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Louvre at night most visited museums

The top 20 most visited museums in the world

We take a closer look at the top 20 most visited museums in the world, from art galleries and national collections to those focusing on science, history and technology

There are world-class museums located across the globe, from well-established institutions such as the V&A in London and The Met in New York to newer builds and niche offerings. For museum fans, the choice is endless. Here, we look at 20 of the world’s most visited museums.

Top of the list is the Louvre in Paris, which broke attendance records in 2018 when it crossed the 10 million visitor mark. A must-see on any trip to Paris, it is a favoured haunt of celebrities too, including Beyoncé and Jay-Z.

Beyonce & Jay-Z recording Apesh*t at the Louvre most visited museums

Other highlights include some of London‘s best-loved museums, such as Tate and the National Gallery. In the US, big names like the American Museum of Natural History and the National Gallery of Art feature in the list, Meanwhile, China’s top museums include the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum and Nanjing Museum.

Read on to find out which are the world’s most visited museums.

1 The Louvre – Paris, France

mona lisa crowds

With record-breaking visitor figures, The Louvre is undoubtedly one of the most popular museums in the world. It is home to over 380,000 objects and a permanent collection that covers 60,600 square metres. Visitors can enjoy sculptures, paintings, drawings, and more, with famous highlights being the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo

As well as its world-class collection, it is also a landmark in itself, thanks to the iconic Louvre Pyramid, designed by the Chinese-American architect I. M. Pei.

In recent years, the Louvre has put extra effort into managing visitor flows and visiting conditions. Even pre-COVID, the museum encouraged people to book their visit online, especially in the peak summer months. These measures make it easier for the museum to set a cap on the number of daily visitors, for a less crowded, more enjoyable experience.

The Louvre’s Leonardo da Vinci exhibition was visited by around 1.1 million guests. The show ran for four months in 2019/20 and commemorated the 500th anniversary of the artist’s death.

In 2021, the museum put its entire collection of artworks online. That same year, Laurence des Cars became the first female president of the Louvre in the museum’s history.

At the start of 2023, the Louvre announced plans to limit daily attendance to 30,000 in order to improve the visitor experience after welcoming 7.8 million guests in 2022. Later in the year, it revealed plans to increase its entrance fee by 29 percent in 2024. The institution has not increased the price of admission since 2017.

2 National Museum of China – Beijing, China

National museum china most visited museums asia

The second most visited museum in the world is the National Museum of China in Beijing, China. This free museum is home to 1.3 million objects, displayed in a series of galleries exploring everything from ancient ceramics and calligraphy to jade and bronze treasures, as well as Buddhist sculptures and socialist-realism art.

Recent exhibitions have covered a wide range of topics from across the world of art, culture, history and politics. These have included The Power of Truth: Marking the Bicentenary of the Birth of Karl MarxThe Journey Back Home: An Exhibition of Chinese Artifacts Repatriated from Italy and The Splendor of Asia: An Exhibition of Asian Civilizations.

Since May 2021, more than 30 of China’s top museums have adopted digital collectibles as an alternative to NFTs.

3 Vatican Museums – Vatican City

The Vatican Museums display works from the Catholic Church’s collection and the papacy throughout the centuries. The museums contain around 70,000 works including Roman sculptures and Renaissance art.

To mark the 500th anniversary of Leonardo da Vinci’s death, the Vatican Museums held a free exhibition of the artist’s famous painting of Saint Jerome in 2019. The work of art was moved from the Vatican Pinacoteca to the Braccio di Carlo Magno in Saint Peter’s Square.

Here, it was on display for three months alongside a document from the Historical Archive of the Fabric of Saint Peter which details da Vinci’s stay in an apartment arranged for him in the Vatican Belvedere.

In 2022, Pope Francis announced plans to return the 2,500-year-old Parthenon marbles held at the Vatican Museums to Greece. The three fragments at the Vatican include a head of a horse, a head of a boy and a bearded male head. They have been in the Vatican’s collection since the 19th century.

4 The Metropolitan Museum of Art – New York, USA

metropolitan museum of art

Number four on the list of the most visited museums in the world is The Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met).

The Met is the largest art museum in the United States and holds more than 2 million works in its permanent collection. It is famous for holding blockbuster attractions, such as 2018’s record-breaking Michelangelo: Divine Draftsman and Designer. It also hosts the Met Gala each year, although the 2020 event had to be moved online due to the pandemic.

In 2021, Sofie Andersen, head of digital content at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, spoke to blooloop about digital storytelling and the museum’s online strategy.

The museum has selected Brooklyn-based architecture firm Peterson Rich Office to design a new gallery and reimagine the museum’s dining and retail spaces. The development is set to take several years. In recent years, The Met has also announced plans to return items to a number of countries, including Thailand, Cambodia and Nepal.

5 British Museum – London, UK

Egyptian Sculpture Gallery British Museum most visited

The UK’s first entry on the list of the most visited museums is London’s British Museum.

The British Museum was the first public national museum in the world. It is home to around 8 million works and is dedicated to history, art and culture. 

One of the museum’s key exhibitions of recent years was 2019’s Inspired by the east: How the Islamic world influenced western art. This blockbuster exhibition spanned five centuries and explored the influence of the Islamic world on western art. It was a collaboration with the Islamic Arts Museum Malaysia (IAMM) in Kuala Lumpur.

The British Museum also worked with Samsung to reopen the Samsung Digital Discovery Centre and launch a digital learning programme for teenagers. Together, they also announced a further 35,000 places for school children across the UK on its ‘Virtual Visits’ scheme.

In 2021, blooloop spoke to Amanda Mayne, international engagement manager at the British Museum, about touring exhibitions, the lessons we can take from the pandemic, and the importance of international partnerships. In March 2022, The British Museum became the latest cultural institution to remove the Sackler name from galleries and rooms supported by the family.

The British Museum revealed plans to digitise its entire collection in a bid to increase public access and security after the alleged theft of around 2,000 artefacts, which came to light in 2023. The same year, it announced a new £50m deal with energy giant BP.

6 Tate Modern – London, UK

tate modern infinity room

London museums dominate the next few spaces on our list of the world’s most visited museums, with Tate Modern coming in at 6th place.

Visitors to Tate Modern can explore Tate’s collection of British and international modern and contemporary art from 1900 to the present. Tate Museum is housed in one of London’s historic buildings, the former Bankside Power Station. Here, it is able to display very large pieces in the huge Turbine Hall.

Founded in 2000, Tate Modern celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2020 and had a series of events planned, before COVID-19 struck. This included a special immersive exhibition by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama featuring her ‘Infinity Rooms’ (pictured above).

In 2021, the director of digital at Tate, Hilary Knight, spoke to blooloop about how digital enhances the museum’s mission. Tate Modern appointed Karin Hindsbo, former director of Oslo’s National Museum, as its new director in 2023. She is the second woman to take on the role.

 

7 The National Gallery – London, UK

National_Gallery most visited musuems

A popular tourist destination in the city centre, the National Gallery first opened in 1824. The iconic building in Trafalgar Square holds a collection of over 2,300 paintings, which date from the mid-13th century to 1900.

In 2019, the National Gallery continued its mission to expand the brand into Asia, with a branded pop-up store in the Grandview mall, Guangzhou. Here, visitors could enjoy interactive installations with replicas of famous works. The 200 square metre pop-up featured art from Michelangelo, Da Vinci and Raphael. Visitors could also learn more about the artists through a series of innovative room sets.

In 2021, the museum unveiled £25m upgrade plans. This will include work on the iconic Trafalgar Square buildings to reconfigure the Sainsbury Wing, upgrade the visitor amenities, create new spaces and renovate the ground floor entrance. The museum will undergo a major makeover ahead of its bicentenary celebrations in 2024. Julie Molloy of National Gallery Global shared more about the museum’s renovation plans at blooloop’s Festival of Innovation in 2022.

8 The Natural History Museum – London, UK

Natural History Museum

Visitors to the Natural History Museum in London can view items from its 80 million-strong collection of specimens. These cover five main subjects; botany, entomology, mineralogy, palaeontology and zoology. It is particularly famous for its dinosaur exhibits.

In 2019, The Natural History Museum received support from the National Lottery for its Urban Nature Project. This aims to transform the attraction’s five acres of outdoor space. The gardens will become a space for urban wildlife research and conservation. In September, 2022, it began work the redevelopment of its gardens.

The museum is one of several to have declared a planetary emergency and in 2021, the museum was involved in a series of events at COP26 in Glasgow. A key strategy that underpins a lot of its work is its goal to create advocates for the planet. Representatives from the museum also took part in COP28, engaging in critical conversations around the planetary emergency, biodiversity loss, nature-based solutions and the vital role of data.

9 American Museum of Natural History – New York, USA

american museum of natural history

The American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York is one of the largest natural history museums in the world. It spans 26 connected buildings and is home to 45 permanent exhibition halls, as well as a planetarium and a library. It is home to more than 34 million specimens.

A new wing, the $465 million Richard Gilder Center for Science, Education, and Innovation opened to the public in May 2032. Designed by Studio Gang, this is home to research facilities, scientific collections, new exhibits, an insectarium, and a butterfly vivarium.

The 230,000-square-foot Gilder Center also enhances the museum’s visitor experience, connecting 10 buildings that were constructed over nearly 150 years.

10 State Hermitage – St Petersburg, Russia

The State Hermitage in St Petersburg is the second-largest art museum in the world and dates back to 1764. It has been open to the public since 1852.

Visitors can enjoy a huge collection of paintings within the complex of historic buildings. This includes the Winter Palace, which used to be the home of Russian emperors, and the Menshikov Palace.

In 2021, The State Hermitage Museum announced that is was selling digital artworks from a limited digital collection in the form of NFTs. These are digital copies of masterpieces from its collection.

11 Shanghai Science and Technology Museum – Shanghai, China

Shanghai_Science_Technology_Museum

Shanghai Science and Technology Museum in Pudong, Shanghai, is China’s second entry in our list of the most visited museums in the world and first opened to the public on 18 December 2001 when it began by looking at the themes of nature, people and technology. It welcomed over 19.5 million visitors during the first decade of operation.

Permanent exhibitions include World of Robots, Space Navigation, Spectrum of Life and Earthcrust Exploration. It also holds special exhibitions throughout the year.

In 2021, the Shanghai Astronomy Museum, the world’s largest planetarium and a branch of the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum, opened to the public after nearly five years of construction.

12 Reina Sofía – Madrid, Spain

Reina Sofia Museum Madrid

Spain makes an entry on this list of the world’s most visited museums with Madrid’s Reina Sofía. This museum reported a healthy increase of 13.5% last year, from 3,898,000 in 2018.

The Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía (MNCARS) is the country’s national museum of 20th-century art. It holds a large collection of work by two of Spain’s most famous artists, Salvador Dalí and Pablo Picasso.

Notable exhibitions have included displays of the works of Henrik Olesen, Sara Ramo and H.C. Westerman. The museum also held an exhibition exploring the recreational and political resistances in Madrid during the 1990s.

13 National Museum of Natural History – Washington D.C., USA

smithsonian national museum of natural history

Washington D.C.’s popular National Museum of Natural History is the third American museum on this list of 2019 the world’s most visited.

Part of the Smithsonian Institution, this museum first opened in 1910. It covers 1.5 million square feet with 325,000 square feet of exhibition and public space, which is dedicated to natural history, with a huge collection of specimens, including plants, animals, fossils, rocks and meteorites, as well as cultural artefacts.

Permanent exhibits include the famous Bone Hall, which can now be explored with an innovative AR app. In 2021, the museum also launched a new AR experience that immerses visitors in a holographic orca pod.

14 Nanjing Museum – Nanjing, China

Nanjing Museum

Nanjing Museum was one of the first museums to be established in China and has since been expanded in both 1999 and 2009. It holds a large permanent collection with more than 400,000 pieces, including an impressive display of Ming and Qing imperial porcelain.

One of the permanent installations at Nanjing Museum is an exhibition on the Jiangsu Area in Ancient Times, covering ancient history through to the to Ming and Qing dynasties. Visitors can view a dinosaur skeleton and a wall made of bricks from the Northern and Southern Dynasties.

Image: Nanjing Museum, Wikimedia Commons

15 Zhejiang Museum – Hangzhou, China

Jade Ring Zheliang Museum most visited

Zhejiang Museum, 15th on the list of the world’s most visited museums, was founded in 1929, making it one of China’s oldest museums. Zhejiang museum holds more than 100,000 items in its permanent collection and was expanded in 2009 with a new building in West Lake Cultural Square.

The museum holds a collection of pottery, lacquerware, woodenware, bone tools and ivory artefacts, as well as jade ware, bronzes, porcelain, gold and silver coins, paintings and calligraphy.

Image: Zhejiang Museum, Jade ring from the Majiabang culture (7,000–6,000 years ago)

16 National Gallery of Art – Washington D.C, USA

Visitors capture Sir Edwin Landseer’s Alpine Mastiffs Reanimating a Distressed Traveler, National Gallery of Art, Washington

The National Gallery of Art is dedicated to visual art, education, and culture. It holds over 150,000 items, including paintings, sculpture, decorative arts, photographs, prints, and drawings. The museum spans two buildings as well as a sculpture garden.

Notable exhibitions of recent years include a show on lunar photographs as well as an exhibition on renaissance sculptor and painter, Andrea del Verrocchio, of whom Leonardo da Vinci was a pupil.

In 2022, Nick Sharp, chief digital officer, spoke to blooloop about the museum’s digital strategy and the importance of an authentic voice

17 Victoria & Albert Museum – London, UK

Victoria and Albert Museum v&a east smithsonian

This museum of art and design is home to a permanent collection of over 2.3 million objects, covering more than 5,000 years of human creativity. Mediums covered within its permanent exhibitions include architecture, furniture, fashion, textiles, photography, sculpture, painting, jewellery, glass, ceramics, book arts and more.

Recent blockbuster exhibitions include shows on iconic fashion designers Mary Quant and Christian Dior, which enjoyed record-breaking attendance.

In 2020, blooloop found out more about the plans for V&A East, in conversation with Tim Reeve, deputy director of the V&A and Dr Gus Casely-Hayford OBE, director of V&A East. The project includes a new five-storey museum, alongside a new collection and research centre, located in London’s Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, Stratford. We also spoke to the team in 2022 for a project update.

The V&A has also launched a digital platform called Explore the Collections.

18 China Science and Technology Museum – Beijing, China

China science_and_technology_museum Beijing

China Science and Technology Museum was founded in 1988 before being expanded in 2000. It then moved into new buildings in 2006 ahead of the 2008 Summer Olympics in the city.

China Science and Technology Museum has five permanent exhibitions: Science Paradise, The Glory of China, Science & Technology and Life, Explorations and Discoveries, and Challenges and the Future. Visitors can also enjoy a dome theatre, giant screen theatre, 4D theatre and motion theatre.

Image: China Science and Technology Museum, Wikimedia Commons 

19 National Palace Museum – Taipei, Taiwan

National-Palace-Museum Taiwan most visited

The National Palace Museum in Taipei was established in 1925 and holds almost 700,000 pieces of ancient Chinese imperial artefacts and artwork.

In 2018, The Government of Taiwan approved a six-year, $342 million development plan for the National Palace Museum. This will include the renovation and expansion of the National Palace Museum headquarters as well as creating an exhibition and restoration facility at the museum’s Southern Branch in Chiayi County.

The museum, which has been working to make its collections more accessible through the use of digital technology, is listed in blooloop’s roundup of the world’s best virtual museum tours.

20 Musée d’Orsay – Paris, France

musee orsay tripadvisor museums

The final entry on this list of the top 20 most visited museums in the world is the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, France.

The Musée d’Orsay is located in the former Gare d’Orsay, a Beaux-Arts railway station built between 1898 and 1900. As well as sculptures, furniture, and photography, it holds the largest collection of Impressionist and post-Impressionist paintings in the world, including work by including Monet, Degas, Renoir, Cézanne, Gauguin, and Van Gogh.

In 2020, the museum announced the launch of a major expansion project. This will see the creation of a new wing, intended to display the Musée d’Orsay’s Impressionist and Post-Impressionist collection. The project is scheduled to complete by 2026.

In 2021, it appointed Christophe Leribault as director. Leribault was previously curator at the Louvre and director of the Musée Delacroix.

The Musée d’Orsay announced its first-ever VR experience in 2023, as part of a new Van Gogh exhibition. The museum partnered with Vive Arts on the experience, called ‘La Palette de Van Gogh’. This takes inspiration from the last surviving paint palette used by Vincent van Gogh, held in the Musée d’Orsay’s permanent collection.

Figures courtesy of The TEA/AECOM Theme Index and Museum Index. All images courtesy of those museums mentioned, unless otherwise stated.

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charlotte coates

Charlotte Coates

Charlotte Coates is blooloop's editor. She is from Brighton, UK and previously worked as a librarian. She has a strong interest in arts, culture and information and graduated from the University of Sussex with a degree in English Literature. Charlotte can usually be found either with her head in a book or planning her next travel adventure.

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