With your New York Explorer Pass, you pick the number of attractions you want to visit—3, 5, 7 or 10—from 54 choices, and take up to 30 days to visit them! You can skip the ticket line at top sights and save big with special discounts. Now available for instant delivery!
Save up to 45% off combined gate prices!
If for any reason you can't activate your pass within a year of purchase, we'll give you a full refund. No questions asked. Learn more.
The New York Explorer Pass includes access to over 54 attractions for one low price. It's the easiest way to see all the city has to offer.
Just swipe your card and go!
A New York Explorer Pass is an attraction pass that gets you into multiple attractions for one low price, and includes many extras and discounts.
Have your passes delivered instantly!.
If you prefer, you can also have your passes shipped, or pick them up when you get there at one of our in-city pickup locations.
Passes are activated the first time you visit an attraction. After activation, you have 30 days to use your choices.
You can pick up your Statue of Liberty Ferry Tickets year round at the NY CitySights desk at Madame Tussauds in Times Square.
The Statue of Liberty Express Cruise is offered on a year round basis. However, during the high season (May–October) you will also receive a complimentary ticket to the Hop On Hop Off Water Taxi when you choose the Statue of Liberty Express Cruise as one of your choices.
Each NYC Explorer Pass holder may choose one of the following tours.
Once you decide which tour you would like to take, present your Explorer Pass at the City Sights Ticket Desk inside Madame Tussauds in Times Square. You will receive a ticket for the bus tour of your choice.
Yes, the New York Explorer Pass allows entrance into attractions during all operating hours.
With our Free Cancellation Insurance, you can return any unactivated passes for a full refund, within a year of the purchase date.
Compare the price of the card to the gate prices of the attractions to see how much you can save. Many customers save more than 40%.
You may only visit each attraction once per the life of your card.
Child passes are for ages 3–12. Most attractions are free for children under 3.
View a list of sales locations in New York. Note that if we are running a web-only sale, the in-city sales locations will not be able to honor that sale price. In-city purchases are available at full price only.
Attractions that require a reservation will display this symbol on the guidebook page.
Some attractions require a credit card to hold a reservation. In these cases, your credit card will not be charged unless you do not show up for your reservation.
For reservations on the NBC Experience Tour, you will be asked to provide your Explorer Pass Number or your order number. Because of the popularity of the tour, your cards will be charged (one visit deducted) if you do not show up or are late for your reserved time.
If you are interested in taking the Gossip Girl, NY TV and Movie Tour and Sex and the City Tour, you should pick up your tickets as soon as possible after arriving in the city.
There’s no catch. New York City Explorer Pass has a partnership with all of the participating attractions to make your visit to New York City as memorable as possible and to help you save time and money.
Please feel free to call us at 866-629-4335 and we’ll be happy to help you!
Note: A New York Explorer Pass is non-transferrable. This means that once you start using it, you are the only person who can use it to get into attractions. New York Explorer Passs may not be re-sold.
You should treat your New York Explorer Pass like cash. If it is lost or stolen, it cannot be replaced.
Call us at 866-629-4335 and we'll be happy to help you!
Passes are activated the first time you visit an attraction. After activation, you have 30 days to use your choices.
You can pick up your Statue of Liberty Ferry Tickets year round at the NY CitySights desk at Madame Tussauds in Times Square or at Bike and roll in Battery Park Kiosk (April–October)
The Statue of Liberty Express Cruise is offered on a year round basis. However, during the high season (May–October) you will also receive a complimentary ticket to the Hop On Hop Off Water Taxi when you choose the Statue of Liberty Express Cruise as one of your choices.
Each NYC Explorer Pass holder may choose one of the following tours.
Once you decide which tour you would like to take, present your Explorer Pass at the City Sights Ticket Desk inside Madame Tussauds in Times Square. You will receive a ticket for the bus tour of your choice.
Yes, the New York Explorer Pass allows entrance into attractions during all operating hours.
With our Free Cancellation Insurance, you can return any unactivated passes for a full refund, within a year of the purchase date.
Compare the price of the card to the gate prices of the attractions to see how much you can save. Many customers save more than 40%.
In most cases, you can visit each attraction once per day. Some attractions are valid only once during the life of the pass. Please reference your guidebook page for specific information on each attraction.
Child passes are for ages 3–12. Most attractions are free for children under 3.
View a list of sales locations in New York. Note that if we are running a web-only sale, the in-city sales locations will not be able to honor that sale price. In-city purchases are available at full price only.
Attractions that require a reservation will display this symbol on the guidebook page.
Some attractions require a credit card to hold a reservation. In these cases, your credit card will not be charged unless you do not show up for your reservation.
For reservations on the NBC Experience Tour, you will be asked to provide your Explorer Pass Number or your order number. Because of the popularity of the tour, your cards will be charged (one visit deducted) if you do not show up or are late for your reserved time.
If you are interested in taking the Gossip Girl, NY TV and Movie Tour and Sex and the City Tour, you should pick up your tickets as soon as possible after arriving in the city.
There’s no catch. New York City Explorer Pass has a partnership with all of the participating attractions to make your visit to New York City as memorable as possible and to help you save time and money.
Please feel free to call us at 866-629-4335 and we’ll be happy to help you!
Note: A New York Explorer Pass is non-transferrable. This means that once you start using it, you are the only person who can use it to get into attractions. New York Explorer Passs may not be re-sold.
You should treat your New York Explorer Pass like cash. If it is lost or stolen, it cannot be replaced.
Customers most agreed on the following attributes:
[3 of 3 customers found this review helpful]
from London Ontario Canada on 8/22/2012Comments about Smart Destinations New York Explorer Pass:
this is the second time I have bought a smart destination card.. Boston and NYC... both were well worth it... convienent easy to use... nice variety of attractions...
[8 of 8 customers found this review helpful]
Comments about Smart Destinations New York Explorer Pass:
we went on 7 attractions with the explorer pass; we found the NBC Studio Tour very dis-organized and nothing to see except empty rooms and a lot of room to room shuffling. Save your money on this one.
[5 of 6 customers found this review helpful]
from Sacramento, CA on 7/9/2012Comments about Smart Destinations New York Explorer Pass:
We purchased 2 adult and 3 child passes for NYC. Although you do not get to cut in any lines and don't save any time with them, they are absolutely worth it. We saved a lot of money using the pass for our family trip. We even experienced a problem with one attraction that double dipped two of our cards and SmartDestinations handled it promptly and efficiently. I would buy this again and will look for other cities to use the Explorer Pass in also.
[3 of 3 customers found this review helpful]
from Boston, MA on 4/29/2012Comments about Smart Destinations New York Explorer Pass:
After using a Go Card in San Fransisco, I've looked to use them in every city I travel to that has this product. In NYC, I used this pass to do a Hop On/Hop Off tour to get a quick overview of the city and cover a lot of ground. We paid the $14 upgrade for a 2 day pass. Great things about this were 1. It came with a free cruise, which offered great photos of the city and amazing Statue of Liberty shots 2. We were able to use the bus for transportation the rest of the weekend to get to the other sights we wanted to see. Doing that actually canceled out our need to do a separate Statue of Liberty tour. I would have liked to have gone to the Ellis Island museum but lines were really long and we only had two days. Next time.... We also used the pass to visit Madame Toussade's which was really fun! A lot of the studio/movie tours were booked up so I wish I had planned better ahead of time. Overall, I really liked that the pass gave me access to so many choices but also helped me narrow down what I wanted to prioritize. I would definitely use the pass the next time I go to NYC.
[3 of 3 customers found this review helpful]
from Antwerp, Belgium, Europe on 9/2/2011Comments about Smart Destinations New York Explorer Pass:
We used the pass during the week of 21st august. We did 7 attractions, and with most of them the pass was really a advantage. Intrepid, Hudson-Cruise, Top of the Rock, Museum of Natural history, Guggenheim: no waiting at all. For Bike and Roll hiring and the Circle Line Harlem bus tour we had to go to the main office to get tickets with the pass, while the start of the tours was somewhere else, that was a disadvantage! But it was nice to have it anyway.
[5 of 5 customers found this review helpful]
from Phx on 6/25/2011Comments about Smart Destinations New York Explorer Pass:
Each member of my family of four bought the ten-attraction, NY Explorer Pass for our nine-day trip to Manhattan. We could easily have used a fifteen event pass, as there were so many choices. There were absolutely no problems. Plan ahead, but keep a flexible schedule. Learn to use the subway system to get from one attraction to the next faster. Try the Hop on-Hop off Tour early in your stay. We hopped off at the Empire State Building, Ground Zero, and Chinatown/Little Italy.
[10 of 11 customers found this review helpful]
from Charleston, SC on 12/26/2010Comments about Smart Destinations New York Explorer Pass:
My boyfriend and I bought the explorer pass before our 5 day trip to NYC in December. It saved us a great deal of money as the destinations that are available with this pass are ones that we had already planned on visiting. Most activities range from about $25-30 a piece if you were to visit them without using the explorer pass. We bought the 7 destination pass, but only ended up using 5. Even though we missed out on 2 destinations I still feel we got our money's worth or at least broke even. Make sure you are going to be able to hit all of your destinations before purchasing. There was only one destination that I felt was inconvenient and that was the tour of the statue of liberty museum. We first had to go to Madame Tussaud's to pick up our vouchers, then had to take the Subway down to South Ferry, get off the subway and find the man selling City Tour tickets, exchange our vouchers for hard copy tickets and then make our way to where the ferry was departing but first waiting in security for about an hour before we boarded. I definitely recommend visiting the Ground Zero Museum Workshop, it's within the meatpacking district which we didn't enjoy very much, but the museum itself is definitely a must see. Overall, very happy with our purchased of the explorer pass.
[9 of 9 customers found this review helpful]
from Philippines on 10/11/2010Comments about Smart Destinations New York Explorer Pass:
I bought two 5-Attraction New York Explorer Cards for me and my wife when we visited NYC from Oct 3-6. Spent [$] per card. (By the way, pick up of card in Times Square Area is now at the Ripley's Museum, not at Madame Tussauds.)We used the card for the following attractions:King Tut Exhibition ($29.50)City Sights All Around Tour ($42)Top of the Rock ($20)Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum ($35.50)NY Waterway Twilight Tour ($26)That comes to $153 per person. Therefore we saved more than $50 each using this card!
[18 of 19 customers found this review helpful]
from Paris, France on 8/8/2010Comments about Smart Destinations New York Explorer Pass:
While picking the passes up yourself (with your printed voucher - don't forget it !) is listed as a con, its really not a big deal. Besides, if you pick it up at Rockefeller Center, you can profit by making a reservation to go to Top of the Rock, a real "must" and actually a much better attraction than the Empire State Building. We felt the passes worked great, I was somewhat hesitant as I had seen mixed reviews, but our experience was great. There's alot to do in NY and you need to choose wisely, but there are enough choices with the Explorer that you can pretty well fill up a 5 day visit without any trouble. For families, the bike tours, museum and view at the top of Rockefeller Center and Empire State are particularly attractive.
[39 of 39 customers found this review helpful]
from Sacramento, CA on 6/16/2010Comments about Smart Destinations New York Explorer Pass:
Our party of four chose to each individually purchase a 5 day Explorer Pass. Although in the end, we did ultimately save at least about $20 each, this did not come without a degree of difficulty and some added stress to go along with it. But, before I get into that, I first want to mention that the overall savings is primarily due to the bus tour being so overpriced to begin with. For all other attractions (like museums, cruises, etc.) the prices are actually quite comparable at or around $20 a piece. Therefore, unless you plan on choosing a bus tour as one of your attractions (this is why you can only choose ONE bus tour), I would not recommend the Explorer Pass as the savings would be very minimal if any. Plus, the added stress and no guarantee (see below) is not worth it. Regarding the difficulties that we encountered with use of the card, it all started at Madame Tussaud's. Of course, we didn't know this at the time. The cashier there must've swiped one of the cards 3-4 times. We didn't realize this until we tried to use the card at the Empire State Building and the cashier there told us that there was nothing left on one of the cards. However, she was able to kindly let us through. This caused a little stress as we now knew that future use of the cards would undoubtedly cause some problems. But the next museum that we went to didn't mention a word about one of the cards being depleted, so we thankfully had no problems there. However, the Skyline Cruise cashier (our last attraction) would only initially give us three tickets when he noticed that nothing was left on one of the cards. It took a great deal of haggling to convince him to just give us the extra ticket. Even showing him receipts of past uses (with accurate counts on each receipt) did nothing to convince him as he said that there was nothing he could do since the card was depleted. So, although you do purchase the Explorer Pass in advance for a discounted price, there is no guarantee that 1) The correct number of attractions was programmed into your card to begin with (there is absolutely no way of knowing this), or 2) The partnering companies who contract with the Explorer Pass will not make an error in swiping the card multiple times. To improve the quality of this service and make the purchase satisfaction guaranteed, I would recommend that instead of programming a set number of uses into any singular card, that the customer instead be given multiple attraction tickets (cheap paper tickets would suffice)to be redeemed at each attraction. That way, if you lose it, it's your own fault. You can't rely on any of the contracted partners to use the card correctly and there is no way to check the balance on the card.On a side note, the information in the booklet regarding the Twilight Cruise needs to be updated. The book implies (or it is not clear) that the FIRST Twilight Cruise departs at 6:30pm. This really is the LAST and ONLY twilight cruise departure. The cruise times in the ticket window also differ from the booklet. Customers should be alerted in bold print to check the times by calling the office ahead of time. I take partial responsiblity for this and should have doublechecked anyway, but still. We walked all the way to the attraction and back, only to go again the next day at the right time.
Below are the most popular ways New York Explorer Pass holders saved money on their trip. While you don’t have to follow these itineraries, these examples show how much you can save! Just choose from 54 of New York’s best attractions and let the fun begin!
Choose 3 New York Explorer Pass Choose 5 New York Explorer Pass
| Typical time spent | Gate Price | |
|---|---|---|
| Top of the Rock Observation Deck | 2 hours | $25.00 |
| Circle Line 2-Hour Semi Circle Cruise | 2 hours | $34.00 |
| CitySights Uptown Treasures Hop-On Hop-Off Tour | 2.5 hour loop, valid all day | $44.00 |
| Total gate price | $103.00 |
|---|---|
| 3-Attraction Pass | $79.99 |
| You save | $23.01 |
22% off the adult gate price! | |
| Typical time spent | Gate Price | |
|---|---|---|
| Hop-on Hop-off Downtown Double Decker Bus Tour | 2.5 hour loop, valid all day | $44.00 |
| Ripley's Believe it or Not | 2 hours | $32.61 |
| Circle Line Semi Circle Cruise | 2 hours | $34.00 |
| NYC TV & Movie Sites | 3.5 hours | $42.00 |
| Top of the Rock Observation Desk | 2 hours | $25.00 |
| Total gate price | $177.61 |
|---|---|
| 5-Attraction Pass | $116.99 |
| You save | $60.62 |
34% off the adult gate price! | |
| Delivery Information | ||
|---|---|---|
| Instant Delivery | FREE! | |
| US Ground | 7-10 business days | $5.25 |
| FedEx | 3-4 business days | $15.00 |
| In-City Pickup | $4.00 | |
| Canada | 3-5 business days | $22.00 |
| International | Up to 10 business days | $25.00 |
