Which is better and cost-effective - Carte Orange or Paris Visite?

Question

This is for a tourist visiting Paris for 6 days. Which is better to purchase Carte Orange or Paris Visite pass. Is Carte Orange limited to residents only? Thank you.

Answer 1

If you're staying in Paris proper then you may be better off getting the Carte Orange.

This is because the Paris visite sells you something you generally don't need, to wit, a pass that is for zones 1-3. A tourist will rarely travel to zone 3. The carte orange can be purchased for zones 1-2. So instead of paying 27.20 euros for a five day Paris Visite for zones 1-3 you can get a 7 day Carte orange for zones 1-2 for 16 euros. Even if you do want zones 1-3 the Carte Orange costs 21 euros for a week.

The drawback of the Carte Orange is that it is good for a fixed period of from Monday to Sunday while the Paris Visite is for any continuous five day period beginning whenever it is first used.

What you ought to do is to consider how much you will actually be using public transportation. On many days you may not be using it much at all since Paris is quite compact and on some days you may get on the Metro only once or twice. If that is the case then simply buying a "carnet" of ten tickets that can be used anytime may be the best buy.

Even if some days you may have an itinerary that uses a lot of public transport you may be better off just buying a one day pass called a Mobilis that, for one day travel in zones 1-2 will cost you only 5.50 euros.