By state · ID

National Parks in Idaho.

Idaho's NPS network at a glance — units, designations, visit totals, and what shapes the visiting season.

By Nicholas Major · Last updated

Idaho has the small southwestern corner of Yellowstone National Park plus Craters of the Moon National Monument & Preserve, Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument, City of Rocks National Reserve, Nez Perce National Historical Park (multi-state), and Minidoka National Historic Site. Boise (BOI) anchors the southern network; Idaho Falls (IDA) reaches Craters of the Moon and the Yellowstone corner. Craters of the Moon is the state's headline standalone NPS unit — vast basalt lava flows from eruptions roughly 2,000 to 15,000 years old; the Loop Drive operates roughly mid-April through mid-November with seasonal variation. Yellowstone's Idaho portion has no developed visitor facilities — most Yellowstone visits enter via Wyoming or Montana. The state's high-elevation parks are summer-and-fall destinations; Boise itself sits at a meaningfully lower elevation and has a longer year-round shoulder.

Every NPS unit in Idaho.

Idaho's 10 NPS units: 3 National Historic Trails · 1 National Reserve · 1 National Monument & Preserve · 1 National Monument · 1 National Geologic Trail · 1 National Historic Site · 1 National Historical Park · 1 National Park. Combined 5-year-average annual visits: 5,185,477 (multi-state units count their full visits in every state they touch — see methodology). The most-visited unit is Yellowstone National Park at about 4.43M annual visits.

UnitDesignation5-yr avg visitsBusiest month
Yellowstone National Park National ParkYELL 4,431,841 July
Nez Perce National Historical Park National Historical ParkNEPE 343,582 June
Craters Of The Moon National Monument & Preserve National Monument & PreserveCRMO 268,147 July
City Of Rocks National Reserve National ReserveCIRO 90,856 June
Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument National MonumentHAFO 28,515 July
Minidoka National Historic Site National Historic SiteMIIN 22,536 July
California National Historic Trail National Historic TrailCALI — —
Ice Age Floods National Geologic Trail National Geologic TrailIAFL — —
Lewis & Clark National Historic Trail National Historic TrailLECL — —
Oregon National Historic Trail National Historic TrailOREG — —

Methodology

Unit list and per-unit visit counts come from the official NPS Visitor Use Statistics Data Package, 2025. The "5-year average visits" column is the mean of 2021-2025 Recreation Visits. Multi-state NPS units (Yellowstone, Death Valley, Great Smoky Mountains and others) are listed under every state they touch; the per-unit visit count is the unit's total, not a per-state share. Independent site, not affiliated with the National Park Service.

Adjacent reading

Independence

Independent site. Not affiliated with or endorsed by the National Park Service. Data comes from the official NPS Visitor Use Statistics Data Package, 2025; editorial analysis is ours. The NPS Arrowhead and other NPS marks are not used.

Last updated · 2026-05-19