The US has 63 national parks, from the glaciers of Alaska to the coral reefs of the Florida Keys. Some are a short drive from a big city. Some can only be reached by boat or plane. Seeing all of them is a lifetime project, which is exactly why a checklist helps.

What counts as a national park

The National Park Service looks after hundreds of sites: monuments, historic sites, seashores, battlefields and more. Only 63 of them carry the full title of national park. When people say they are trying to "visit all the national parks", these 63 are the list they mean.

Where the parks are

The parks are not spread evenly. Grouped by region:

  • Pacific: 16 parks, including Yosemite, Olympic, Haleakalā and the National Park of American Samoa.

  • Southwest: 13 parks, including the Grand Canyon, Zion, Arches and Big Bend.

  • East: 11 parks, including Acadia, Great Smoky Mountains, Shenandoah and the Everglades.

  • Alaska: 8 parks, most of them far from any road.

  • Midwest: 8 parks, including Badlands, Indiana Dunes and Voyageurs.

  • Rockies: 7 parks, including Yellowstone, Glacier and Rocky Mountain.

California has more national parks than any other state, nine in all.

Use a checklist you can see

A plain list works, but a map shows you the next park that is actually within reach. The free national park checklist on stampsy.app puts all 63 parks on one map. Check off each one you have visited, see your count by region, save the map as an image, or print the checklist for the glovebox. No sign-up.

Ideas for ticking off more parks

  • Cluster them. Utah's five parks (Arches, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef, Bryce Canyon and Zion) fit into one road trip.

  • Go in the shoulder season. Spring and fall are often quieter at the busiest parks.

  • Look up access first. Some popular parks have used timed entry reservations in peak months, and the Alaska parks can mean a small plane or a boat.

Remember the ones you forgot

If you have been to a park but are not sure which one, your photos can settle it. The Stampsy app reads only the place and date of each photo, on your phone. With Stampsy Pro it fills in the national parks you have been to as well as your countries.