Winter in the Dolomites: best towns, ski areas & winter experiences

Winter in the Dolomites feels like stepping into a snow-dusted film set: sharp limestone peaks, pine forests heavy with snow, and villages that look almost too pretty to be real. 

This corner of northern Italy is only going to be more in the spotlight thanks to the Winter Olympics this year, having already been counted among the world’s best travel destinations for 2026.

Acknowledged as one of the best winter holiday destinations in Italy, the region is also unusual culturally. In South Tyrol, Italian, German, and Ladin mingle on menus and street signs, which makes it feel a bit like Italy and Austria had a beautiful, snow-covered baby. For English-speaking visitors, it’s a fairly easy part of Italy to navigate, with good tourism infrastructure, reliable winter transport on main routes, and plenty of locals who speak at least some English.

Choosing where to stay in the Dolomites can be surprisingly tricky because the mountains are spread over a wide area and the character changes a lot from valley to valley. Some places are classic resort towns where almost everyone is on holiday, while others are proper cities with museums, universities and commuters in puffer jackets.

Cortina d’Ampezzo is the sleek, snow-dusted face of the Dolomites, with sharp peaks all around. It has long been recognised as one of the top Italian ski resorts, increasingly popular for second-home buyers seeking a bit of luxury. However, the area has seen property prices soar recently, thanks to the 2026 Winter Olympics. Cortina feels very much like a classic Alpine resort town, where most people are either heading to the slopes or heading out for aperitivo.

Why use Cortina as your winter base
Cortina works well as a base if you want easy access to a big ski area, a wide choice of hotels and plenty of non-ski distractions in the evenings. You’re plugged into the vast Dolomiti Superski network, there are ski schools and guides for all levels, and transfers from Venice and Treviso are relatively straightforward.

Falcade is a smaller, more low-key village surrounded by wooded slopes and jagged ridgelines. It has a church spire and a handful of traditional buildings at its core. The pace here is slower and more local than in the big-name resorts, and evenings tend to be about hearty food and early nights rather than nightlife.

Why use Falcade as your winter base
Falcade is a good choice if you want proper Dolomites scenery and access to Dolomiti Superski pistes without Cortina-level prices or crowds. It suits families and couples who’d rather stay somewhere peaceful and spend their days between skiing, snowshoeing and long lunches in mountain huts. 

Trento sits in a valley at the foothills of the Dolomites and is recognised as having the best quality of life in Italy. It boasts castle towers, painted façades and a compact historic centre that feels cosy once the temperatures drop. It’s very much a lived-in city rather than a resort, so you’ll be sharing the streets with students, office workers and families as well as other visitors.

Why use Trento as your winter base
The underrated Italian city of Trento makes a smart base if you’d like a winter break with more culture than ski miles. Think museums, wine bars and day trips up to nearby ski areas instead of a week of nothing but lifts. You can reach slopes like Monte Bondone or Paganella in under an hour while keeping all the advantages of staying in a city.

If you’re used to the damp greyness of a British winter, the brighter light and drier cold can actually feel easier to handle. In general, you can expect daytime winter temperatures in the Dolomites to hover somewhere between -5°C and 5°C at village and city level.

Cities like Trento and Bolzano often sit a couple of degrees warmer than higher-altitude resorts, while the mountains above stay firmly snow-covered. Snowfall is most common from December through to March, though artificial snowmaking on major pistes helps keep ski seasons running even if natural snowfall is patchy. The famous “inversion” days – with mist in the valleys and blazing sun on the ski slopes – are surprisingly frequent, so sunglasses are just as essential as gloves.