For price and convenience, the Paris Métro can't be beat. It has some 366 stations throughout the city, so there is bound to be a Métro station near where you want to go.

Single Métro tickets cost 1.40€, but if you ask for un carnet (a booklet) you will get ten (loose) tickets for 11.40€, dropping the price per ticketby 18% to 1.14€.

Métro stations are marked by a variety of signs, including "M," "Métro," and ones reading Métropolitain. The trains run from 5:30 am to past midnight (24:00), finishing up their final runs after 01:00 am.

On most journeys, you will have to change lines at least once. Even if you have to change twice, trains arrive and depart so frequently (about every 3 minutes), and operate so fast, that this is not a hindrance, although the walk between lines can be long—even five or ten minutes—in some large stations such as Châtelet, the largest subway station in Europe.

Route Maps & Plans du Quartiers
Every Métro station has route maps of the system. Near the exit is a plan du quartier, a map of the streets and buildings surrounding each Métro station. The maps are pictorial and very detailed, so you can see exactly where you will be standing when you emerge from a particular Métro exit stairway. Consult the plan du quartier before you exit the station. You may want to use a different exit stairway so as to be on the other side of a busy street.

Safety
The Paris Métro is quite safe most of the time. Precautions are in order in the northern parts of the city, in deserted stations late at night, and in those long corridors between stations late at night.

As a tourist, you are a special mark.

You may feel safer riding in the front-most (head) car of the train, where the engineer is.

Pickpockets
A special warning is in order against pickpockets(pickpockets in French) who operate in every subway system in the world. In Paris, these include bands of children who will jostle or surround you, distract you by rushing around or waving something in your face, pick your pockets clean, and disappear, all in only a few seconds.

Do not let them near you!

Be rude if you have to, but keep them at bay if you value your valuables.

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