By state · IN

National Parks in Indiana.

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

By Nicholas Major · Last updated

Indiana has three NPS units — Indiana Dunes National Park (along Lake Michigan's southern shore), Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial, and George Rogers Clark National Historical Park — plus segments of the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail. Indianapolis (IND) anchors the central state; Chicago O'Hare (ORD, Illinois) is closer to Indiana Dunes; Evansville (EVV) reaches Lincoln Boyhood. Indiana Dunes is the year's heaviest visitor pressure, with peak demand June through August for the beaches plus a notable fall shoulder for the dune-migration trails. Lincoln Boyhood operates year-round with peak demand around the President's Day weekend and during school field-trip seasons. The state's NPS footprint is small but spans Great Lakes coastline, presidential history, and Revolutionary-era frontier interpretation. Indiana Dunes specifically benefits from its proximity to the Chicago metro area, which puts a large day-trip pool within a two-hour drive and compresses summer beach visits into weekend pulses rather than weekday-distributed traffic.

Every NPS unit in Indiana.

Indiana's 4 NPS units: 1 National Historical Park · 1 National Park · 1 National Historic Trail · 1 National Memorial. Combined 5-year-average annual visits: 3,074,297 (multi-state units count their full visits in every state they touch — see methodology). The most-visited unit is Indiana Dunes National Park at about 2.82M annual visits.

UnitDesignation5-yr avg visitsBusiest month
Indiana Dunes National Park National ParkINDU 2,822,398 July
George Rogers Clark National Historical Park National Historical ParkGERO 132,986 May
Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial National MemorialLIBO 118,913 July
Lewis & Clark National Historic Trail National Historic TrailLECL — —

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