Is the Gibraltar Cable Car Open? The 2026 Status and Every Way Up

17 October 2026 Last checked 2026-10-17

The cable car has been shut since 18 November 2025 and reopens in 2027. What it costs to reach the Top of the Rock without it, with the official prices.

The short answer: no, the Gibraltar Cable Car is not open

The Gibraltar Cable Car stopped carrying passengers on 18 November 2025 and has not carried one since. The Gibraltar Nature Reserve's own page for the attraction now says it is undergoing full refurbishment and is expected to reopen in 2027. That is the official position as of October 2026, and it is the only reopening guidance anyone has published.

This is not a seasonal pause. The whole system is being demolished and rebuilt, so the closure is measured in years. We keep this page updated because the search results for the cable car are full of pages that still describe a four minute ride to the summit, and a trip planned around one of those is a trip planned around something that no longer exists.

The part those pages usually miss is the good news. The Top of the Rock never closed. The macaques are still up there, the caves and tunnels are open, and there are two reliable ways up. Here is what it costs and how long it takes.

Quick facts at a glance

Why it closed, and why for this long

The 1966 installation was built by the Swiss manufacturer Von Roll and refitted in 1986, when the cabins now being removed were fitted. Sixty years is a long life for a ropeway. The decision was to replace rather than patch again, which is what turns a closure into a two year programme.

The scale is in the planning file. When MH Bland, which built, owns and operates the cable car, put the scheme to the town planner, the application was to demolish the upper and lower stations and all three towers and replace them with a new station building, two towers and an entirely new system. The reason given was blunt: two cabins holding 25 people each could not meet the numbers arriving.

Nothing is being repaired. The stations are coming down, the three towers are coming down, and a different machine goes up in their place. That is why the answer is 2027 and not next month.

What the new cable car will be like

The headline figure comes from the operator. MH Bland describes the rebuild as taking the system from 260 to 1150 passengers per hour, a jump of more than four times. Three towers become two, and the new upper station at Signal Hill is larger than the old one but designed to sit lower against the skyline.

Beyond that, be careful what you read. Figures circulating for the new cabin size, and claims about solar power and step free access, are not stated by MH Bland or the Nature Reserve anywhere we can find. We are not going to repeat them as fact. What is published is the capacity, the tower count and the year. Everything else about the new system is still unannounced.

Is the Top of the Rock still open?

Yes, and this is the thing worth getting straight. The cable car was transport. It was never the attraction. The Gibraltar Nature Reserve, which contains everything people come up for, has stayed open throughout.

St Michael's Cave, the Great Siege Tunnels, the Skywalk, the Moorish Castle, the Windsor Suspension Bridge and the viewpoints are all operating. Our Rock of Gibraltar guide covers what to do once you are up there. The reserve runs 09:00 to 18:15 in winter with last entry at 17:45, and 09:30 to 19:15 in summer with last entry at 18:45. It closes on 25 December and 1 January.

Option one: walk up

Walking costs you nothing beyond the reserve ticket, and on a clear morning it is the better experience. Pedestrian routes climb from Jews' Gate, from the Moorish Castle end of town and from Devil's Gap. From the town centre to the upper viewpoints is roughly an hour of steady uphill on paved road and path, longer if you stop.

The Mediterranean Steps are the route people ask about, and there is a detail here worth knowing before you set out. A rockfall closed them in May 2026. The Government reopened them at noon on 26 June 2026 after emergency safety works, with temporary protective fencing at the affected section. Permanent repairs to the retaining wall had not started when that notice was issued, and the temporary measures stay until they are done. So the steps are open, but check for notices before you commit to them, because the permanent works may close them again.

Allow between one and two hours for the steps depending on where you start and how fit you are. They are steep and uneven in places. Proper shoes, not sandals. Carry water between June and September, when the south face holds the heat all afternoon.

If you have the legs, walking up is better than the ride it replaced. The cabins crossed the view. On foot you are in it.

Option two: the official taxi Rock tour

If walking is not the plan, the licensed Rock tours drive you up, stop at the main sights and sort the reserve entry for you. A standard tour runs about an hour and a half to two hours.

On price, we would rather be honest than tidy. We could not find a published tariff from the Gibraltar Taxi Association, and the figures quoted around the web disagree with each other by a wide margin. Recent accounts put a shared seat at roughly 40 to 50 GBP per person with reserve entry included, and a private vehicle for up to six at roughly 360 to 390 GBP including entry. An earlier version of this page quoted 22 to 25 GBP per adult. We can no longer stand that figure up, so we have withdrawn it. Confirm the price and exactly what is bundled before you get in.

What a day on the Upper Rock actually costs

The reserve ticket is the real cost now that there is no cable car fare. The official Nature Reserve prices are 30 GBP for an adult, meaning anyone over 11, and 22 GBP for a child aged 5 to 11, with under fives free. Proof of age is asked for at the gate. That ticket covers the attractions inside the reserve.

One thing the closure quietly took with it: the free shuttle from the frontier to the lower station was bundled with a cable car ticket, so with no cable car ticket on sale there is no shuttle. Budget for the walk from the border, about twenty five minutes to Grand Parade, or a short taxi hop. It is the kind of small thing that reshapes a morning if you only find out about it at the frontier.

For a family of two adults and two children aged 5 to 11, walking up, that is 104 GBP and no transport cost. The same family on a private taxi tour is closer to 390 GBP with entry included. Two adults buying shared taxi seats sit somewhere between the two. Knowing which of those three numbers you are aiming at is most of the planning.

Can you still see the monkeys?

Yes, and it is the question that comes up more than any other. The Barbary macaques are the only wild monkey population in Europe and they live on the Upper Rock, not in the cable car. Several hundred of them range across a handful of troops, most reliably seen around the Apes' Den and the upper viewpoints.

The building works have not moved them. Walk or ride up and you will almost certainly meet some. Do not feed them and do not touch them: feeding carries a fine and a bitten hand ends a holiday. Our guide to the macaques covers how to behave around them properly.

Should you still come in 2026?

Yes. The closure changes how you get up the Rock, not whether it is worth going up. A territory of under seven square kilometres holds wartime tunnels, a Neanderthal cave system, the Skywalk and Europa Point, and you can cross the whole of it on foot in a morning.

There is also a date worth putting in the diary now. On 2 August 2027 a total solar eclipse crosses Gibraltar, with about four minutes and twenty eight seconds of totality around 10:48 local time. For comparison, Cadiz gets under three minutes and Malaga under two: Gibraltar sits better than either. If the cable car reopens during 2027 it will reopen into the busiest summer the Rock has had. Our eclipse guide explains why the summit is not the best place to watch it from.

For the rest of a trip, the 48 hours in Gibraltar itinerary fits the Rock and the town into a weekend, and the Skywalk guide covers the viewpoint that has taken over as the photograph everyone comes back with.

Where to stay while the cable car is down

With no ride to the top, where you sleep matters more than it used to, because you will be walking further than you planned. Victory Suites is a purpose built apart hotel on Devils Tower Road with 100+ serviced apartments, three minutes from the airport terminal and a flat walk from the Upper Rock entrances rather than a climb before the climb.

Each apartment has a full kitchen, a separate living area and air conditioning, which is the difference between a long day on the Rock and a long day on the Rock followed by a restaurant you did not want. The building has an indoor pool and a gym for legs that have done the Mediterranean Steps, and a business lounge. Rates step down at seven nights and again at a month. We sell through 300+ booking channels and the direct rate is the best of them.

Plan your visit

So: the cable car is shut until 2027, the Rock is open, and the two ways up are your own legs or a licensed taxi. Budget 30 GBP a head for the reserve, start early in summer, and check the notices on the Mediterranean Steps before you rely on them. Book your stay direct with Victory Suites and use us as the base. When the new system finally opens, we will update this page the same day.