1. Louvre, Paris, France
Best time to visit: June-Oct
Cost: $
- Most visited art museum in the world
- World's largest art museum with approximately 38,000 objects from prehistory to the 21st century
- Originally a museum housed in the Louvre Palace
Featured in The Best of France
#2 in Best Attractions in the World
#26 in Best Landmarks in the World
2. British Museum, London, England, United Kingdom
Best time to visit: March-May
Cost: $
- Public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in London
- Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence
- It documents the story of human culture from its beginnings to the present
- The British Museum was the first public national museum to cover all fields of knowledge
Featured in The Best of England
3. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, United States
Best time to visit: April-June, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- Largest art museum in the Americas
- It is ranked eighth in the list of most-visited art museums in the world, and is the second-most visited art museum in the United States
- Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments
4. Vatican Museums, Vatican City, Italy
Best time to visit: Jan-April, Oct-Dec
Cost: $
- The Vatican Museums are the public museums of the Vatican City
- They display works from the immense collection amassed by the Catholic Church and the papacy throughout the centuries, including several of the most renowned Roman sculptures and most important masterpieces of Renaissance art in the world
- Pope Julius II founded the museums in the early 16th century
- The Sistine Chapel, with its ceiling and altar wall decorated by Michelangelo, and the Stanze di Raffaello (decorated by Raphael) are on the visitor route through the Vatican Museums
Featured in The Best of Italy
5. National Gallery, London, England, United Kingdom
Best time to visit: March-May
Cost: $
- The National Gallery is an art museum in the City of Westminster, in Central London, founded in 1824
- It houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900
Featured in The Best of England
6. Museo del Prado, Spain
Best time to visit: March-May, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- Main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid
- It is widely considered to house one of the world's finest collections of European art, dating from the 12th century to the early 20th century, based on the former Spanish royal collection, and the single best collection of Spanish art
- The Prado Museum is one of the most visited sites in the world and is considered one of the greatest art museums in the world
Featured in The Best of Spain
7. Rijksmuseum, The Netherlands
Best time to visit: April-May, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- National museum of the Netherlands dedicated to Dutch arts and history, located in Amsterdam
- The Rijksmuseum was founded in The Hague in 1798 and moved to Amsterdam in 1808, where it was first located in the Royal Palace
- It is the largest art museum in the country
- The museum has on display 8,000 objects of art and history, from their total collection of 1 million objects from the years 1200–2000, among which are some masterpieces by Rembrandt, and Johannes Vermeer
Featured in The Best of The Netherlands
8. Uffizi, Florence, Italy
Best time to visit: May-Sept
Cost: $
- Art museum in the Historic Centre of Florence
- One of the largest and best known collections in the world, holding priceless works, particularly from the Italian Renaissance
- One of the first modern museums, opening in 1581
- Art collections were gifted to the city of Florence after the ruling house of Medici died out
Featured in The Best of Italy
9. National Palace Museum, Taiwan
Best time to visit: Oct-Dec
Cost: $
- Museum in Taipei that has a permanent collection of nearly 700,000 pieces of Chinese artifacts and artworks, many of which were moved from the Palace Museum in the Forbidden City in Beijing, as well as five other institutions throughout mainland China during the ROC retreat
- The museum's collection encompasses items spanning 8,000 years of Chinese history from the neolithic age to the modern period
- The National Palace Museum shares its roots with the Palace Museum of Beijing, whose extensive collection of artwork and artifacts were built upon the imperial collections of the Ming and Qing dynasties
Featured in The Best of Taiwan
10. Musee d'Orsay, Paris, France
Best time to visit: June-Oct
Cost: $
- Museum on the bank of the Seine housed in a railway station built between 1898 and 1914
- Includes paintings, sculptures, furniture, and photography
- Houses the largest collection of impressionist and post-impressionist masterpieces in the world by painters like Monet and Van Gogh
Featured in The Best of France
11. Tate Modern, London, England, United Kingdom
Best time to visit: March-May
Cost: $
- Art gallery located in London, that houses the United Kingdom's national collection of international modern and contemporary art, dating from 1900 until today
- Tate Modern is one of the largest museums of modern and contemporary art in the world
Featured in The Best of England
12. Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Spain
Best time to visit: March-May, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- Spain's national museum of 20th-century art, officially inaugurated in 1992, and is located in Madrid
- The museum is mainly dedicated to Spanish art, highlights of the museum include excellent collections of Spain's two greatest 20th-century masters, Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dalí
Featured in The Best of Spain
13. Acropolis Museum, Greece
Best time to visit: March-May, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- Archaeological museum focused on the findings of the archaeological site of the Acropolis of Athens
- The museum was built to house every artifact found on the rock and on the surrounding slopes, from the Greek Bronze Age to Roman and Byzantine Greece
- The Acropolis Museum also lies over the ruins of part of Roman and early Byzantine Athens
Featured in The Best of Greece
14. Museum of Modern Art, New York, United States
Best time to visit: April-June, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- Art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, that plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of the largest and most influential museums of modern art in the world
- MoMA's collection offers an overview of modern and contemporary art, including works of architecture and design, drawing, painting, sculpture, photography, prints, illustrated and artist's books, film, and electronic media
15. National Museum of Natural History, Washington D.C., United States
Best time to visit: March-May, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- The National Museum of Natural History is the second most visited natural history museum in the world after the Natural History Museum in London
- Opened in 1910, the museum was one of the first Smithsonian buildings constructed exclusively to hold the national collections and research facilities
- The museum's collections contain over 146 million specimens of plants, animals, fossils, minerals, rocks, meteorites, human remains, and human cultural artifacts, the largest natural history collection in the world
Featured in The Best of Washington D.C.
#28 in Best Museums in the USA
#99 in Best Attractions in the USA
16. Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark
Best time to visit: March-May, June-Aug
Cost: $
- Art museum located on the shore of the Øresund Sound, and the most visited art museum in Denmark
- It has an extensive permanent collection of modern and contemporary art, dating from World War II to the present day
- The museum is also acknowledged as a milestone in modern Danish architecture
- The museum occasionally also stages exhibitions of work by the great impressionists and expressionists, such as Claude Monet
Featured in The Best of Denmark
17. Natural History Museum, London, England, United Kingdom
Best time to visit: March-May
Cost: $
- Museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history
- The museum is home to life and earth science specimens comprising some 80 million items within five main collections: botany, entomology, mineralogy, palaeontology and zoology
- Given the age of the institution, many of the collections have great historical as well as scientific value, such as specimens collected by Charles Darwin
- The museum is particularly famous for its exhibition of dinosaur skeletons and ornate architecture—sometimes dubbed a cathedral of nature—both exemplified by the large Diplodocus cast that dominated the vaulted central hall before it was replaced in 2017 with the skeleton of a blue whale hanging from the ceiling
Featured in The Best of England
18. Victoria and Albert Museum, London, England, United Kingdom
Best time to visit: March-May
Cost: $
- The Victoria and Albert Museum in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects
- It was founded in 1852 and named after Queen Victoria and Prince Albert
Featured in The Best of England
19. National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., United States
Best time to visit: March-May, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- National art museum, established in 1937, that features a collection of paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, sculpture, medals, and decorative arts, and traces the development of Western art from the Middle Ages to the present
- The collection includes the only painting by Leonardo da Vinci in the Americas
Featured in The Best of Washington D.C.
#3 in Best Museums in the USA
#54 in Best Attractions in the USA
20. Tokyo National Museum, Japan
Best time to visit: March-May, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- Art museum in Ueno Park in the Taitō ward of Tokyo, that is considered the oldest national museum in Japan, is the largest art museum in Japan, and is one of the largest art museums in the world
- The museum collects, preserves, and displays a comprehensive collection of artwork and cultural objects from Asia, with a focus on ancient and medieval Japanese art and Asian art along the Silk Road
- There is also a large collection of Greco-Buddhist art
Featured in The Best of Japan
21. Van Gogh Museum, The Netherlands
Best time to visit: April-May, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- Dutch art museum dedicated to the works of Vincent van Gogh and his contemporaries, located in Amsterdam
- Not commercially successful in his career, he struggled with severe depression and poverty, which eventually led to his suicide at age thirty-seven
- Today, Van Gogh's works are among the world's most expensive paintings to have ever sold
Featured in The Best of The Netherlands
22. National Museum of African American History and Culture, Washington D.C., United States
Best time to visit: March-May, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- Smithsonian Institution museum opened in its permanent home in 2016 with a ceremony led by President Barack Obama
- Early efforts to establish a federally owned museum featuring African-American history and culture can be traced to 1915 and the National Memorial Association
- After many years of little success, a legislative push began in 1988 that led to authorization of the museum in 2003, and the museum was completed in 2016
- The NMAAHC is the world's largest museum dedicated to African-American history and culture
- It ranked as the fourth most-visited Smithsonian museum in its first full year of operation
Featured in The Best of Washington D.C.
#18 in Best Museums in the USA
23. Getty Center, California, United States
Best time to visit: Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- Campus of the Getty Museum and other programs of the Getty Trust
- The center opened to the public in 1997
- It is well known for its architecture, gardens, and views overlooking Los Angeles
- The center sits atop a hill connected to a visitors' parking garage at the bottom of the hill by a three-car, cable-pulled hovertrain people mover
24. Weald and Downland Living Museum, Singleton, England, United Kingdom
Best time to visit: March-May
Cost: $
- Open-air museum in Singleton, West Sussex that covers 40 acres, with over 50 historic buildings dating from 950AD to the 19th century, along with gardens, farm animals, walks and a mill pond
- Along with the buildings, there are "hands-on" activities, like cooking, and weaving, and a number of yearly activities, including seasonal shows, historic gardens weekend and Tree Dressing
Featured in The Best of England
25. American Museum of Natural History, New York, United States
Best time to visit: April-June, Sept-Nov
Cost: $
- Museum complex that comprises 26 interconnected buildings housing 45 permanent exhibition halls, in addition to a planetarium and a library
- The museum collections contain over 34 million specimens of plants, animals, fungi, fossils, minerals, rocks, meteorites, human remains, and human cultural artifacts, as well as specialized collections for frozen tissue and genomic and astrophysical data, of which only a small fraction can be displayed at any given time
26. Art Institute of Chicago, Illinois, United States
Best time to visit: April-May, Sept-Oct
Cost: $
- Museum founded in 1879, and one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world
- Its collection includes iconic works such as Pablo Picasso's The Old Guitarist, and Grant Wood's American Gothic
- Its permanent collection of nearly 300,000 works of art is augmented by more than 30 special exhibitions mounted yearly