The 5 Best Children's Museums In America, According To Reviews From Parents

When you picture a museum, you might think of ancient halls filled with cultural artifacts like London's British Museum or art galleries full of paintings so famous that you'll need to find a secret entrance to avoid the crowds, like Paris's Louvre. While almost any good museum can be a fantastic place for children, children's museums are full of exhibits designed specifically for kids. These exciting places are full of tactile things to experience, ways for kids to express themselves, and opportunities to learn more about the world around them.

The United States has hundreds of children's museums, but if you're looking for the perfect family outing that challenges and entertains your kids, parents around the world have rated Treehouse Children's Museum in Ogden, Utah, Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York, The Marbles Museum in Raleigh, North Carolina, St. Louis, Missouri's City Museum, and The Children's Museum of Indianapolis the best of the best.

Whether you live in Utah or you and your family are just stopping by to spot the red rocks at Capitol Reef National Park, you won't want to miss the charming Treehouse Children's Museum in Ogden. This special place celebrates children's stories and gives them the opportunity to become the storytellers. The building itself is designed around a model tree in the center, with different branches leading to different exhibits. As children travel through the museum, they will feel transported to different worlds, from rideable toy horses and model villages with houses large enough to step inside, to enormous chess sets and a statue of a slumbering dragon. Along the way, children will be able to try on costumes and pick up props that encourage creative, imaginative play.

"This place is amazing, especially for little (sic) with lots of energy, and there's plenty of fun for all ages...And with so much to do, every visit will be a new adventure, your kiddos won't get tired of this place any time soon," one parent on Google Reviews enthused about Ogden's beloved children's museum. They aren't alone. Visitors to The Treehouse Museum have rated it extremely highly across platforms, with reviewers on Yelp and Tripadvisor both rating it an average of 4.5/5 stars, while nearly 2,000 Google Reviews give it an average score of 4.8 out of 5.

New York, New York is home to some of the best museums in the world, but drive five and a half hours northwest and you'll find yourself in the far smaller city of Rochester, NY. It may not have the Guggenheim, but it does have one of the best children's museums in the county: The Strong Museum of Play.

"At a normal museum you spend your time walking from exhibit to exhibit reading and looking at old stuff," one parent of five stated on TripAdvisor. "At the Strong you spend most if not all if your time playing and interacting with the exhibits."

The Strong National Museum of Play is one of the highest rated children's museums in the country, with 4.8 out of 5 stars on Google Reviews, 4.6 out of 5 on Yelp, and an impressive perfect 5 out of 5 stars across more than 2,000 Tripadvisor reviews. While it has been called the second-largest children's museum in the United States, it also has exhibits that adults will love. While exploring this huge museum, you will come across a lifesize replica of the iconic Sesame Street stoop, exhibits about the history of board games and video games, and a 15-foot-tall version of the iconic game Shoots and Ladders.

The Marbles Museum in Raleigh, North Carolina, is jam-packed with a wide variety of games and experiences designed to challenge kids as they explore and play. The exhibits in this museum encourage kids to tap into their artistic side, painting pictures and putting on costumes to play pretend, but it also engages their logical side as well, letting them practice chess and even learn how to manage finances. Best of all, it's big enough to provide hours of fun. As one Yelp reviewer stated: "Huge area that just seemed to keep going and going and going. So many different interactive places for the kids to play. My kids loved it and would have stayed there all day if I let them."

This museum has won numerous awards, including the STEMmy Award for helping kids to learn more about science and technology, and has been consistently ranked among the most popular places in Raleigh to visit with children. It was among the top 10 children's museums in a reader poll conducted by USA Today and is consistently ranked extremely highly by parents on review platforms like Google Reviews (4.8 out of 5 average), Yelp (4.5 out of 5), and TripAdvisor (4.5 out of 5).

"This place is incredibly cool and mind blowing. We spent hours exploring the intricate tunnels, amazing exhibits, and cool rooftop..." one local guide who brought their child to St. Louis, Missouri's fascinating City Museum wrote on Google Reviews. "Seriously, explore every corner you can of this place. It will not disappoint."

City Museum is definitely a children's museum, but parents will need to get into the spirit, too. This unique place, designed by sculptor Bob Cassilly and primarily constructed from found objects, consists of metal ramps, tunnels, a ferris wheel, and even a metal plane for kids to climb and explore. When you take your kids here, you might just find yourself playing along with them, crawling, running, and climbing around this fascinating place.

City Museum is a favorite of St. Louis locals and tourists alike, and reviewers from around the country consistently rate it very highly on review sites like Yelp and Tripadvisor, where it has an average rating of 4.5 out of 5 stars, and on Google Reviews, where it has more than 20,000 reviews and an average score of 4.7 out of 5. It was also ranked one of the top 10 children's museums in the country by a reader poll from USA Today.

The first time you catch a glimpse of the enormous statue of a dinosaur seemingly breaking out of the museum's wall, it's obvious why this is considered one of the best places to spend the afternoon with your kids. Not only is it the largest children's museum in the United States, The Children's Museum of Indianapolis has received national acclaim for its exciting exhibits, including a beautiful carousel, a geology lab where you can see and touch minerals, and a model of an ancient Egyptian tomb. Not only was it ranked among the best children's museums in the US by USA Today's 2024 reader poll, it has stellar reviews on Yelp (4.5 out of 5), Google Reviews (4.7 out of 5) and Tripadvisor, where its 4.5 out of 5 stars made one of the top children's museums on the platform.

"A ton of hands on activities for our kids including opportunities for them to put on costumes, and get into their activities. In addition we were amazed by the animation Dino studio, and the joyful dancing going on in the middle of the main floor," one visitor to The Children's Museum of Indianapolis wrote on Tripadvisor. "Our kids loved this place and their joy brought joy to us when we really needed it."

While there are many wonderful museums across the United States that have exhibits that will certainly appeal to children, like the American Museum of Natural History in New York City or the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC, for this list, we limited ourselves to museums that primarily have exhibits geared towards children. To find the very best children's museums in the US, we looked at tens of thousands of reviews from sites like Google Reviews, Yelp, and TripAdvisor and selected only those that have the absolute highest scores across these review platforms. We also narrowed our search to cover only museums that had a significant amount of reviews, to ensure that we only selected popular choices that many families have vouched for.