Top 10 Most Visited National Parks in 2017

The National Park Service announced their 2017 Visitor Use Statistics earlier this month. This includes the Top 10 Most Visited National Parks in the United States.  For several years, Parkchasers.com has compiled a quick list of these parks and the number of visitors to each site.  Some highlights of this year’s list:

• The overall number of visitors to the National Park Service decreased slightly from the National Park Service centennial year in 2016.  Total recreation visits across the 417 units was 330,882,751.
• All 10 parks listed for 2017 also made the Top 10 in 2016 and 2015.
• Great Smoky Mountains National Park stayed #1 on the list.  Great Smoky Mountains has been the most visited national park since statistics reporting began in 1979.
• Zion National Park zoomed ahead from 5th to 3rd on the list of most visited national parks.  The increase in visitation to Zion has been hotly debated.  Crowd control and damage to the park from overuse are among the biggest concerns.
• Yellowstone National Park had fewer visitors in 2017 going against the trend of all other parks on the list.

Here’s the list of 10 Most Visited National Parks:

Share the list above with your friends on Facebook and Pinterest with your own #parkchasing list of where you’d like to visit next.  Want to compare it to last year’s list? Check out 2016 and 2015 park visitation stats.

Interested in traveling to any of these parks?  Need ideas on what to see and when to go?  Check out the links in our drop-down menu for travel planning and itineraries for more than 50 national park units.