New York Pass: 100+ Things To Do including Empire State Building

New York rewards ambitious sightseeing, and this pass gives you a way to tackle its biggest sights without buying a separate ticket every time. For $169 per person, you can choose one to five consecutive days and use a phone-based pass at more than 100 attractions.

I like the freedom to mix grand viewpoints with smaller museums, neighborhood walks, bike rentals, and harbor cruises. I also like that the pass can make a packed four-day visit much cheaper than paying admission one attraction at a time. The catch is simple: this is not a skip-every-line ticket, and reservations or timed tickets are required at many of the most popular sights.

Key points to know before you buy

• Empire State Building access is included, but you must reserve a time through the Go City app or digital guide.
• You can compare five different durations, from one day to five consecutive calendar days.
• The best value comes from a planned schedule, with two or three worthwhile admissions each day.
• Major observatories often involve queues or assigned time slots, including One World Observatory, Top of the Rock, and Edge.
• The Statue of Liberty ferry and Ellis Island are included, but pedestal and crown access cost extra.
• The pass covers much more than famous landmarks, including museums, bike rentals, walking tours, gardens, jazz, and food tours.

How the New York Pass works in practice

Your digital pass becomes available after purchase confirmation. You can sync it with the Go City app, which also provides attraction details, operating hours, reservation instructions, and a downloadable PDF guide.

The pass is valid for one year from purchase before activation. Once you use it at your first attraction, it runs for the number of consecutive calendar days you selected. A three-day pass means three calendar days, not 72 hours, so activating it late in the day can waste part of your first day.

Each included attraction can be visited once. That matters if you are considering a return visit to an observatory or museum. The app is useful for building a route, but you should check each attraction separately. Operating days, booking rules, and time slots are not identical.

The pass is accepted in English, and the activities are generally close to public transportation. Transportation between attractions is not included unless specifically stated. You will need a MetroCard or other subway and bus payment method, plus a little patience when crossing Manhattan.

Empire State Building and three different views of New York

The Empire State Building is the headline attraction, and the pass includes admission to its observation experience. On a clear day, the views can reach as far as 80 miles, taking in Central Park, New Jersey, Connecticut, and distant parts of Pennsylvania and Massachusetts.

Allow up to three hours here. Reservations are required, and sunset slots cannot be reserved with the pass. For a night view, plan a later visit after sunset rather than trying to use the pass for the most sought-after twilight period.

One World Observatory gives you a very different view from Lower Manhattan. The SkyPod Elevator reaches the 102nd floor in 47 seconds, and interactive displays cover New York’s cultural and financial story. Allow about two hours, but expect to wait in line to receive a time slot.

Top of the Rock is especially useful if you want the Empire State Building in your photographs. Its open views stretch across Midtown and beyond, with a clear look toward Central Park and the city’s other towers. Again, you receive a time slot after waiting in line, so do not schedule this too tightly against another attraction.

Edge at Hudson Yards adds an outdoor glass platform 100 stories above the street. You reserve the next available entry time at a kiosk outside the entrance. It is one of the newer viewpoints in the pass, and the open-air design gives it a different feel from enclosed observation decks.

I would not try to visit all four viewpoints in one day. Two can work if you plan carefully, but spreading them across several days gives you time to notice how much the view changes from Midtown, Lower Manhattan, and Hudson Yards.

Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, and the 9/11 sites

The Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island ferry is included, and you should set aside about four hours. The ferry gives you the official approach to Liberty Island, followed by time to explore the island and continue to Ellis Island, where more than 12 million immigrants were processed after arriving in the United States.

The pass does not include entry to the Statue of Liberty’s pedestal or crown. Those levels must be purchased separately, and you cannot simply add them after arriving on Liberty Island. Make your ferry reservation ahead of time through the current instructions in the app.

At the southern end of Manhattan, the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum offers a serious, carefully presented account of the Twin Towers attacks. The memorial pools provide a quiet outdoor space, while the museum uses artifacts, testimony, and first-hand accounts. Allow about two hours, and give this visit more time than a quick photo stop.

The Ground Zero Museum Workshop provides another approach. Its exhibits are designed to be non-graphic and interactive, making it a possible choice for families who want an age-sensitive introduction to the subject. Advance reservations are required.

The Museum of Jewish Heritage, also near Battery Park, focuses on Jewish life before, during, and after the Holocaust. Together with the Skyscraper Museum and the South Street Seaport Museum, it gives you reasons to spend more time in Lower Manhattan rather than rushing through it between major landmarks.

The museums worth making time for

New York Pass value improves when you use museums as planned stops rather than filler. MoMA can easily take three hours, with modern and contemporary works ranging from famous masterpieces to visiting exhibitions. Present your pass at the ticket desk for the next available time slot.

The American Museum of Natural History needs at least two hours, though families may want much longer. The blue whale display, fossils, dinosaur exhibits, taxidermy, and anthropology collections offer a useful break from skyscrapers and crowded streets. Advance reservations are required.

The Guggenheim is as much about the building as the collection. Frank Lloyd Wright’s spiral design changes the way you move through the art, and the museum presents Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, early Modern, and contemporary works.

The Whitney Museum of American Art focuses on American art from the 20th and 21st centuries, including works by Georgia O’Keeffe, Edward Hopper, Jasper Johns, and Jackson Pollock. Its location works well with a walk on the High Line.

For smaller and more specialized visits, consider the Museum of Arts and Design at Columbus Circle, Cooper Hewitt on Museum Mile, the International Center of Photography, and MoMA PS1 in Long Island City. MoMA PS1 is a good reason to cross into Queens, especially if you want experimental art rather than a standard museum collection.

The Museum of the City of New York and the New York Historical Society are useful for understanding how the city changed over four centuries. The Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine offers Romanesque and Gothic architecture, gardens, and a quieter uptown stop.

The Museum at Eldridge Street preserves the story of a historic Lower East Side synagogue through artifacts, letters, and digital displays. The Museum of Sex is adults-only and admits no one under 18, so check your group before including it.

Cruises, buses, bikes, and open-air sightseeing

Circle Line cruises let you see Manhattan from the water. The pass provides a choice of five New York cruises, including routes focused on the city’s best-known sights and harbor lights. You must wait in line to secure a boarding pass for one of the day’s departures, so check schedules before building your day around a cruise.

The Clipper City Tall Ship runs seasonally from May through October. Its daytime Statue Sail lasts about an hour after departure from Battery Park and offers views of Lower Manhattan, Governors Island, Ellis Island, and the Statue of Liberty. Advance booking is required.

Big Bus New York is included for the Uptown and Downtown loops. The service has live commentary and more than 25 stops, including Times Square, Central Park, the Empire State Building, and Statue of Liberty viewing areas. The pass is not a general unlimited bus ticket, and service can be affected by parades or city events. That makes the bus less dependable as your main transportation plan.

Cycling gives you more control. Central Park rentals and tours can fill two or four hours, and a guide can point out Strawberry Fields, Shakespeare Garden, Cherry Hill, movie locations, and park design details. A separate Brooklyn Bridge rental offers up to four hours of cycling, while the listed Brooklyn Bridge and DUMBO walking tour takes about 1 hour and 40 minutes.

You can also join a Central Park TV and Movie Sites tour, a High Line and Chelsea Meatpacking walk, or the High Line and Hudson Yards tour. These shorter guided activities help turn familiar places into stories rather than simple backdrops.

Neighborhood walks and local character

The pass is strongest when you move beyond the famous towers. A guided Chinatown walk takes about an hour through the neighborhood’s streets, shops, and food culture. The Little Italy tour runs about two hours and connects the area with the films and stories associated with Martin Scorsese.

The Harlem walking tour covers two hours of neighborhood history, culture, population changes, and future development. For music, Room 623 offers a 90-minute Harlem jazz program artistically directed by trombonist and composer Craig Harris, a longtime Harlem resident whose career in the local jazz scene began in 1976.

A one-hour Wall Street tour explains how the financial district developed and introduces the people who shaped it. The Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens bus tour covers several boroughs in an hour, including connections to hip-hop, baseball, and local cultural sites.

The Broadway and Times Square walking tour takes about 1 hour and 45 minutes. The Grand Central tour listed with the pass uses a Marvel and DC superhero theme and lasts two hours, while the Rockefeller Center tour focuses on Art Deco design, sculpture, and the complex’s Depression-era construction.

The Catacombs by Candlelight tour at the Basilica of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral lasts 90 minutes and requires advance reservation. You visit the nave and historic crypts below the church. It is atmospheric and very different from an observation deck or museum.

You can also book tours focused on slavery and the Underground Railroad, historic Wall Street, Chinatown, Little Italy, and local food. The Food On Foot Tours option runs four hours and includes authentic local favorites in New York neighborhoods. Reservation details matter here, since these smaller tours may operate only on selected days.

Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn, and Staten Island options

A common mistake is to treat the pass as a Manhattan-only product. The New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx covers 250 acres and more than 50 gardens, with a children’s garden among its family-friendly features. Plan for at least two hours, and remember that the size of the grounds can make this a half-day outing.

Yankee Stadium offers a Classic Tour lasting about 90 minutes. You can see historic baseball artifacts, visit Monument Park and the New York Yankees Museum, and learn about the 27-time World Series champion team. Tours are popular, so arrive 15 minutes before your selected start time and allow time for security.

Brooklyn Botanic Garden provides another two-hour green-space stop. It works well with the Brooklyn Bridge, DUMBO, or other Brooklyn plans, but do not assume you can squeeze every borough attraction into one afternoon.

Staten Island requires more planning. The Staten Island Museum at Snug Harbor covers art, science, natural specimens, and local artifacts. Nearby Snug Harbor Cultural Center and Botanical Garden includes more than 20 gardens, including a Chinese Scholar’s Garden, a Heritage Rose Garden, and the Connie Gretz Secret Garden with its drawbridge and castle entrance.

The Staten Island Zoo takes about three hours and focuses on wildlife across its compact eight-acre grounds. These attractions are worthwhile if you have five days, but they are not practical add-ons to a tightly packed Manhattan day.

Price, planning, and the real value

At $169 per person, the pass only saves money if you use it actively. I would compare the pass with the admission prices of the attractions you genuinely want, not with the total value of every attraction in the app.

A one-day pass suits an aggressive plan built around two or three major admissions. A two- or three-day pass can work well for a first visit if you combine observatories, museums, cruises, and short walking tours. Four or five days offer the best chance to use smaller museums, borough attractions, gardens, and seasonal activities without sprinting from one queue to another.

The strongest plan is geographic. Pair the Statue of Liberty with Battery Park museums, the High Line with the Whitney and Edge, Central Park with the American Museum of Natural History, and Brooklyn Bridge with DUMBO or Brooklyn Botanic Garden.

Start early at popular sights. One four-day plan used 13 included activities and visited all the major skyscraper viewpoints by building each day around opening times. That is the kind of preparation needed to turn the pass into a bargain.

Reservations are the biggest source of frustration. Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty, the American Museum of Natural History, selected tours, and several other activities require advance booking. One World Observatory, Top of the Rock, Edge, MoMA, Intrepid Museum, and the 9/11 Museum may involve a line for a time slot or ticket even when admission is covered.

Do not assume the words included or skip the line mean instant entry. You may still wait for security, a boarding pass, or a timed ticket. If an attraction is sold out, closed on a particular day, or affected by a parade, the pass does not solve the problem.

The pass has a 4.1 rating from 1,329 reviews, which fits the experience: excellent value for organized sightseers, but frustrating when app access, reservations, or ticket rules go wrong. Keep your QR code accessible, sync every pass correctly, and save the PDF guide in case mobile data is unreliable.

Who should buy the New York Pass?

Buy it if you want several major attractions, enjoy a full sightseeing schedule, and are willing to plan reservations before you arrive. Families can get strong value from museums, the bus, bike rentals, and observation decks, while couples and solo visitors can mix headline sights with neighborhood walks and specialized museums.

Skip it if you prefer slow mornings, spend most of your time wandering neighborhoods, or plan to visit only one or two paid attractions. It is also a poor fit if you dislike timed entries and queues.

My practical call: choose the shortest duration that lets you visit at least two substantial attractions per day, then use the app to map them by neighborhood. For a packed three- or four-day New York visit, this can be a smart buy. For a loose itinerary, paying directly may be simpler and cheaper.

FAQ

How many days can I choose for the New York Pass?

You can choose a pass lasting 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 days. The pass runs on consecutive calendar days after activation, not on 24-hour periods.

Is the Empire State Building included?

Yes. Admission to the Empire State Building is included, but reservations are required. Sunset time slots cannot be reserved with the pass.

Does the pass include the Statue of Liberty crown or pedestal?

No. The Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island ferry is included, but pedestal and crown access must be purchased separately.

Do I need reservations for attractions?

Some attractions require advance reservations, while others issue time slots or boarding passes at the attraction. Check the Go City app or PDF guide before visiting.

Does the pass include transportation around New York?

Transportation to and from attractions is not included unless the attraction specifically provides it. Big Bus New York and selected boat tours are included activities.

Can I visit an attraction more than once?

No. Each included attraction can be visited once with the pass.