Which months are busiest in the national parks?

July is the busiest month: the 63 national parks had 13.9 million recreation visits in July 2025, about 15% of the year's total and more than four times the 3.0 million of January, the quietest month. June and August come close behind July, so summer (June through August) held 41% of the year's visits.

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Key facts

Measure: Recreation visits to the 63 national parks. Written from the data below.

  • July has the highest figure, 13.9M, followed by August (12.5M) and June (12.4M).
  • January has the lowest figure, 2.98M, followed by February (3.25M) and December (4.1M).
  • The highest is 4.7 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 months are busiest in the national parks?” Chart. Data: National Park Service, Visitor Use Statistics, https://irma.nps.gov/Stats/ (data as of December 31, 2025). https://chart.ly/charts/national-park-visits-by-month (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.

Month Recreation visits to the 63 national parks
January 2,975,414
February 3,252,393
March 5,605,585
April 6,349,542
May 9,425,070
June 12,385,112
July 13,878,389
August 12,537,502
September 10,314,651
October 8,357,049
November 4,712,076
December 4,099,338

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