The Paris Metro, short for Métropolitain, is a rapid transit system serving the Paris metropolitan area in Île-de-France, the region of France's capital. A symbol of the city, it is known for its density within the capital's territorial limits, as well as its uniform architecture and historical entrances influenced by Art Nouveau. The system is long, mostly underground, as well as its 321 stations of which 61 allow the riders to transfer between the sixteen lines The Montmartre funicular is considered to be part of the metro system within which is represented by a 303rd fictive station, "Funiculaire".Statistiques Syndicat des transports d'Île-de-France rapport 2005 (in French) states 297 stations + Olympiades + Les Agnettes + Les Courtilles (with an additional four under construction and one in project), all numbered 1 to 14, with two extra branches, 3bis and 7bis, named such as they are former parts of Lines 3 and 7 respectively. Three of these lines (1, 4 and 14) are fully automated, and the additional four are also planned as such. Lines are identified on maps by an individual number and an associated specific colour, all part of an official palette, with the traveling direction indicated by the terminus, the last stop on each line. All trains travel from one end of the line to the other, serving every station along the way. The Paris Metro is operated by the Régie autonome des transports parisiens (RATP), which also operates part of the RER (commuter standard train) network, most of the tram lines and many bus routes around and within Paris itself.
It is the second-busiest metro system in Europe, as well as the twelfth-busiest in the world. It carried 1.523 billion passengers in 2025, roughly 4.17 million passengers a day, which makes it the most used public transport system in Paris, even more than the RER which uses higher-capacity standard-gauge trains. It is one of the densest metro systems in the world, with 244 stations within the of the City of Paris. Châtelet–Les Halles, with five Metro and three RER commuter rail lines, is one of the world's largest metro stations. The system generally has poor accessibility for people with reduced mobility due to its old age (established 126 years ago) and because most of the current infrastructure was built before accessibility standards emerged, with only few stations retrofitted since. However, all new infrastructure and rolling stock meets current accessibility standards, including modern extensions of historic lines.
The first line opened without ceremony on 19 July 1900, during the World's Fair (). The system expanded quickly until World War I, with its core complete by the 1920s. Extensions into the suburbs were started in the 1930s. The network reached saturation after World War II and new trains were built in order to allow higher traffic, but further improvements were limited by the network's design and, in particular, the short distances between stations. In 1998, Line 14 opened with the intention to relieve RER A. The eastbound extension of Line 11 towards in 2024 is the network's most recent extension. A large expansion programme known as the Grand Paris Express (GPE) is currently under construction with four new orbital Metro lines (named lines 15, 16, 17 and 18) around the Île-de-France region, outside the limits of Paris, in order to alleviate the traffic on the near-exclusively radial historic network. Further plans exist for Line 1 east, Line 7 north, Line 10 east, Line 12 south and a merger of Lines 3bis and 7bis, as well as a new proposed Line 19 in the city's northernmost urbanised suburbs across the Val-d'Oise department.
Besides the Metro, central Paris and its urban area are served by five RER lines (602 km or 374 mi with 257 stations), fourteen tramway lines (186.6 km or 115.9 mi with 278 stations), nine Transilien suburban trains (1,299 km or 807 mi with 392 stations), in addition to three VAL lines at Charles de Gaulle Airport and Orly Airport. This makes Paris one of the best served cities by public transportation in the world. Despite the network's uniform architecture, several of its stations stand out because of their unique design. The Metro itself has become an icon in popular culture, being frequently featured in cinema and mentioned in music. In 2021, the RATP started offering an umbrella lending service at several Metro and RER stations, highlighting the Metro's own rabbit mascot, which advises children on staying away from the closing doors.
Naming
Metro is the abbreviated name of the company that originally operated most of the network: the Empain group subsidiary Compagnie du chemin de fer métropolitain de Paris S.A. (Paris Metropolitan Railway Company Ltd), also known as CMP. The name was directly inspired by the 1863 London Metropolitan Railway (), which had been commonly abbreviated as "métropolitain" in French since the late Second Empire.
CMP was known as "Le Métropolitain", which quickly became abbreviated to Métro, which became a common designation and brand name for rapid transit systems in France and elsewhere. 'Metro' has been adopted in many languages, making it the most used word for an urban rapid transit system.
The Metro is operated by the Régie autonome des transports parisiens (RATP), a public transport authority that also operates part of the RER network, light rail lines and many bus routes within and around Paris.
History
By 1845, Paris and the railway companies were already thinking about an urban railway system to link inner districts of the city. The railway companies and the French government wanted to extend mainline railways into a new underground network, whereas the Parisians favoured a new and independent network and feared national takeover of any system it built. The disagreement lasted from 1856 to 1890. Meanwhile, the population became denser and traffic congestion grew massively. The deadlock put pressure on the authorities and gave the city the green light.
Prior to 1845, the urban transport network consisted primarily of a large number of omnibus lines, consolidated by the French government into a regulated system with fixed and unconflicting routes and schedules. The first concrete proposal for an urban rail system in Paris was put forward by civil engineer Florence de Kérizouet. This plan called for a surface cable car system. In 1855, civil engineers Edouard Brame and Eugène Flachat proposed an underground freight urban railway, due to the high rate of accidents on surface rail lines.
Paris had orbital railways before it had a metro: the Petite Ceinture inside the city walls, built from 1852 to 1869 with 40% of underground sections for merchandise transport, then passengers service from 14 July 1862 beginning on the north and east section of Clichy-Bercy with underground parts, and the Grande Ceinture, finished in 1886 further out.
On 19 November 1871 the General Council of the Seine commissioned a team of 40 engineers to plan an urban rail network. This team proposed a network with a pattern of routes "resembling a cross enclosed in a circle" with axial routes following large boulevards. On 11 May 1872 the Council endorsed the plan, but the French government turned down the plan. After this point, a serious debate occurred over whether the new system should consist of elevated lines or of mostly underground lines; this debate involved numerous parties in France, including Victor Hugo, Guy de Maupassant, and the Eiffel Society of Gustave Eiffel, and continued until 1892. Eventually the underground option emerged as the preferred solution because of the high cost of buying land for rights-of-way in central Paris required for elevated lines, estimated at 70,000 francs per metre of line for a -wide railway.
The last remaining hurdle was the city's concern about national interference in its urban rail system. The city commissioned renowned engineer Jean-Baptiste Berlier, who designed Paris's postal network of pneumatic tubes, to design and plan its rail system in the early 1890s. Berlier recommended a special track gauge of (versus the standard gauge of ) to protect the system from national takeover, which inflamed the issue substantially. The issue was finally settled when the Minister of Public Works begrudgingly recognised the city's right to build a local system on 22 November 1895, and by the city's secret designing of the trains and tunnels to be too narrow for mainline trains, while adopting standard gauge as a compromise with the state.
Fulgence Bienvenüe project
On 20 April 1896, Paris adopted the Fulgence Bienvenüe project, which was to serve only the city proper of Paris. Many Parisians worried that extending lines to industrial suburbs would reduce the safety of the city. Paris forbade lines to the inner suburbs and, as a guarantee, Metro trains were to run on the right, as opposed to existing suburban lines, which ran on the left.
Unlike many other subway systems (such as that of London), this system was designed from the outset as a unified system, initially of nine lines. Such a large project required a private-public arrangement right from the outset – the city would build most of the permanent way, while a private concessionaire company would supply the trains and power stations, and lease the system (each line separately, for initially 39-year leases). In July 1897, six bidders competed, and The Compagnie Generale de Traction, owned by the Belgian Baron Édouard Empain, won the contract; this company was then immediately reorganised as the Compagnie du chemin de fer métropolitain.
Construction began in November 1898. The first line, Porte Maillot–Porte de Vincennes, was inaugurated on 19 July 1900 during the Paris World's Fair. Entrances to stations were designed in Art Nouveau style by Hector Guimard. Eighty-six of his entrances are still in existence.
Bienvenüe's project consisted of 10 lines, which correspond to current Lines 1 to 9. Construction was so intense that by 1920, despite a few changes from schedule, most lines had been completed. The shield method of construction was rejected in favor of the cut-and-cover method in order to speed up work. Bienvenüe, a highly regarded engineer, designed a special procedure of building the tunnels to allow the swift repaving of roads, and is credited with a largely swift and relatively uneventful construction through the difficult and heterogeneous soils and rocks.
Line 1 and Line 4 were conceived as central east–west and north–south lines. Two lines, ligne 2 Nord (Line 2 North) and ligne 2 Sud (Line 2 South), were also planned but Line 2 South was merged with Line 5 in 1906. Line 3 was an additional east–west line to the north of line 1 and line 5 an additional north to south line to the east of Line 4. Line 6 would run from Nation to Place d'Italie. Lines 7, 8 and 9 would connect commercial and office districts around the Opéra to residential areas in the north-east and the south-west. Bienvenüe also planned a circular line, the ligne circulaire intérieure, to connect the six mainline stations. A section opened in 1923 between Invalides and the Boulevard Saint-Germain before the plan was abandoned.
Nord-Sud competing network
On 31 January 1904, a second concession was granted to the Société du chemin de fer électrique souterrain Nord-Sud de Paris (Paris North-South underground electrical railway company), abbreviated to the Nord-Sud (North-South) company. It was responsible for building three proposed lines: Line A would join Montmartre to Montparnasse as an additional north–south line to the west of Line 4. Line B would serve the north-west of Paris by connecting Saint-Lazare station to Porte de Clichy and Porte de Saint-Ouen.