An adult day pass on Los Angeles' two sightseeing networks starts at $50 with Starline City Sightseeing and $59 with Big Bus Tours, and the afternoon traffic that clogs Wilshire Boulevard can push a scheduled coastal loop well past its printed timetable. Both companies run open-top double-deckers between Hollywood and Santa Monica, and both stop running in the middle of the afternoon.
Riding a hop-on hop-off bus covers the Hollywood streetscape without a rental car or a parking garage, but these loops are built for looking rather than for getting somewhere quickly. Anyone who misses a transfer or a last departure finishes the day on a Metro train or in a surge-priced rideshare.
Two operators, two separate systems
Big Bus Tours Los Angeles and Starline City Sightseeing share curbs on Hollywood Boulevard but run separate tickets, stops and routes. Staff scan vouchers at the kerb before boarding, and a pass bought from one company is not accepted on the other's buses.
Both work the same way once you are on: board at any signed stop, ride as far as you like, and step off when something interests you, as long as you are back within your pass window. Starline only has physical signs at a subset of its stops, so the operator's app map is the reliable reference for the rest.
Big Bus runs two loops, the Hollywood Loop (Red Route) with 13 stops and about two hours end to end, and the Beach Loop (Blue Route) out to the coast. On the operator's Los Angeles ticket page, the 24-hour Discover pass costs $59 for adults and $49 for children aged 3 to 12, the 48-hour Essential pass $65, the 72-hour Explore pass $75, the Best of LA package with a two-hour Celebrity Homes tour $79, and a single-loop ticket $45. Commentary is pre-recorded in English, Spanish and Mandarin, with free earphones handed out on board.
Starline's hop-on hop-off timetable covers three interconnecting routes: Hollywood (Red), Santa Monica and Venice (Yellow), and Downtown (Purple). Fares start at $50 for the Red Route alone, $58 for a one-day multi-route pass, $73 for two days and $86 for three. Narration runs in nine languages, including French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Japanese and Korean, and plays through the company's phone app, so bring earbuds and a charged phone. Starline's own FAQ notes that the Downtown route may use minivans in place of double-deckers.
The $59 Big Bus Discover pass covers both loops. The $45 single-loop ticket is worth it only if you plan to stay in Hollywood, because it excludes the coast entirely.
Fares and timetables come from the operators' published pages and change through the year, so check them before you book.
Child fares, luggage and lost paper tickets
Big Bus charges the child rate for ages 3 to 12 and carries under-3s free on an adult's lap; every child aged 15 or under must travel with an adult, and pushchairs have to be folded and stowed on the lower deck. Starline uses the same 3-to-12 child band. Neither company allows luggage, so the loops cannot serve as airport transfers.
Keep the paper boarding pass or yellow ticket you are given when your voucher is scanned. Big Bus states that those tickets cannot be replaced, so a lost slip means paying for a new pass to re-board.
Passes are sold by the hour as well as by the day, and the difference between a rolling 24-hour window and a calendar-day ticket decides whether a late-afternoon start costs you a whole day of validity.
The Hollywood Loop (Red Route)
Stops and timing
Big Bus starts at Stop 1, the visitor centre at 6763 Hollywood Boulevard; Stop 2 is the TCL Chinese Theatre at 6911 Hollywood Boulevard, the stop to use for the handprint forecourt. The full circuit is 13 stops and about two hours without hopping off, and buses run every 45 to 60 minutes, so a five-minute photo stop can cost you a whole cycle. The last Red Route bus leaves Stop 1 at 4:30 PM and reaches Hollywood and Vine (Stop 13) at about 6:10 PM.
Starline's Hollywood route covers the same boulevard under its own stop numbers, from the Dolby Theatre terminal through the Sunset Strip and Beverly Hills and back, also about two hours, with the last full loop leaving the Dolby Theatre at 4:30 PM.
Museum Row without running out of bus
South of Hollywood the route turns onto Fairfax Avenue past Museum Row and The Grove, which is where a loop ticket earns its keep and also where most visitors lose the afternoon. Typical visit lengths:
- Petersen Automotive Museum: 90 minutes for the vault and the concept-car floors.
- Academy Museum of Motion Pictures: two hours or more for the Oscars galleries.
- La Brea Tar Pits: 45 minutes for the lake pits and the fossil lab windows.
- Original Farmers Market and The Grove: an hour for lunch and a lap of the stalls.
Two of those in one afternoon is realistic; three is not, given the 45-to-60-minute headway and the 4:30 PM cut-off. I once tried Petersen and the Academy Museum on the same ticket and finished the last stretch on foot along Fairfax, because the bus I wanted had already been through.
When Hollywood Boulevard closes
Red carpets shut the boulevard several times a year. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences closes all lanes of Hollywood Boulevard between Orange Drive and Highland Avenue for Oscars preparations, and the Hollywood Partnership street-closure alerts list premieres, film festivals and concerts that close the same stretch, sometimes westbound only, sometimes in both directions. Sightseeing buses then skip the Dolby Theatre and Chinese Theatre stops and pick up elsewhere.
Starline does not operate on Oscars Sunday, Thanksgiving or Christmas Day. Both companies post short-notice diversions on their apps and service pages, so it is worth a check on the Big Bus Tours site before you leave the hotel.
Coastal loop and the Beverly Gardens Park transfer
The Stop 7 transfer
Both operators send coast-bound passengers through one transfer in Beverly Hills. On Big Bus it is Stop 7 at 9385 Santa Monica Boulevard, beside the "Playground" artwork in Beverly Gardens Park; on Starline it is Stop 7 at 9333 W 3rd Street behind the Beverly Hills courthouse, moving to 444 N Rexford Drive on Sundays.
The Big Bus Beach Loop leaves the park at 10:30 AM, 11:30 AM, 1:00 PM, 2:00 PM and 3:15 PM, plus a late run that reaches Santa Monica Pier and turns back there. A badly timed hop-off costs you the whole gap between departures: I once stepped off the Hollywood bus at 11:35 AM and spent 85 minutes on the bench for the 1:00 PM coach, which is exactly what the published timetable promises.
Santa Monica, Venice and the Downtown route
The Blue Route runs out along Ocean Avenue to Stop 16 at Santa Monica Pier (1450 Ocean Ave), Stop 17 at Santa Monica Beach, Stop 18 at Venice Boardwalk and Stop 19 on Main Street. Starline's Yellow Route covers the same coast under its own stop numbers, and its last departure from the pier leaves later than the Big Bus equivalent.
Starline also runs the only sightseeing loop into Downtown Los Angeles. The Purple Route takes two hours and 15 minutes from the Dolby Theatre past Echo Park, Dodger Stadium, Olvera Street, Little Tokyo, Grand Central Market, the Fashion District and LA Live, with a first departure at 10:45 AM and a last full loop at 3:00 PM.
What the top deck actually shows you
The upper deck is worth paying for on some stretches and close to useless on others.
| What you came to see | From the top deck | What the loop skips |
|---|---|---|
| Walk of Fame, Hollywood Boulevard | A rolling view of the whole block above the crowd, but the bronze stars are too small to read from the seat | Hop off at Stop 2 (TCL Chinese Theatre) for the forecourt and the plaques |
| Hollywood Sign | Brief, hazy glimpses over rooftops | The loop never climbs into the hills; Big Bus sells a separate Celebrity Homes tour for hill viewpoints |
| Sunset Strip (Comedy Store, Whisky a Go Go) | One of the few stretches where the top deck beats the pavement, because the signage and clubs sit at first-floor level | Nothing much, this is a ride-by highlight |
| Rodeo Drive and Beverly Hills | Civic centre, park and boulevard | The shops on Rodeo Drive sit two blocks south of the transfer stop |
| Museum Row (LACMA, Petersen, Academy Museum, La Brea Tar Pits) | Drive-by only, you see facades | Every museum here needs a hop-off, and each one costs an hour or more |
| Venice Beach Boardwalk | Sand and the bike path from Stop 18 at 3400 Barnard Way | The boardwalk crowd and the canals, both on foot |
| Santa Monica Pier | The pier entrance and the bay from Stop 16 | The pier deck, the aquarium and the view back to the mountains |
Traffic, tracking and the deadlines that matter
Wilshire and the 405
The loops use Wilshire Boulevard to cross between Hollywood and the coast, and every coastal bus has to get past the Interstate 405 interchange at Westwood. Big Bus publishes the Beach Loop at one hour and 45 minutes under clear conditions; in the afternoon peak that is optimistic, and the company points riders to its live service page when roadworks or events change the route. Starline's FAQ is blunter about the city it drives in, and both operators answer the same question the same way: a bus is on the way, call if you have been waiting.
Scheduled runtimes and actual runtimes part company on this corridor, which is why the printed brochure is a rough guide and the app is the working one. Big Bus tracks its buses live and publishes estimated arrivals; on Starline routes the same job falls to the City Sightseeing app.
The only deadline list you need
| Loop and stop | Last departure that still gets you back |
|---|---|
| Big Bus Red Route, Stop 1 (6763 Hollywood Blvd) | 4:30 PM; Hollywood and Vine at about 6:10 PM |
| Big Bus Blue Route, Beverly Gardens Park (Stop 7) | 3:15 PM; the final run reaches Santa Monica Pier only |
| Big Bus Blue Route, Santa Monica Pier (Stop 16) | 3:45 PM back toward Hollywood |
| Starline Red Route, Dolby Theatre (Stop 1) | 4:30 PM for a full loop |
| Starline Yellow Route, Santa Monica Pier (Stop 57) | 4:20 PM |
| Starline Purple Route, Dolby Theatre (Stop 1) | 3:00 PM for a full loop |
Neither network runs in the evening, so plan dinner and any sunset stop around the Metro or a rideshare rather than around a bus.
Weather on the open deck
Two climates in one ride
Downtown Los Angeles averages a high near 85°F (29°C) in August, while the weather station at LAX, roughly 12 miles closer to the ocean, averages about 77°F (25°C); on heat-wave days the gap runs much wider. Late spring and early summer bring the marine layer locals call May Gray and June Gloom, when the coast sits under low cloud and a cold wind while Hollywood is already in the 80s. On a summer ride the top deck left Hollywood in the low 90s and reached Santa Monica Pier under grey fog with half the upper deck pulling on hoodies.
What to carry
- Sunscreen, SPF 30 or higher, reapplied at the transfer stop.
- A cap with a chin strap, since crosswinds on Santa Monica Boulevard take loose hats.
- Sunglasses for glare off car roofs on the approach to the 405.
- A packable windbreaker or fleece for the coastal end of the line.
The lower deck is enclosed and warmer, and it is the place to sit out the final stretch if the wind or the stop-start diesel fumes on Wilshire get to you.
Using Metro for the trip back
Fares and travel times
Metro charges $1.75 a ride with free transfers inside two hours, and fare capping stops the total at $5 a day and $18 across seven days; children under 6 ride free with a fare-paying adult, per the LA Metro fares page. Against a $50 to $86 sightseeing pass that is the cheapest way to cover the same ground.
The B Line subway runs from Hollywood/Highland to 7th Street/Metro Center in about 17 minutes with trains every 15 minutes, and the E Line light rail covers Downtown Santa Monica to 7th Street/Metro Center in about 45 minutes. Timetables for both are on Metro's schedules and maps page.
| Travel metric | Hop-on hop-off bus (Big Bus / Starline) | LA Metro rail (B Line subway and E Line light rail) |
|---|---|---|
| Adult daily fare | $50.00 to $59.00 | $1.75 per ride ($5.00 daily cap with TAP) |
| Child fare policy | Free under 3 (on lap); $49.00 for ages 3 to 12 | Free under age 6 with a fare-paying adult |
| Hollywood to Downtown LA | 2 hours 15 minutes (Starline Purple Route) | 17 minutes (LA Metro B Line subway) |
| Downtown LA to Santa Monica | 90 to 120+ minutes in surface traffic | 45 minutes (LA Metro E Line light rail) |
| Operating hours | Shuts down between 3:15 PM and 4:30 PM | Runs from early morning until approximately midnight |
Neither rail line stops at the Sunset Strip, Beverly Hills or Museum Row, so a Metro-only day means extra walking or a local bus for those, and the Line 20 down Wilshire is the usual substitute. The trade-off, and the reason the bus still sells, is the view: an elevated seat, open air and narration that no train offers. The same trip by rideshare avoids the walk to the station but sits in the same Wilshire traffic, and the differences show up clearly in a bus, Uber and Metro time comparison.
Is a hop-on hop-off pass worth it?
Who the pass suits
A pass makes sense for a first visit of one or two days, when the point is to see the sweep of Hollywood, Beverly Hills and the coast from an open deck, and when nobody in the group wants to drive. It makes less sense for anyone on a tight budget, travelling with children under six, or working around timed museum entries, because the loops are slow and finish early. For a tight budget, the Metro alternative in this comparison of hop-on buses and public transit usually wins on both cost and speed.
Riding west on the bus, returning east on the rails
- 10:00 AM: board the Big Bus Red Route at Stop 1 on Hollywood Boulevard and ride the Sunset Strip and Beverly Hills from the top deck.
- 11:30 AM: step off at Stop 7 (Beverly Gardens Park) and pick up the Beach Loop.
- 12:30 PM: reach Stop 16 at Santa Monica Pier; leave the timetable behind and have lunch on the pier or in the market on the promenade.
- After 4:00 PM: walk east along Colorado Avenue to Downtown Santa Monica station instead of waiting for the last bus.
- Return: take the E Line to 7th Street/Metro Center, change to the B Line, and ride back to Hollywood/Highland.
That return costs $1.75 with a tap, skips both the afternoon deadline and the evening crawl up Wilshire, and leaves the day open-ended at the coast. Multi-day passes on both networks must be used on consecutive days, and Starline will extend a pass by 24 hours for $20 if you buy the extension from the driver before it expires.