Where Should You Eat in Florence on a Budget?

Florence has a reputation as an expensive city, and if you eat within sight of the Duomo every day, it will happily live up to it. But here is the honest truth we tell every guest who asks: Florence is one of the easiest cities in Italy to eat brilliantly on a modest budget, as long as you eat the way Florentines do.

If you are planning a trip and wondering where to eat in Florence on a budget, this guide gives you the real numbers. What things actually cost, where locals go when they want a cheap lunch that is also a great lunch, and the handful of habits that quietly save a family a lot of money over a week.

 

What Does Food Actually Cost in Florence?

Before deciding where to eat, it helps to know what fair prices look like, because most overspending in Florence comes from simply not knowing them.

An espresso taken standing at the bar costs around €1.20 to €1.50, and a cappuccino with a pastry should come in under €3.50. Sit at a table and the same order can double, which is not a scam but a service model. Locals stand, so stand with them. A good panino runs €5 to €8, a lampredotto sandwich €4 to €6, and a slice of schiacciata from a bakery €2 to €4. At a trattoria, expect €9 to €14 for a primo (pasta or soup), €14 to €20 for a secondo (a meat or fish course), and €2 to €4 per person for the coperto, the cover charge that appears on nearly every bill and covers your bread and your seat.

Put together, a traveller who eats well but eats local should budget around €30 to €40 per person per day. For a family of four, the biggest savings come from making lunch the main event and letting the markets feed you.

Which Cheap Meals Does Florence Do Brilliantly?

The best cheap food in Florence is not a compromise. It is the food locals are proudest of, and most of it costs less than a sandwich at the airport.

Start with lampredotto, the slow simmered tripe sandwich sold from carts and market stalls at the Mercato Centrale and the Sant’Ambrogio market for €4 to €6. It is rich, deeply savoury, and about as Florentine as food gets. We have written a full guide to lampredotto if the idea needs a little selling. For the less adventurous members of your group, schiacciata is the safe bet that never feels like settling: a thin, crisp, oil brushed flatbread sold by the slice at bakeries like Pugi near Piazza San Marco, plain or filled, from €2 to €4.

Then there are the rosticcerie, the hot delis where Florentines pick up roast chicken, baked pasta and stuffed vegetables by weight. A generous plate costs €6 to €9, and on the ground floor of the Mercato Centrale you can eat freshly made pasta, cooked to order in front of you, for €6 to €8. With kids in tow, the markets are the easiest win of the trip: everyone chooses their own lunch, nobody waits for a table, and the bill stays small.

 

Which Trattorias Won’t Break the Budget?

Here is the single most useful habit in this article: in Florence, lunch is the budget window for a proper sit down meal. Many trattorias run a fixed price lunch menu, the menu fisso, where a primo, a secondo and a side cost less than a single main course at dinner.

Trattoria da Rocco, inside the Sant’Ambrogio market, is the classic of the genre: home cooking, shared tables, red wine paid for by the flask, and a daily menu where nothing strains the wallet. It is lunch only, and the market closes at 2pm, so go early. I Buongustai, a step from Piazza della Signoria, runs a cheap daily menu of pastas, salads and meat dishes in the middle of the most expensive square metre of the city. Trattoria Mario, by the Mercato Centrale, has been feeding market workers since 1953: no reservations, cash only, and worth the queue. And in San Frediano, Trattoria Sabatino serves the kind of simple, honest plates that make you wonder why anyone pays triple elsewhere.

Wherever you sit down, the ordering tactics are the same. Share courses rather than ordering one each, drink the house wine (it is always the cheapest thing on the list and almost always good), and skip the trattoria dessert in favour of a gelato on the walk home. Done this way, a real Florentine lunch lands at €15 to €25 a headgood value restaurant.

If the research is starting to feel like a second job, this is exactly what our food tours are for. One booking covers a full meal across multiple stops, led by a local who knows every trick in this article and a few we keep for guests. Our Florence Central Market food tour is the best value plate for plate that we know of in the city.

 

How Do You Avoid the Tourist Traps?

Nothing drains a food budget faster than one bad €90 dinner, so it is worth knowing the warning signs. They are remarkably consistent: a laminated menu with photographs, a host outside inviting you in, a “tourist menu” sign, and a hundred item menu that promises every Italian dish ever invented. Add a table with a direct view of the Duomo or the Ponte Vecchio and you are paying a view tax on top.

The checks take two minutes. Look at who is eating there: if you can hear Italian at the tables, you are probably fine. Check that prices are posted and readable before you sit. And favour short, seasonal menus over long ones, because a small kitchen cooking twelve dishes well beats one microwaving eighty. None of this requires cynicism. Most restaurants in Florence are honest. The traps are just loud.

Eating Cheap in Florence Doesn’t Mean Eating Badly

If you remember three habits from this guide, make them these: eat where the locals are eating, make lunch your big meal, and trust the markets. Follow those and where to eat in Florence on a budget stops being a research project and becomes the most enjoyable part of the trip.

And if you would rather have a local handle the choosing altogether, take a look at our Florence food tours. We built them around exactly the places this article celebrates.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much should I budget per day for food in Florence?

Around €30 to €40 per person covers a very good day: bar breakfast, market or street food lunch, gelato, aperitivo and a shared trattoria dinner. Sit down restaurant dinners every night push that closer to €50 to €60.

Is the coperto a scam?

No. The coperto is a standard cover charge of €2 to €4 per person that covers bread and your place at the table. It must be printed on the menu, so check it before you sit rather than after.

What is the cheapest genuinely good meal in Florence?

A lampredotto sandwich from a market cart at €4 to €6, with a made to order pasta plate on the Mercato Centrale ground floor a close second at €6 to €8. Both are meals locals queue for, not fallbacks.

Are food tours worth it on a budget?

Honestly, yes, if you treat one as a meal rather than an extra. A tour replaces lunch or dinner with multiple stops, and the local knowledge pays for itself across the rest of the trip. Our Florence Central Market food tour is the one we point budget minded travellers to first.

How We Choose the Places We Recommend

We run food tours in Florence every day, which means our guides eat at these places on their own time as well as ours. Nothing in this guide is included because of a press visit or a partnership. We recommend the spots we return to ourselves, and we check prices in person, most recently in summer 2026, so the numbers you see reflect what you will actually pay. Where a place slips, we take it out. Florence changes quickly, especially around the markets, and we would rather update a guide than defend an old recommendation. If you find a price that has moved since we published, tell us and we will fix it.

Let us show you where your money goes furthest. Join one of our Florence food tours and eat like a local from your first day in the city.

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Sources

Eating Europe. (n.d.). Florence food tours. https://www.eatingeurope.com/florence/

Eating Europe. (n.d.). Florence market & wine tasting food tour. https://www.eatingeurope.com/florence/market-winetasting-food-tour/

MICHELIN Guide. (2026). The most affordable restaurants in Florence. https://guide.michelin.com/en/best-of/best-affordable-restaurants-florence

Mercato Sant’Ambrogio. (n.d.). Mercato Sant’Ambrogio. Retrieved July 17, 2026, from https://mercatosantambrogio.it/?lang=en

Da Rocco Trattoria. (n.d.). Da Rocco Trattoria. Retrieved July 17, 2026, from https://www.daroccotrattoria.com/

Trattoria I Buongustai. (n.d.). Trattoria I Buongustai. Retrieved July 17, 2026, from https://trattoriaibuongustai.it/

Trattoria Mario. (n.d.). Trattoria Mario. Retrieved July 17, 2026, from https://trattoriamario.com/

Trattoria Sabatino. (n.d.). Trattoria Sabatino. Retrieved July 17, 2026, from https://www.trattoriasabatino.it/

Eating Europe. (n.d.). Traditional Florentine dishes: What to eat in Florence. Retrieved July 17, 2026, from https://www.eatingeurope.com/blog/traditional-florentine-dishes/