In most European capitals, swimming fifty metres in a proper Olympic lane means joining a private club. In Barcelona it costs €13.64 and you walk in off the street. What makes that number stranger is what sits above it: the city’s most expensive municipal pool charges €18.73 for a plain rectangle with no lanes at all. The price list of Barcelona’s pool network does not reward what you would expect, and almost every guide online has the figures wrong anyway.
How much do Barcelona’s municipal pools cost? From €2.75 at the Creueta del Coll lake to €18.73 at CEM Parc de la Ciutadella, the priciest in the network. Montjuïc costs €7.92 and the Olympic Bernat Picornell €13.64. Most are free for under-5s and reduced for over-65s. The season runs June to September, with four sites open year-round.
The essentials in 2 minutes
- Olympic lane swimming — Bernat Picornell, €13.64, open all year
- Cheapest — Creueta del Coll lake, €2.75, capacity 800, expect queues
- Priciest — CEM Parc de la Ciutadella, €18.73, and no lanes
- Free — Banys del Fòrum, seawater, bring water shoes
- The famous one — Montjuïc, €7.92, skyline views, no lanes either
- New this season — topless and burkini both stop being banned
What the entry fee actually buys
The instinct is to read price as quality, and in this network that reading fails. Bernat Picornell gives you a 50-metre Olympic pool with numbered lanes and certified filtration for €13.64. The CEM Parc de la Ciutadella charges €18.73, five euros more, for a facility with none of that. CEM Sant Sebastià asks €16.49 and its selling point is the beach next door, not the water.
What you are actually paying for is the club infrastructure around the pool: changing rooms, gym access, opening hours, year-round operation. The pool itself is often the cheapest part of the ticket. That explains why the Olympic pool undercuts a neighbourhood sports centre, and why the €2.75 lake in Gràcia is not a bargain version of anything — it is a different product entirely.
Which leads to the rule that matters most here: decide what you want to do in the water before you look at any price. Lane swimming, child-minding, sunbathing and cooling off are four different needs, and the network prices them almost at random.
Which pool to pick for your plan
The network has 14 options and none of them does everything. This is the short answer for anyone in a hurry.
| If you want… | Go to | Costs |
|---|---|---|
| Proper lane swimming | Bernat Picornell | €13.64 |
| To spend as little as possible | Creueta del Coll | €2.75 |
| To bring children | Can Dragó | €9 |
| The Barcelona photo | Montjuïc | €7.92 |
| To pay nothing | Banys del Fòrum | Free |
| To swim in October | Parc de la Ciutadella | €18.73 |
| Quiet | Can Caralleu | €15.14 |
All 14 municipal pools in Barcelona and what they cost
This is the information that drives most searches and the one that circulates worst. Rates are revised each season and worth confirming before you go, but this is the current map of the municipal network.
| Pool | District | Adult entry | Season |
|---|---|---|---|
| Llac Creueta del Coll | Gràcia | €2.75 | 6 Jun – 6 Sep |
| CEM Guinardó | Horta-Guinardó | €6.35 weekday | 2 Jun – 3 Sep |
| Piscines Montjuïc | Sants-Montjuïc | €7.92 | 8 Jun – 6 Sep |
| CEM Tennis Vall d’Hebron | Horta-Guinardó | €8.27 | 20 Jun – 3 Sep |
| Piscina de la Clota | Horta-Guinardó | €8.29 | 20 Jun – 30 Aug |
| CEM Trinitat Vella | Sant Andreu | €8.35 | 22 Jun – 3 Sep |
| CEM Can Dragó | Nou Barris | €9 | 2 Jun – 31 Aug |
| CEM Bon Pastor | Sant Andreu | €9.95 | 1 Jun – 3 Sep |
| CEM Can Toda | Gràcia | €13.60 | Year-round |
| Bernat Picornell | Sants-Montjuïc | €13.64 | Year-round |
| CEM Bac de Roda | Sant Martí | €13.68 | 4 May – 27 Sep |
| CEM Can Caralleu | Sarrià-Sant Gervasi | €15.14 | 14 Jun – 10 Sep |
| CEM Sant Sebastià | Ciutat Vella | €16.49 | Year-round |
| CEM Parc de la Ciutadella | Ciutat Vella | €18.73 | 1 Apr – 1 Nov |
The price spread, visualised
| Pool | Entry | |
|---|---|---|
| Creueta del Coll | €2.75 | |
| Montjuïc | €7.92 | |
| Bernat Picornell | €13.64 | |
| Parc de la Ciutadella | €18.73 |
The gap between cheapest and priciest is €15.98, close to seven times over. One swim at the Ciutadella buys six at the Creueta lake with change left for the bus.
The counting problem nobody has noticed
Ask how many municipal outdoor pools Barcelona has and the city gives two different answers. Its official directory lists 14, spread across seven districts: two in Ciutat Vella, two in Gràcia, three in Horta-Guinardó, two in Sant Andreu, one in Sant Martí, three in Sants-Montjuïc and one in Sarrià-Sant Gervasi. Its press office announces 15.
The missing one is Can Dragó in Nou Barris — the largest facility in the city, roughly 15,000 m² of water leisure. It is absent from the directory, and the district filter does not even offer Nou Barris as an option. Add the Banys del Fòrum, which is a bathing zone rather than a pool, and the number shifts again. According to official data from the council, this season also brings the reopening of the Pistes Municipals de Tennis Montjuïc pool after refurbishment, and the first summer in three years without drought restrictions.
Montjuïc, the pool you have already seen
The Piscines Municipals de Montjuïc (Av. Miramar, 31) are the ones you recognise without having been. The diving platform frames the city skyline behind it, which produced the most-reproduced images of the 1992 Games and turned the site into a standing set for music videos and adverts.
Entry €7.92, reduced €5.48 for under-15s and over-65s. Open 8 June to 6 September, Monday to Thursday 11am–7pm and Friday to Sunday until 8:30pm.
The warning almost nobody gives: there are no swimming lanes. The basin is built for lounging, and the 2,520 m² sun terrace is the real centrepiece. If you came to swim lengths, Bernat Picornell is ten minutes’ walk away with the infrastructure this one lacks. For the hill’s free viewpoints, the Montjuïc complete guide covers what else is up there.
The free one, and its one non-negotiable
The Banys del Fòrum (Plaça del Fòrum, 1, Sant Martí) are free, and barely make the guides. This is not a conventional pool but an urban bathing zone: concrete platforms with steps straight down to the sea, roughly 375 metres of frontage, no sand, adapted access. The format resembles the bathing coves of the Greek islands.
Its problem is the one nobody warns you about. The concrete reaches temperatures that make walking barefoot genuinely painful in the middle of a summer afternoon, and there is no shade anywhere on the platform. This is the one site in the network where water shoes cross from advisable to essential. It works if you arrive early, bring footwear and sun cover, and leave before the surface turns. It closes out a day in Poblenou neatly.
Mistakes to avoid
- Assuming the Olympic pool is the expensive one. It is €13.64, five euros below the priciest in the network.
- Going to Montjuïc to swim laps. No lanes. It is a lounging pool with a famous view.
- Chasing the €2.75 at Creueta del Coll on a hot Saturday. Capacity is 800 and the queue wraps the park.
- Arriving at the Fòrum barefoot. Concrete in August sun. Water shoes or don’t bother.
- Trusting price lists online. Most circulate figures from earlier seasons. Rates are revised annually.
The 2 rule changes worth knowing
This is the most significant shift of the season and it has barely been reported. From this season, both topless bathing and full-coverage swimwear such as the burkini stop being prohibited in Barcelona’s municipal pools, on the grounds that banning either constitutes discrimination.
What makes it notable is that it cuts both ways at once: it protects the swimmer who wants to wear less and the swimmer who wants to wear more, under the same reasoning. According to experts in public facility management, it aligns the pool network with the non-discrimination standard already applied elsewhere in the city’s public spaces.
On booking, most sites allow walk-in entry, but the hottest days push several to capacity before midday and some require advance reservation at weekends. Can Dragó and Montjuïc saturate first. Set the cost against a realistic daily budget by traveller type, and if the pools are full, what to do in Barcelona in the heat has the alternatives.
Frequently asked questions about Barcelona’s municipal pools
How much do Barcelona’s municipal pools cost?
From €2.75 at the Creueta del Coll lake to €18.73 at CEM Parc de la Ciutadella, the most expensive in the network. The Montjuïc pool is €7.92 and the Olympic Bernat Picornell is €13.64. Most sites are free for under-5s or under-6s, with reduced rates for over-65s and Targeta Rosa holders.
Can you swim in an Olympic pool in Barcelona?
Yes. Piscines Bernat Picornell on Montjuïc has a 50-metre Olympic pool built for the 1992 Games, open to the public year-round for €13.64. Numbered lanes, uniform depth and certified filtration for lap swimming. It is one of the few genuinely public Olympic pools in a European capital.
How many municipal pools does Barcelona have?
The city’s own directory lists 14 outdoor pools across seven districts, while its press office announces 15. The gap is Can Dragó in Nou Barris, the largest of them all, which the directory omits entirely — the district filter does not even include Nou Barris as an option.
Which is the cheapest pool in Barcelona?
The lake at Parc de la Creueta del Coll in Gràcia, at €2.75, with a ten-session pass for €20.68. Free for under-1s and over-65s. The catch is capacity: it caps at 800 people and queues regularly wrap around the park, so the €5 you save can cost you two hours.
Is there a free place to swim in Barcelona?
Yes, the Banys del Fòrum in Sant Martí. It is not a pool but an urban bathing zone with concrete platforms and steps down to the sea, roughly 375 metres long, with no sand and no entry fee. Water shoes are essential because the concrete gets painfully hot.
Is topless swimming allowed in Barcelona’s municipal pools?
Yes. This season both topless bathing and full-coverage swimwear such as the burkini stop being prohibited across the municipal network, on the grounds that banning either is discriminatory. It is the most significant rule change of the summer and applies to every municipal facility.
What I’d actually do
Having crossed the prices against capacity and season, here is how I would call it.
- Best for swimming → Bernat Picornell. Olympic lanes for €13.64, open all year.
- Best value → Montjuïc. €7.92 buys the best view in the city, as long as you accept there are no lanes.
- Best for families → Can Dragó. The €9 buys a 10 cm to 1.30 m range, the only one that covers several ages at once.
- Best on a budget → Creueta del Coll. €2.75 and a Chillida sculpture over the water, if you arrive early enough to skip the queue.
- Best free → Banys del Fòrum. Mediterranean seawater for nothing, water shoes on.
- The one I’d skip → Parc de la Ciutadella at €18.73 in summer, unless you specifically need to swim in April or October.
In Barcelona the Olympic pool is not the expensive one, and the biggest does not appear on the city’s own list.