Is Matera Part Of Puglia?

Matera is a city of about 59,368 residents in the region of Basilicata, southern Italy, and no, it is not part of Puglia. The confusion is understandable and almost universal: Matera sits directly on the regional border, the neighbouring province of Bari wraps around it on three sides, and the drive to Bari takes about an hour. The city is inland, at about 400 m above sea level on the edge of the Gravina canyon, with the Murgia plateau opposite. There is no sea at Matera. The coast, at Polignano a Mare, Bari or Metaponto, is a day trip away.

The question matters for practical reasons, not just trivia. Train times, tourist taxes, regional transport and even some travel insurance wording follow the region, and Basilicata and Puglia are two separate administrative regions of Italy. This page, maintained as part of the Matera Travel Guide, sets out what the sources say.

Is Matera Part Of Puglia?

No. Matera is the capital of the province of Matera, within the region of Basilicata, in southern Italy. Puglia is a different region that begins a few kilometres east and north of the city. The border is close enough that Bari, Alberobello and Gravina in Puglia are all easy day trips by road, but every regional statistic for Matera, from tourist arrivals to transport concessions, is counted under Basilicata, never under Puglia.

The clean way to hold the geography in your head is this: Basilicata is the instep of the Italian boot, an inland, sparsely populated region between Puglia to the east and Calabria and Campania to the west. Matera is its second city and its most visited place by a wide margin. Puglia is the heel and the flat coastal plain on the other side of the border, home to Bari, Lecce, Ostuni and the trulli of Alberobello.

The APT Basilicata data makes the regional accounting explicit. Matera's registered accommodation logged 479,083 arrivals and 748,812 overnight stays in 2025, figures published by the Basilicata tourism board for the city of Matera. In 2025, 57.4% of those arrivals came from abroad, and in September, the busiest month of the year at 61,630 arrivals, 74.5% came from abroad. Those are Basilicata's numbers, not Puglia's.

Where Is Matera, If Not In Puglia?

Matera stands on the edge of the Gravina canyon in eastern Basilicata, about 64 km by road from Bari Airport and roughly 68 km from the city of Bari, both of which are in Puglia. The old quarters, the Sassi, are Sasso Caveoso and Sasso Barisano: cave dwellings, stone houses and rock-hewn churches cut into pale tufa limestone, inscribed by UNESCO in 1993 as "The Sassi and the Park of the Rupestrian Churches of Matera".

The position on the border is the root of the whole confusion. The city looks east toward Puglian towns, its rail line runs to Bari through Altamura, and its airport is Bari's. UNESCO's own inscription text describes a settlement "adapted perfectly to its geomorphological setting and ecosystem and exhibiting continuity over more than two millennia", with the first occupation during the Palaeolithic. The regional law that created the protected park around the churches is a Basilicata law, Regional Law 11/1990.

Distances help more than adjectives here. The road figures below were computed over OpenStreetMap routing, free-flow, from Matera Centrale station, so they are driving distances without traffic, not door-to-door promises.

Read the table one way and Matera looks like a Puglian city: five of the nine places nearest to it are across the border. Read it the other way and the point of this page stands: every one of those Puglian towns is a trip out of the city, while the Sassi, the rupestrian churches and the Murgia park are in Basilicata, in and around Matera itself. For planning a combined route, the Puglia and Matera itinerary page covers how the two regions chain together, and the Puglia to Matera guide covers the transport options from the Puglian side.

Why Do People Think Matera Is In Puglia?

The mix-up comes from four sources: the city's position on the regional border, the name of the neighbouring Puglian province of Bari that surrounds it on land routes, the fact that almost all flights and trains arrive through Puglia, and years of tour marketing that sold Matera as part of a Puglia circuit. None of that changes the administrative fact, which is that Matera has been in Basilicata since the region's creation and is counted there in every official statistic.

Start with the airport. Bari Airport is the closest, about 64 km and an hour's drive, and it is in Puglia. Travellers who fly in, rent a car and drive west often never register that they crossed a regional line. The rail route reinforces it: the operator on the Bari to Matera line is FAL, Ferrovie Appulo Lucane, whose very name spans the two regions, Apulia and Lucania, the old names for Puglia and Basilicata. There is no Trenitalia station in Matera, and the posted weekday timetable involves a change at Altamura, in Puglia.

Marketing did the rest. After the Sassi became a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1993, and especially after the 2019 European Capital of Culture year and the 2021 Bond film No Time to Die, Matera was folded into "Puglia" itineraries by travel sellers because travellers searching for Puglia outnumbered those searching for Basilicata. The city's own numbers show what that exposure produced: 2025 beat the 2019 Capital of Culture year, with 479,083 arrivals against 388,158 in 2019, a rise of 23.4%, according to the APT Basilicata data.

The practical consequence for a visitor is small but real. Matera charges a tourist tax collected by the accommodation, and the amount is confirmed at booking. Regional transport concessions, museum tariffs and event calendars all answer to Basilicata. And if a tour description promises "Puglia including Matera", read it as a route across two regions, not a single-region trip.

Can You Visit Matera And Puglia On The Same Trip?

Yes, easily. Matera is 68 km from Alberobello, 30 km from Gravina in Puglia and about an hour from Bari by road, so a single trip can cover both regions without long transfers. The border is administrative, not physical: the same road crosses it without any sign of change, and organised day tours run from both sides, from Bari into Matera and from Matera into the Puglian trulli towns.

The most efficient split depends on where you sleep. Staying in Matera keeps you inside the Sassi at night, when the cave district is at its quietest, and puts the Puglian towns within a morning's drive. Staying in Bari does the reverse, with Matera as the day trip. A third option is to move once: nights in Matera, then nights in the Valle d'Itria or Bari. The Gravina in Puglia day trip page covers the closest Puglian town, 30 km away, which is often the first stop on a west-to-east route.

For travellers without a car, the tour option crosses the border for you. The Alberobello and Matera by Private Bus tour pairs the two UNESCO-listed places in one day, and its live listing carries the current price, times and inclusions: Check availability.

Does It Matter Which Region You Say Matera Is In?

For booking and travel logistics, yes, in three places: regional transport, the tourist tax and any official information you look up. FAL's fares, service notices and replacement-bus sheets are Basilicata and Puglia documents together, the tourist tax is set locally by the Matera comune, and museum and event information is published by Basilicata bodies. For everything else, on the ground, the border is invisible and the drive across it takes minutes.

One example shows why the label matters. On Sundays and public holidays no FAL trains run between Bari and Matera at all; the operator runs replacement buses instead, and its posted festive sheet shows 8 arrivals at and 8 departures from Matera Stazione Centrale. That is a fact about a Basilicata-Puglia cross-border line that no purely Puglian travel guide tracks. The same goes for the ZTL camera hours in the Sassi, published by the Matera comune, or the Parco della Murgia's access rules for the Sentiero 406 suspension bridge path, published by the park authority in Basilicata.

The regional identity is also part of the city's story. Matera was European Capital of Culture in 2019, and the foundation that ran it still coordinates the Matera 2026 Mediterranean Capital of Culture and Dialogue programme. Both are Basilicata projects. The Festa della Bruna, the city's patronal feast fixed on 2 July every year since 1389 by the organisers' own history, is a Basilicata institution that predates every modern regional boundary. For more on the city itself, see Is Matera Italy Worth Visiting?.

Common Questions About Matera And Puglia

Is Matera part of Puglia?

No. Matera is in Basilicata, the region west of Puglia. Puglia begins a few kilometres east and north of the city, and Bari, Alberobello and the other Puglian towns are day trips across a regional border.

Is Matera near the sea?

No. Matera is an inland city at about 400 m above sea level on the edge of the Gravina canyon. The nearest coasts are a day trip away: Metaponto on the Ionian at 47 km, and Polignano a Mare and Bari on the Adriatic at 100 km and 68 km by road.

Is Basilicata the same as Puglia?

No. They are two separate regions of Italy. Basilicata is the inland instep of the boot, its capital Potenza; Puglia is the heel and the coastal plain to the east, its capital Bari. Matera is Basilicata's second city.

Can you day trip from Bari to Matera?

Yes. Bari is 68 km and about an hour by road, and the FAL railway links the two with a change at Altamura, in about 1 h 45 to 2 h on the posted weekday timetable. No trains run on Sundays and public holidays, when FAL substitutes buses, so check the operator's timetable page before travelling.

Why do Puglia itineraries include Matera?

Because the city sits on the regional border and sells well alongside the Puglian towns. Grouping it with Alberobello, Bari and Polignano a Mare makes a coherent driving route even though it crosses from Puglia into Basilicata and back.

The short version to carry with you: say Basilicata, book through Puglia, and enjoy the fact that the border between them is one of the easiest crossings in southern Italy.