We tried sooo many times over a period of days to buy tickets through the app to no success. We went in person and talked with the workers outside and they were of no help. They told us that was the only way and they offered no solutions for how to get tickets. We saw the red Barcelona tourism info booth on Carrer de Sardenya, in front of Plaça Sagrada Familia. They were super helpful and immediately able to get us tickets. My advice to fellow travelers- don’t waste time trying to buy tickets on the app if it doesn’t work the first time. Just go in person to the booth! It’s not officially connected to the Sagrada Familia foundation and that’s why the workers at the building won’t tell you about it. As an additional note, it seems like some credit cards from non-European countries don’t work on the app due to differences in security features. That’s the only reason I could find as to why my visa didn’t work.

Whoever designed this needs to be fired. The App is just a holder using the website and it’s not even good at that. The form entries time out and then a error is just shown with letting me know what the error actually is. We used the site and got more “in” only to get some error trying to use the credit card (U.S.) No one is the U.S. has a 2-factor credit card. Why not just use Apple Pay in an IOS App? That’s far more secure than using a debit card - which no one should be using for purchases. After around a dozen attempts on our phone, various laptop browsers, we just decided not to visit this place. Obviously with this horrible system to get tickets, they don’t want direct visitors. Maybe only tour operators who can charge far more.

You can only buy tickets for the cathedral through the app, but the ticket purchasing function always results in a generic error. UNLESS you are connected to the local wifi there. So it’s not buying tickets ahead of time so much as show up an hour before you want to go in to futz around with their terrible app then wait for your turn. It’s like the 1980s except only the visitor is wasting their time waiting now. Sheesh. I never ended up going inside because I was so annoyed by all this.

I had no glitches with purchasing or downloading the audio guide using my home WIFI. The app does warn that if you use a credit card, you will need to have the ability to do a 2 step verification with your bank. This meant that I got a pop up window asking me to go to my bank app and verify the purchase. Once I did this, I returned to the app, clicked verification completed, and the purchase went through. All without a glitch and in less than 3 min. I hope this is helpful!