The live camera in Vatican City is positioned to capture St. Peter’s Square, offering a real-time view of its grand architecture and the daily movement of pilgrims and tourists. From this vantage point, viewers can see St. Peter’s Basilica, including its impressive façade and towering dome, as well as the iconic central obelisk and Bernini’s curved colonnades. The feed provides a glimpse of Vatican life—papal events, religious ceremonies, and the bustle of visitors—showcasing the spiritual and historical heart of the world’s smallest independent state.
About Vatican City
Also known as
Vatican City, officially the Vatican City State, often shortened as the Vatican, is a landlocked sovereign city-state. Ruled by the pope, it is an enclave within Rome and serves as the administrative centre of the Catholic Church. Vatican City is governed by the See of Rome, commonly known as the Holy See, itself a sovereign entity under international law, which maintains its temporal power, governance, diplomacy, and spiritual independence. Vatican is also used as a metonym for the Holy See, which is the central governing body of the Catholic Church and Vatican City, comprising the pope and the Roman Curia. The independent state of Vatican City came into existence in 1929 via the Lateran Treaty between the Holy See and the Kingdom of Italy, which spoke of it as a new creation, not as a vestige of the much larger Papal States (756–1870), which had previously encompassed much of Central Italy.
