National Park Visitation Statistics
Published September 15, 2026 · StatsGalore
Recreation visits across reporting NPS sites [1]
The National Park Service recorded 323,014,305 recreation visits across 406 reporting parks in 2025. That systemwide count includes many kinds of NPS sites. The table below focuses on the ten most-visited sites specifically designated as national parks. [1]
The numbers
| National park | 2025 recreation visits | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Great Smoky Mountains | 11,527,939 | [1] |
| Zion | 4,984,525 | [1] |
| Yellowstone | 4,762,988 | [1] |
| Grand Canyon | 4,430,653 | [1] |
| Yosemite | 4,278,413 | [1] |
| Rocky Mountain | 4,171,431 | [1] |
| Acadia | 4,079,318 | [1] |
| Grand Teton | 3,800,648 | [1] |
| Olympic | 3,584,187 | [1] |
| Glacier | 3,136,557 | [1] |
The park system is broader than national parks
The National Park System includes sites with different designations. A systemwide total and a ranking limited to national parks have different scopes. Both are useful, but their labels must travel with their numbers.
The ten rows are a subset of the reporting system. Adding them together would not reproduce the systemwide headline because many other sites contribute visits.
[1]Visits do not identify unique people
A person visiting multiple parks can contribute to more than one park’s count. Repeated visits to the same site can also contribute multiple times under its counting rules. The system total is therefore not a count of distinct people.
This matters when comparing park visitation with population. Dividing visits by residents would produce a visits-per-resident ratio, not the share of residents who visited.
[1]A high total is not a crowd forecast
Annual visits summarize a long period. They do not tell a traveler how crowded a specific trail will be on a particular day. Visits can vary within a park as well as across seasons.
The physical size and layout of parks also differ. Comparing raw visit totals does not measure visitor density or how busy every location feels.
[1]Use the reporting period consistently
These are calendar-year 2025 counts. Comparisons with another year should use matching definitions and the same type of site. Changes in access, counting methods, or reporting coverage can matter.
For a detailed trend, the linked NPS statistics provide a better foundation than extrapolating from one annual ranking. The table is a starting point for exploring the scale of recreation visits.
[1]Sources & notes
National Park Service 2025 visitation release. Headline: all reporting NPS sites. Ranking: national-park-designated sites only. Counts are recreation visits, not unique visitors.
Source review: 2026-09-15. Article publication and underlying data dates are separate. How we use statistics · Suggest a correction