The Chamonix valley has four main ski areas, and only two of them are joined by a lift: Brévent and Flégère. Where you stay matters as much as how well your group skis, because you do that journey to the lifts every morning.
- Chamonix has four main ski areas: Brévent-Flégère, Les Grands Montets, Balme and Les Houches. None of them is lift-linked to another, apart from Brévent and Flégère, two sectors joined by a cable car.
- One pass, the CHAMONIX Le Pass, covers three of them: 110 km of pistes, 86 runs and 43 lifts, between 1,030 and 2,765 m. Les Houches is sold separately.
- As a rule, Brévent-Flégère suits most groups, including mixed-ability ones: two sectors on one pass, and the easiest to reach from Chamonix and from Les Praz.
- Switching areas means coming back down to the valley and taking a bus, a train or the car. A valid lift pass doubles as your bus ticket.
- The four areas don't open and close on the same dates. To catch all four open at once, plan between 19 December and 4 April in the 2026-27 season; Les Grands Montets alone runs from 5 December to 2 May.
How many ski areas does Chamonix actually have?
Ask that question and you will be told four, five or eleven, depending on which page you land on.
The Ski Club of Great Britain counts four. Several valley guides count five, one of them by treating the Aiguille du Midi as a ski area, which it is not. One well-known resort database counts eleven and totals 170 km of pistes, compared with the 110 km the valley pass actually covers.
Part of the gap comes down to where you draw the boundary. The valley spans several communes, and a count that stops at Chamonix itself leaves out Les Houches and Vallorcine. The rest of the gap comes from the beginner areas, which some sources fold into the total and others ignore.
One fact sits underneath all of it. The operator states it plainly on the page for its own valley pass: its ski areas are not linked to each other, apart from Brévent-Flégère.
So you pick an area in the morning, you ski it all day, and you come down where you went up. That applies between areas, not inside them: within a single area you can drop over from one side to the other as you like. Brévent and Flégère are the only pair of areas joined to each other, by that cable car high above the bowl. Nowhere else can you ski from one area into the next before lunch, the way you would in the linked resorts of the Tarentaise or the Portes du Soleil.
It also makes Chamonix hard to compare with anywhere else on paper. Two sources quoting piste kilometres are rarely counting the same mountains.
Read more: Where to stay in Chamonix: which area for a group chalet
The four main Chamonix ski areas compared
The four areas differ in altitude, aspect and who they suit. Those things decide a day out far more reliably than a piste-kilometre figure, and the opening dates further down complete the picture.
| Ski area | Altitude | Terrain and aspect | Best for | Valley pass | Access |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brévent-Flégère | 1,030 to 2,525 m | Due south | Everyone but complete beginners, and groups who want to stay together | Yes | Chamonix or Les Praz, bus line 1 |
| Les Grands Montets | 1,235 to 2,765 m, summit closed | North | Strong skiers, steep terrain | Yes | Argentière, bus line 2 or train |
| Balme, Le Tour, Vallorcine | 1,453 to 2,270 m on the Le Tour side | Two sides: Le Tour in the sun, Vallorcine in the trees | Families, anyone happy on a blue | Yes | Le Tour on line 2, Vallorcine by train |
| Les Houches, Saint-Gervais | 950 to 1,900 m | Wooded and sheltered | Families, poor visibility days | No, separate pass | Les Houches, bus line 1 or train |
Brévent-Flégère, Les Grands Montets and Balme all sit on the same valley pass. Les Houches is sold on its own, which makes it the one area you cannot decide on over breakfast.
Brévent-Flégère, two sectors on one pass
Brévent-Flégère covers two sectors on the Aiguilles Rouges, the side of the valley that looks straight across at the Mont Blanc massif. It runs from 1,030 to 2,525 m and backs onto a nature reserve.
Each side has its own lift out of the valley. The Planpraz gondola goes up to Brévent from the centre of Chamonix, and the Flégère gondola from the village of Les Praz, 3 km (2 miles) further up the valley. A cable car called the Liaison, which is its actual name, links the two high above the bowl between them.
It is the only place in the valley where two separate ski areas are joined by a lift, and that alone explains why it suits most groups. Two sectors on one pass means that much more terrain before anyone has to get on a bus.
Facing due south is a blessing and a curse. You get sun all day and Mont Blanc straight ahead, but the snow softens fast in the afternoon once the season wears on. Brévent has the snowpark, and Flégère a timed slalom course.
Les Grands Montets, the highest and the longest open
Les Grands Montets, above Argentière, faces north. Snow holds better here than anywhere else in the valley, and the season proves it: close to five months, from 5 December to 2 May.
These days you ski it without its summit. The top at 3,275 m has been shut since the fire that destroyed the lift station at Lognan, so you now take the Plan Joran gondola from Argentière, which drops you at 2,134 m.
Chairlifts above take you on to 2,765 m, the highest point you can currently ski. A cable car designed by Renzo Piano is due to reopen the summit, though no date has been announced.
This is the area for confident skiers: steep terrain, big vertical and the off-piste routes that made its name. Take a guide and the full avalanche kit for those, and never head out on impulse.
An average skier with someone who knows the mountain will enjoy a day here on the lower runs, but a full week would grind them down. It is the area you do for a day or two, not the one where you base the group.
Balme, Le Tour and Vallorcine, the widest pistes
Balme sits at the head of the valley, on the Swiss border, and has two faces. On the Le Tour side, the Charamillon gondola brings you out onto wide, gentle, sunlit pistes looking down the whole valley. The other side drops towards Vallorcine, into darker, more sheltered trees.
It starts higher than anywhere else: 1,453 m on the Le Tour side, compared with 1,030 m at Brévent-Flégère. Snow holds better at the bottom of the runs, which matters in December and again in April.
Its highest point is the lowest of the three areas on the valley pass, at 2,270 m, and Le Tour is eleven kilometres (7 miles) from the centre of Chamonix. If your group wants wide, forgiving pistes rather than vertical drop, this is the one.
Les Houches and Saint-Gervais, in the trees and on a separate pass
Les Houches sits at the south-western end of the valley, and you ski between 950 and 1,900 m, mostly among trees. It is the area you keep in reserve for the day visibility drops elsewhere: you can still see where you are going under the trees when the tops of the other areas are in cloud. That is, if you thought of it when you bought the passes.
It is home to the Verte des Houches, a World Cup downhill and one of the hardest runs in the valley. The name catches British skiers out: verte is French for green, but this is nobody's beginner slope. Extensive snowmaking makes up for the modest altitude.
Two things set it apart. It is not on the valley pass. It has its own, shared with neighbouring Saint-Gervais, and that pass also covers the Tramway du Mont-Blanc, the rack railway up to the Nid d'Aigle viewpoint at 2,372 m. And from Les Praz or Argentière it means crossing the whole valley, which makes it a full day out rather than a last-minute change of plan.
The short version:
- Mixed abilities, and everyone wants to stay together: Brévent-Flégère.
- A group that skis well and wants big vertical: Les Grands Montets, for a day or two in the week.
- Children and nervous skiers who want wide pistes: Balme.
- A day of flat light or heavy snow: the Vallorcine side of Balme, already on your pass, or Les Houches if you bought theirs.
Opening dates announced for the 2026-27 season, snow permitting: Les Grands Montets 5 December to 2 May, Brévent-Flégère 12 December to 18 April, Balme 12 December to 11 April, Les Houches 19 December to 4 April. All four are only open together between 19 December and 4 April, which covers Christmas, February half term and most of the Easter holidays. Check the tourist office pages before you book.
Where beginners actually ski in Chamonix
Three of the four main areas work for anyone who can ski a blue with confidence; Les Grands Montets asks more of you. None of them is the place to learn from scratch. Chamonix keeps that separate, with eight beginner areas down in the villages and up on two high plateaux.
Seven of them are covered by the valley pass. Le Savoy and Les Planards sit in Chamonix itself, both walkable from the centre. La Vormaine and Les Chosalets are up towards Argentière and Le Tour, La Poya is at Vallorcine, and two more sit on the plateaux at Planpraz and Lognan, the Lognan nursery slopes still running even though the lift station there burned down.
Les Houches has its own, Le Tourchet, which sits outside the valley pass just as its ski area does.
There is one warning that matters more here than in most resorts. French piste grading is not generous in Chamonix, and British skiers regularly find the blue runs firmer and steeper than the blues they know at home. Aim a grade easier than your group would normally take on.
A beginner pass covers the Savoy area in Chamonix, the Planpraz gondola and the gentle lifts it serves, plus the ride from Les Praz up to Flégère and the Trappe chair, which serves easy ground at the top of that gondola. For the 2026-27 season it is listed at €27.50 a day for an adult, compared with €61.20 to €76.50 for a day on the valley pass, depending on the time of year. That last part matters. It means a beginner skis the easy ground at Flégère and has lunch with everyone else, instead of spending the day alone on the valley floor.
What the lift pass decides for you
The pass has already made part of the choice for you, and it is why Les Houches quietly drops out of most itineraries without anyone deciding it should.
The valley pass, CHAMONIX Le Pass, covers three of the four areas: Brévent-Flégère, Les Grands Montets and Balme. That comes to 110 km (68 miles) of pistes, made up of 15 green, 30 blue, 27 red and 14 black runs, served by 43 lifts. The closed summit of Les Grands Montets is excluded, which makes no difference while it stays shut.
Green runs, gentler than blues, are worth knowing about if you have only skied in Austria or Italy, where the grading starts at blue.
A day at Les Houches means buying a second pass. Sort that out while you plan the week, rather than discovering it on a foggy morning.
Read more: Planning a ski trip with a large group: the organiser's guide
Choosing your ski area day by day
Most groups get through two or three areas over six days of skiing. Moving every morning eats more time than it is worth, and six days in the same place will bore the stronger skiers.
Aspect is the first thing to look at, and the easiest to act on. Brévent-Flégère faces due south: the snow is good first thing and turns slushy by mid-afternoon once the sun has been on it. Les Grands Montets faces north and holds its snow far longer, so it is the one to save for mild days late in the season.
One more thing decides the day in a group: how far apart the abilities are. When they run from beginner to black-run skier, it is the midday meeting point that shapes the day, not the piste.
The second is visibility. When cloud comes down, you lose all definition on the tops of Les Grands Montets and Brévent-Flégère, while the tree-lined pistes stay perfectly skiable. Two places suit that: the Vallorcine side of Balme, which is on the valley pass, and Les Houches, which needs a pass of its own.
Treat the first day differently: take whichever area is closest to where you are staying. Picking up hire kit for fourteen people, handing out passes and finding your feet will take the morning, and nobody wants an hour of driving on top of it.
Moving between ski areas during the week
Decide any move to another area the night before. The valley runs for about thirty kilometres (20 miles), and you have to make the journey back as well.
Three bus routes run all year, two of them useful for skiing. Route 1 links Les Houches to Les Praz and ends at the foot of the Flégère gondola. Route 2 serves Les Bois, Argentière and Le Tour, which means Les Grands Montets and Balme, and route 3 runs down to Servoz at the mouth of the valley.
The Mont-Blanc Express, the valley train, runs alongside the bus network and stops at Servoz, Les Houches, Chamonix, Les Tines, Argentière, Montroc and Vallorcine.
Two rules cover almost everything. A lift pass doubles as your bus ticket: with a valid pass from the Compagnie du Mont-Blanc, which runs the lifts, you don't need a separate ticket on the valley bus network. The carte d'hôte, or guest card, covers the train: your accommodation hands it over free on arrival, and it lets you ride the Mont-Blanc Express for nothing between Servoz and Vallorcine.
On the buses, though, the carte d'hôte is not a ticket. It gets you cheaper ones, bought online before you board, because drivers don't sell tickets. For anyone not skiing and without a card, a single is €1.70 and a weekly pass €19.
Chalet Bonami is in the Les Bois neighbourhood, 550 m (600 yards) from the Flégère gondola, a five-minute walk. That puts Brévent-Flégère within reach without a car, and you cross to the Brévent side on the Liaison cable car without coming down. Three ways to get there: on foot with skis over your shoulder, by car, or on the shuttle that serves the hamlets around Flégère. In winter you have to book that shuttle ahead, apart from a few scheduled runs during the school holidays, so walking is usually simpler.
You come home by gondola and then on foot, because no piste runs down to the chalet. For Les Grands Montets and Balme, Les Tines is the nearest station and the train takes you to Argentière and Montroc. The concierge has hire kit delivered to the chalet, which saves fitting fourteen pairs of boots in a shop on arrival day.
Bonami's tip: if your week falls in early December or after mid-April, look at the opening calendar before you settle on an area. Les Grands Montets opens on 5 December, a week before Brévent-Flégère and Balme and two before Les Houches, and closes on 2 May, a fortnight after Brévent-Flégère and a month after Les Houches. At either end of the season, the lift five minutes from your door may well have shut while the one at Argentière is still turning.
Chalet Bonami is booked directly, with no agency in between: tell us your dates and we will come back to you within 24 hours.
Read more: Sleeps 14 rarely means 14 adults: choosing a chalet for a large group
Common questions about Chamonix ski areas
These are the questions that come up whenever a group starts planning their ski week.
Which is the best ski area in Chamonix?
Brévent-Flégère, for most trips. It is the only area with two sectors joined by a lift, so the only one that doubles your terrain without a bus ride, and you can get to it straight from Chamonix or Les Praz. Les Grands Montets beats it for a group of strong skiers, Balme for a family after wide pistes, and Les Houches for a day of poor visibility.
Are the Chamonix ski areas linked?
No, with one exception. Brévent and Flégère are joined by a cable car that crosses from one side to the other, high above the bowl between them. Everywhere else, changing area means coming back down and taking a bus, a train or the car.
How big is the Chamonix ski area?
110 km of pistes on the valley pass, covering Brévent-Flégère, Les Grands Montets and Balme, which is 86 runs and 43 lifts between 1,030 and 2,765 m. Higher figures you will see elsewhere add in Les Houches, which is sold separately, and count the beginner areas, though seven of the eight are in fact on this pass.
Can you ski in Chamonix without a car?
Yes, provided you pick where you stay with that in mind. A valid lift pass doubles as your bus ticket on the valley network, and the guest card covers the train, which serves Servoz, Les Houches, Chamonix, Les Tines, Argentière, Montroc and Vallorcine. A group staying at Les Praz or Les Bois can walk to Flégère and take the train to Les Grands Montets.
Which Chamonix ski area is best for beginners?
None of the four main areas while you are still learning. The valley has eight beginner areas, including Le Savoy and Les Planards in Chamonix, all much cheaper than the valley pass. The one covering Le Savoy also gets you up to Flégère and its easy ground, so a beginner skis near the rest of the group and eats with them.