're owed

Italy is in the middle of a big rail building program, and the price is disruption. In July 2026, bridge work near Florence pushed some Rome to Milan trips to several hours late, and in February 2026 arson and cable sabotage near Bologna and Pesaro, on the first full day of the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics, held up about 40,000 passengers by as much as two and a half hours. Planned works usually appear under "Lavori programmati" on trenitalia.com weeks ahead, so check them if your dates are fixed, and don't book a tight connection to a flight on the day you arrive by train.

Under EU passenger-rights rules, a long-distance train that arrives 60 to 119 minutes late earns you back 25% of the fare, and 120 minutes or more earns 50%. Claim it through Trenitalia's customer area or the app.

Beyond Italy

Trenitalia now runs trains well outside Italy. Its Frecciarossa from Milan to Paris via Turin and Lyon was cut off by a landslide in the French Alps in August 2023 and restarted on 1 April 2025, with two round trips a day taking roughly seven hours. You can also book Eurocity trains to Switzerland and Germany and overnight Euronight trains to Austria and Germany through Trenitalia. In Spain, Trenitalia is part-owner of the high-speed operator iryo. Italo, meanwhile, signed a deal for new Siemens trains in July 2026 as part of a plan to run trains in Germany.

Passes

If you'd rather not deal with any of this fare math, there are two passes for visitors: the Interrail Italy Pass (Eurail merged into Interrail in September 2026) and Trenitalia's own Trenitalia Pass, sold only to people who live outside Italy. Neither works on Italo. My Italy rail pass guide explains when one saves money.

Further reading: How to Buy Italy Train Tickets, Italy Train Travel Tips, First Class vs Second Class on Italy Trains