The Best Museums in Bay Area

Tenderloin Museum

The Tenderloin Museum celebrates the rich history of a neighborhood in the heart of San Francisco. more

The American Bookbinders Museum

The American Bookbinders Museum is the only museum of its kind in North America, celebrating and exploring the culture and tools of bookbinding, from its earliest forms to the changes and innovations of the industrial revolution. more

The Bay Model

The Bay Model Visitor Center in Sausalito is a fully accessible education center administered by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers which hosts a working hydraulic model of the San Francisco Bay and Sacramento - San Joaquin River Delta System. The m... more

The Beat Museum

The Beat Museum is dedicated to spreading the spirit of The Beat Generation, which we define as tolerance, compassion and having the courage to live your individual truth. The Beats, as in beaten down and beatific, were a collective of writers, arti... more

The Bothwell Arts Center

The Bothwell Arts Center serves as an incubator for the Tri-Valley's vibrant arts community providing a nurturing environment for artists, performers, and cultural arts organizations to create and grow. In 2006, the Bothwell Arts Center opened offeri... more

The Euphrat Museum of Art

The Euphrat Museum of Art: De Anza College highlights the diverse yet interconnected work of art  from De Anza College in Cupertino and Foothill College in Los Altos Hills -- painting, drawing, prints, mixed media, photography, sculpture, cerami... more

The Intel Museum

Explore through interactive exhibits how technologies used to capture images, communicate across distance and record sound have evolved over time through. more

The Interval at Long Now

One-of-a-kind bar-cafe-museum-venue. If you've ever mused on the ultimate fate of humanity or been inspired by the megalithic ceremonial calendar-structure at Stonehenge, you'll feel a familiar twinge of recognition at The Interval at the Long Now... more

The Lace Museum

Featuring priceless lace parasols, gloves, fans and purses dating from the 1800s. more

The MADE (Museum of Art and Digital Entertainment)

The MADE is the only all-playable video game museum in the world.  Itching to replay an old classic? Revel in video game history? Talk shop with fellow video game nerds? From the Atari to the Playstation 3, the MADE houses over 5,300 playable v... more

The Magnes

The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life was established in 2010 following the transfer of the Judah L. Magnes Museum to the University of California, Berkeley. Its remarkably diverse archive, library and museum holdings include art, objects, tex... more

The Museum of Ophthalmology

The Museum of Vision is an educational program of The Foundation of the American Academy of Ophthalmology.  It is the only institution in the United States whose sole purpose is to preserve the history of ophthalmology and celebrate its unique c... more

The Museum of Performance & Design (MPD)

The Museum of Performance & Design (MPD), formerly the San Francisco Performing Arts Library & Museum, is the first museum in the country dedicated exclusively to the performing arts and theatrical design. The Museum's mission is to educate p... more

The Plymire-Schwarz House

The Plymire-Schwarz House and Museum began its life in 1906 as the first hospital in San Mateo County, California. It was established by Dr. H.G. Plymire and also served as his home. more

The Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum and Planetarium

The Egyptian Museum at Rosicrucian Park has been a fixture of San José life for so long that it is difficult to conceive of a time without it. Hundreds of thousands of residents and visitors to Northern California have experienced "history com... more

The Santa Cruz Surfing Museum

The Santa Cruz Surfing Museum is housed in the Mark Abbott Memorial Lighthouse at Lighthouse Point on West Cliff Drive. Overlooking internationally renowned surfing hotspot Steamer Lane, this little gem of a museum has photographs, surfboards, and ot... more

The Space Station Museum - Pacheco Plaza Center

The Space Station is an innovation in museum exhibits in that vacant commercial space is filled and the public gains a new education venue in their local neighborhood through private contributions. It is located in the Pacheco Plaza, a shopping cente... more

The Tech Museum of Innovation

With its splashy, mango-colored exterior, the Tech stands out among everything else in downtown San Jose. Millions have visited the place since it opened at the original location in 1990, which was around the corner on San Carlos Street. The Tech... more

The Walt Disney Family Museum

The fascinating and inspiring story of Walt Disney, whose artistry, imagination and vision helped define 20th-century America, has been brought to life at The Walt Disney Family Museum in the Presidio of San Francisco. The Museum illuminates Walt Dis... more

89 Upcoming events

Tor House

Tor House and Hawk Tower were built by Carmel poet Robinson Jeffers as a home and refuge for himself and his family, using granite boulders gathered from the shore of Carmel Bay. He sited the house on a point of land that meets the sea like the "prow... more

Treasure Island Museum

The Treasure Island Museum engages visitors and island residents with Treasure Island's rich cultural legacy, the natural wealth of Yerba Buena Island, and the islands' forthcoming sustainable development, to explore innovative solutions to the chall... more

Triton Museum of Art

For nearly 50 years, the Triton Museum of Art has been a destination for the community, providing a venue where local artists exhibit their work alongside regional and national artists, and where students of all ages learn about art and the creative... more

Truhlsen-Marmor Museum of the Eye

Discover surprising facts about how your vision works at the American Academy of Ophthalmology Truhlsen-Marmor Museum of the Eye®. The Museum of the Eye is the worlds only free, public museum dedicated to the fascinating science of sight. Through h... more

USS Hornet

The aircraft carrier USS Hornet is a national treasure, having participated in two of the greatest events of the 20th century — World War II and the Apollo 11 manned space mission when the first humans in the history of mankind set foot upon th... more

1 Upcoming events

USS Pampanito

The USS Pampanito (SS-383) is a World War II Balao class Fleet submarine museum and memorial that is open for visitors daily at San Francisco's Fisherman's Wharf. The Pampanito made six patrols in the Pacific during World War II during which she san... more

Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum

Museum with 5 galleries exploring the history of Vallejo & the U.S. naval base at Mare Island. more

Wells Fargo History Museum

Wells Fargo's flagship museum, located at corporate headquarters in the heart of the financial district, is the site where Wells Fargo first opened for business in 1852.  The museum tells the story of how Wells Fargo provided banking and express... more

Wheeler Auditorium

Youth Science Institute / Vasona Science & Nature Center

At the YSI's Vasona Science and Nature Center, there's always something fun going on! You can learn the difference between a tortoise and a turtle, observe live reptiles and other animals and insects, get an inside look into our watershed, see who... more

UPCOMING EVENTS