On a budget, Tram 28 still earns its price.
€3.10 onboard / cheaper on Navegante card
When it works — an off-peak winter morning, a seat by the open window — the 28 is pure Lisbon: the wooden carriage groans and tilts up gradients no modern tram could climb, the bell clangs, and you brush past laundry lines and tiled facades close enough to touch. That's the payoff everyone's chasing. The problem is everyone's chasing it: in season it's a standing-room sardine tin where you see nothing but other tourists' backs, pickpockets work the crush, and you queue 30+ minutes at Martim Moniz for the privilege. The honest verdict — ride it at 7am for the real thing, or accept that the famous loop has been loved to death and just walk the same streets, which is where the magic actually lives.