Which National Park Service sites get the most visitors?

The Blue Ridge Parkway had 16.5 million recreation visits in 2025, the most of any of the 400 sites the National Park Service runs, just ahead of Golden Gate National Recreation Area (15.7 million). Great Smoky Mountains (11.5 million) is the only national park in the top 10; parkways, recreation areas and memorials, many near big cities or roads, fill most of the rest.

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Key facts

Measure: Recreation visits in the year. Written from the data below.

  • Blue Ridge Parkway has the highest figure, 16.5M, followed by Golden Gate National Recreation Area (15.7M) and Great Smoky Mountains National Park (11.5M).
  • Grand Canyon National Park has the lowest figure, 4.43M, followed by Chesapeake & Ohio Canal National Historical Park (4.58M) and Yellowstone National Park (4.76M).
  • The highest is 3.7 times the lowest.

Source and date

Source
National Park Service, Visitor Use Statistics
License
Public domain (U.S. government work); source National Park Service
Data as of
Published

Citation

Chartly. “Which National Park Service sites get the most visitors?” Chart. Data: National Park Service, Visitor Use Statistics, https://irma.nps.gov/Stats/ (data as of December 31, 2025). https://chart.ly/charts/most-visited-national-park-sites (accessed October 15, 2026).

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The data

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The file has the numbers in this table, with the source, license and date. Please credit the source and Chartly.

National Park Service site Recreation visits in the year
Blue Ridge Parkway 16,533,753
Golden Gate National Recreation Area 15,748,676
Great Smoky Mountains National Park 11,527,939
Natchez Trace Parkway 7,994,783
Lincoln Memorial 7,743,295
Gateway National Recreation Area 7,696,939
Gulf Islands National Seashore 7,576,923
George Washington Memorial Parkway 6,732,932
Appalachian National Scenic Trail 6,215,118
Lake Mead National Recreation Area 6,135,586
Zion National Park 4,984,525
Vietnam Veterans Memorial 4,848,112
Yellowstone National Park 4,762,988
Chesapeake & Ohio Canal National Historical Park 4,579,704
Grand Canyon National Park 4,430,653

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