Fourteen memorials and nineteen museums. Most of them need a ticket you book first.
Which night loop actually stops long enough at the Korean War Memorial. What it costs to get inside the Capitol once the free passes are gone. Whether Mount Vernon or Gettysburg is the better use of one spare day. Reviews of every tour you can book in Washington DC.
The Mall after dark, Arlington in the morning, the Capitol from the inside.
Four bookings a first Washington trip is built around. What each one costs, and what the people who took it say.
01The first nightNational Mall Monuments Night Tour with 10+ Stops, Entry TicketsTen stops in the dark with entry tickets included. Lincoln lit from inside the chamber is why people book this one twice.
02The morning afterArlington National Cemetery Walking Tour & Changing of the GuardsOn foot up the hill to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, past the Kennedy graves, with the Changing of the Guard timed into the walk.
03Inside the CapitolSmall-Group Guided Tour inside US Capitol & Library of CongressSmall group through the Rotunda and down the tunnel to the Library of Congress. The free passes go months out; this is the way in.
04The one to plan firstGuided African American History Tour with Reserved Museum EntryReserved entry to the National Museum of African American History and Culture, with the memorials that lead up to its door.
Two miles of memorials. Walk them, ride them, or wait for the floodlights.
The Mall is far longer than it photographs, and every guide here is really selling you a way of covering it. Four of them, what boarding each costs, and how much pavement it saves.
★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · National Mall Monuments Night Tour with 10+ Stops, Entry Tickets
After darkFloodlit marble, warm air, and the Mall to yourself.
On foot by dayLincoln to the Capitol with the stories attached.
By cartEvery stop on the Mall without the four miles of walking.
Hop on, hop offOne ticket, a whole day, get off where you like.
All 67 monument and memorial tours in Washington DC →
Six Washington starting points, and the best thing to book in each.
Two miles of marble between the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial, a hill of white headstones on the Virginia side, nineteen free museums on one lawn, and a canal town of brick and cobbles four stops up the river.
The Washington days out that fill up first.
Every Washington review we have written →More travellers take these than anything else in the city. Here is what each of them actually buys you.
1
DC Memorials Night Tour: Glass-Roof Convertible Upgrade Option
Start at the U.S. Navy Memorial at 7:30 pm for a guided ride past DC’s best-known monuments. You’ll stop at the White House, Capitol, Lincoln Memorial, Jefferson Memorial, and more. Choose a standard coach or a glass-roof bus, which changes to a glass-top vehicle from October through March.
From · $69
Read our review →
2
National Mall Monuments Night Tour with 10+ Stops, Entry Tickets
from $65
3
Washington DC Monuments by Moonlight Tour by Trolley
from $48
4
Hop-on Hop-off Sightseeing Tour by Open-top Bus with 18 Stops
from $49
5
Washington DC in One Day: Guided Sightseeing Tour
from $89
6
Washington DC Moonlight Tour by Electric Cart
from $74
7
Washington DC Hop-On Hop-off Trolley Tour with 15 Stops
from $48
8
Arlington National Cemetery Walking Tour & Changing of the Guards
from $55
The federal collections, and the three worth a booked ticket.
Nineteen Smithsonian museums, the Declaration of Independence in a sealed case at the Archives, and a reading room under a hundred and sixty feet of Library of Congress dome. Entry is free almost everywhere. Getting in on the day you want is the part that costs money.
Washington was laid out facing the river and then mostly turned its back.
The city reads differently from the water: the Kennedy Center from below, the Georgetown boathouses, Old Town Alexandria forty minutes downstream. Brunch boats, sunset decks and a water taxi that beats the Blue Line on a hot afternoon.
Arlington National Cemetery is a hill, and the shuttle is not the point.
Everything at Arlington →
Six hundred and thirty-nine acres on the Virginia side, straight uphill from the Memorial Bridge. The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is guarded every minute of the year and the guard changes on the hour. The tram gets you to three stops; a guide gets you to Section 60 and explains why the rows run the way they do.
Uphill, on foot, with a guide
The tram loops three stops and keeps moving. A walking guide takes you through the Kennedy graves, the Tomb, Section 60 and the older Confederate ground, which is where the cemetery stops being a photo stop.
The Changing of the Guard
A sentinel has walked the mat in front of the Tomb continuously since 1937. The changeover runs hourly in winter and every half hour from April, it is silent, and the crowd stands for all of it.
The rest of the Virginia side
Beyond the headline graves there is the Iwo Jima memorial, the Netherlands Carillon and a view back across the river that puts the whole city in one frame. Short walks, and far fewer people on them.
Four Washington tickets that are gone before you land.
Most of this city can be decided over breakfast. These four run on timed federal entry slots, a congressional queue and a bloom that lasts a fortnight, and none of them care what day your flight gets in.
- 01Washington Monument Direct Entry with GuidebookThe elevator runs on timed tickets released in batches. A handful are held back for same-day and they are gone by nine in the morning.
- 02DC Monuments and Capitol Hill Tour by Electric CartFree Capitol passes are released online and taken months ahead. The paid small-group tours hold their own reserved slots, which is the only reason they still have space.
- 03Guided African American History Tour with Reserved Museum EntryThe museum costs nothing and still needs a timed entry pass. They drop monthly and the weekend slots last minutes.
- 04The DC Cherry Blossom Bus Tour with Tidal Basin Guided WalkPeak bloom on the Tidal Basin lasts a few days and the date is announced weeks, not months, ahead. Everything built around it sells against a moving target.
What a day in Washington actually costs.
The memorials are free and so are the museums, so the money goes on covering the ground between them and getting inside the buildings that are not. Every tour on the site, grouped by price.
Walking tours, cemetery trams, monument entry tickets and the water taxi down to Old Town.
The full days: night loops with entry included, Capitol and Library small groups, Mount Vernon and the Arlington combinations.
Private guides, chartered vans, and the Gettysburg and Shenandoah runs that take twelve hours door to door.
Washington stops being federal about four blocks north.
The canal and the cobbles in Georgetown, the Friendship Arch over H Street, the jazz history along U Street, and Old Town Alexandria across the water. These walks are about the city people actually live in.
Every Washington walk →
Washington was built on filled marsh, and every August it remembers.
From July the Mall bakes with almost no shade between the memorials and the humidity does the rest. The honest plan is the one locals use: take the outdoor half early, then get inside or onto the water until the light goes soft and the marble is worth walking to again.
The best Washington day trip leaves before the Metro opens.
Mount Vernon sits sixteen miles down the Potomac and can be reached by boat. Gettysburg, Shenandoah and Monticello are long days in a van, and all of them pull away from the same few blocks downtown at first light.
- 1Mount Vernon and Old Town Alexandria Day Trip from Washington DCfrom $99
- 2Old Town Alexandria & Mount Vernon Tourfrom $109
- 3George Washington’s Mount Vernon Gardens & Grounds Admissionfrom $28
Three things that only happen in Washington.
Free national museums exist in a handful of cities. A guard who has not left his post since 1937, a working legislature you can walk into, and three thousand Japanese cherry trees around a tidal basin do not.
The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
A sentinel from the 3rd Infantry Regiment has walked the mat in front of the Tomb every hour of every day since 1937, through hurricanes and government shutdowns. The guard changes on the hour through the winter and every half hour from April, the ceremony runs about nine minutes, and the crowd is asked to stand in silence for the whole of it.
- 1Arlington National Cemetery Walking Tour & Changing of the Guards★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 2,566 reviews
- 2Private Washington DC Tour with Changing of the Guard Ceremony★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 184 reviews
- 3Small Group Monuments Tour with Changing of the Guard★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 134 reviews
A legislature you can walk into
The Capitol is a working building, so tours route around whatever the House and the Senate are doing that morning and the schedule moves with them. Underneath it a tunnel runs across to the Library of Congress, where the Main Reading Room sits below the dome and visitors look down on it from a gallery rather than walking in.
- 1VIP Best of DC with US Capitol + National Archives Reserved Entry★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 2,491 reviews
- 2Small-Group Guided Tour inside US Capitol & Library of Congress★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,869 reviews
- 3Capitol Hill and Library of Congress Tour with Tickets★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 1,125 reviews
The Tidal Basin in bloom
Japan sent three thousand cherry trees in 1912 and they went in around the Tidal Basin, where they now flower for roughly a fortnight somewhere between the third week of March and the middle of April. Peak bloom is called only weeks ahead, which is why everything built around it is sold against a date nobody has yet.
- 1The DC Cherry Blossom Bus Tour with Tidal Basin Guided Walk★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 151 reviews
- 2National Mall & Cherry Blossoms Tour with Optional Museum Tickets★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 112 reviews
- 3Washington DC Cherry Blossoms By Bike Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 88 reviews
Mall, Arlington, Capitol Hill: the order most first Washington trips settle into.
The Mall
Arlington
Smithsonians
Capitol Hill
GeorgetownBy place: the Mall, the hill, the river
By kind of day: walk, museum, boat or bus
The newest Washington tour reviews.
The rest of the new ones →
private Ronald Reagan, Washington National Airport transfer
Read our review →
