160 verified museums and galleries in Boston. Free ones are marked FREE; for others, admission and any free days come from the museum's own site. We re-check each official page on a schedule so hours and free-day notes stay honest.
Updated · every listing links to its official source.
📍 Portsmouth · Southern New Hampshire · Strawbery Banke Museum
90-minute guided Thanksgiving history tours through four historic houses on selected November 2026 dates. Regular self-guided admission has ended for the season; museum open for these scheduled tours.
Details Official page ↗📍 Cambridge · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs · Building 14
On view through May 27, 2027 This exhibit celebrates the first-known all-woman architecture firm in Boston, founded in 1900 by Lois Lilley Howe, one of the first women to study architecture at MIT, completing the 2 year Partial Course in Architecture in 1890. Howe, along with architects Eleanor Manning and Mary Almy, completed more than 900 commissions throughout the course of their company’s
Details Official page ↗📍 Dorchester · Boston Neighborhoods · John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum
On Wednesday, November 11, 2026, the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum offers free admission to military veterans in honor of Veterans Day. Active-duty military receive free admission year-round. Museum open 10 a.m.–5 p.m.; free parking.
Details Official page ↗📍 Cambridge · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs · Building W41 (MET Warehouse)
IEEE VIS Arts Program (VISAP) 2026 (https://visap.net/2026/), the arts and design program of Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Visualization Conference (IEEE VIS) (https://ieeevis.org/year/2026/), brings together visualization researchers, designers, artists, and practitioners who explore creative and critical approaches to data through art, design, and visualization. VISAP provide
Details Official page ↗📍 Cambridge · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs · MIT Museum
Join us for a free, drop-in chess experience open to players of all ages and skill levels, from curious beginners to seasoned strategists. Led by MIT student mentors from NYC Chess Connections, this informal, welcoming program invites visitors to sit down, play a game, learn new strategies, and explore the creativity and critical thinking at the heart of chess. Whether you’re stopping by for a
Details Official page ↗📍 Cambridge · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs · MIT Museum
Pulitzer Prize-winning data journalist Mona Chalabi has spent her career bridging the gap between what numbers reveal and what they conceal about who we really are. For her first book, Ten Lives: How What We Have Shapes Who We Are (Random House, 2026), Chalabi spent five years following Americans from different income brackets to explore how money shapes their lives. Join Chalabi in conversation
Details Official page ↗📍 Boston · Boston Core · Central Library in Copley Square
Join us for a workshop with a visiting educator from the Tomaquag Museum to learn a traditional Native American art form and game. This program includes a game demonstration, game play, and art. Kids will get to make their own hubbub bowl game! Ages 6-12. Accessibility Notice: We strive to make our events accessible. To request a disability accommodation and/or language services, please contact th
Details Official page ↗📍 Cambridge · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs · MIT Museum
Join us for an engaging evening with author Thomas Levenson as he discusses his new book, "A Pox on Fools: The True Believers, Grifters, and Cynics Who Convinced Us to Reject Vaccines," in conversation with MIT Museum Director Michael John Gorman. Since the advent of smallpox inoculation in the eighteenth century, the idea that a disease introduced to the body in some lesser, weakened form might
Details Official page ↗📍 Cambridge · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs · Harvard Art Museums
Free evening open house on Thursday, December 3, 2026, 5–9 p.m., with galleries open, courtyard DJ, museum shop, and optional snacks/drinks for purchase.
Details Official page ↗📍 Boston · Boston Core
January 18, 2027 · Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston · Boston · Registration: Required (advance timed tickets required) · Confidence: Medium
Details Official site ↗📍 Boston · Boston Core
Thursdays 5:00-9:00 PM, November 5, 2026 - January 28, 2027 · 5:00 PM – 9:00 PM · Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum · Boston · Registration: Required (advance reservations recommended; tickets released Tuesdays at 10:00 AM) · Confidence: High
Details Official site ↗📍 Salem · North Shore
Large art and culture museum in downtown Salem with global collections, historic houses, and Yin Yu Tang (timed ticket included with general admission).
Details Official site ↗📍 Fenway · Boston Core
Major art museum in the Fenway with a global collection. Tickets required for all visitors including free child ages; Fenway Entrance currently closed per plan-your-visit page.
Details Official site ↗📍 Downtown / Charlestown · Boston Core
NPS park linking Freedom Trail landmarks tied to the American Revolution across downtown Boston and Charlestown. Federally and city-owned sites are free to enter; some privately operated partner museums collect their own admission.
Details Official site ↗📍 Waterfront · Boston Core
Harborfront aquarium with multi-level exhibits including the Giant Ocean Tank. Fall hours Mon–Fri 9–5 and weekends 9–6. Harbor seals temporarily off exhibit during habitat work (noted on official site).
Details Official site ↗📍 Seaport · Boston Core
Contemporary art museum on Boston Harbor in the Seaport. Regular paid admission with weekly free Thursday evening hours and other free or discount programs listed on the official visit page.
Details Official site ↗📍 Beacon Hill · Boston Core
Oldest standing Black church in the US (1806), abolitionist meeting place on Beacon Hill's Black Heritage Trail
Details Official site ↗📍 Beacon Hill · Boston Core
One of America's oldest independent libraries (1807) at 10 1/2 Beacon St with art galleries, talks and concerts
Details Official site ↗📍 Seaport · Boston Core
Hands-on museum on Fort Point Channel; three-story climb
Details Official site ↗📍 Seaport / Fort Point · Boston Core
Actor-led tours; visitors toss tea into the harbor; Abigail's Tea Room
Details Official site ↗📍 South End · Boston Core
Pottery classes, one-time workshops and gallery at 75 Thayer St in the SoWa Arts District
Details Official site ↗📍 Back Bay · Boston Core
Unaltered Victorian brownstone interior at 137 Beacon St, preserved as it was in 1954
Details Official site ↗📍 Back Bay · Boston Core
Walk through the center of a three-story 1935 stained-glass globe on a 30-foot bridge at 210 Massachusetts Ave
Details Official site ↗📍 Beacon Hill · Boston Core
New England's largest museum of Black history, in the Abiel Smith School at 46 Joy St
Details Official site ↗📍 West End / Charles River · Boston Core
On Charles River dam (Boston side); planetarium and Omni add-ons $6
Details Official site ↗📍 North End · Boston Core
Boston's oldest surviving church (1723); 'one if by land, two if by sea' lanterns
Details Official site ↗📍 Downtown · Boston Core
Where the Boston Tea Party began in 1773; run by Revolutionary Spaces
Details Official site ↗📍 Downtown · Boston Core
Oldest surviving public building in Boston (1713); Boston Massacre site outside; run by Revolutionary Spaces
Details Official site ↗📍 North End · Boston Core
Oldest remaining structure in downtown Boston (c.1680)
Details Official site ↗📍 Beacon Hill · Boston Core
1844 Beacon St townhouse of historian William H. Prescott at 55 Beacon St, run by the National Society of Colonial Dames
Details Official site ↗📍 Dorchester · Boston Neighborhoods
Interactive Columbia Point institute with a full-scale Senate chamber replica.
Details Official site ↗📍 Roxbury · Boston Neighborhoods
Roxbury museum celebrating art of the African diaspora in a historic mansion.
Details Official site ↗📍 Arlington Center · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs
Arlington arts center with classes, camps, theatre and gallery programs.
Details Official site ↗📍 Larz Anderson Park, 15 Newton Street · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs
America's oldest car collection, in the Andersons' storybook carriage house atop 64-acre Larz Anderson Park (the park itself is already listed; the museum is a separate ticketed venue): antique autos from an 1899 Winton onward, plus the beloved themed Lawn Event car shows - Tutto Italiano, German Car Day, Cars & Coffee - each spring through fall
Details Official site ↗📍 Medford · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs
Medford estate preserving Northern slavery history alongside a colonial mansion.
Details Official site ↗📍 East Somerville · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs
Somerville ceramics studio offering pottery classes, workshops and gallery sales.
Details Official site ↗📍 Somerville · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs
Somerville's community museum with local history exhibitions and art shows.
Details Official site ↗📍 Watertown Square · Cambridge & Inner Suburbs
Watertown museum - the largest Armenian collection in the diaspora.
Details Official site ↗📍 Merrill Street · North Shore
America's oldest working boat shop (1793); dory-building classes and community rowing
Details Official site ↗📍 Pine Street · North Shore
Home of Rebecca Nurse, executed in 1692; Danvers was the original Salem Village
Details Official site ↗📍 Main Street · North Shore
Story of 4,000+ wooden vessels built in Essex, told in a historic shipyard and schoolhouse
Details Official site ↗📍 Downtown · North Shore
Fitz Henry Lane collection, Folly Cove Designers and fisheries history; verified active with Nov 2026 studio art programs
Details Official site ↗📍 Magnolia · North Shore
Medieval-style inventor's castle on the ocean with Great Hall, courtyard pool and daily guided tours
Details Official site ↗📍 Harbor Loop · North Shore
Working waterfront museum with touch tanks, aquarium, dockside exhibits and schooner pier
Details Official site ↗📍 Argilla Road · North Shore
59-room Great House, Grand Allee and gardens on a 165-acre seaside drumlin; verified active
Details Official site ↗📍 Downtown Cultural District · North Shore
Lynn's shoe-industry and city history museum with rotating LynnArts gallery exhibitions
Details Official site ↗📍 Washington Street · North Shore
1768 Jeremiah Lee Mansion - one of America's finest Georgian houses - plus museum galleries
Details Official site ↗📍 Downtown Waterfront · North Shore
1835 granite Custom House telling Newburyport's shipbuilding and Coast Guard birthplace story
Details Official site ↗Coming up first: Strawbery Banke Thanksgiving Tours 2026 (On now, through Nov 29, Portsmouth), Howe, Manning & Almy: Boston’s First All-Woman Firm and the Changing Face of Architecture (Mon, Nov 9, 10:00 AM, Cambridge), JFK Library Free Admission for Military Veterans — Veterans Day 2026 (Wed, Nov 11, 10:00 AM, Dorchester) and VISAP Exhibition (Wed, Nov 11, 1:30 PM, Cambridge). Places you can visit on your own schedule include ICA MLK Day Free Admission in Boston, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Free Thursday Nights in Boston, Peabody Essex Museum in Salem and Museum of Fine Arts, Boston in Fenway.
Of the 160 verified listings for museums in Boston, 64 are free and 96 are paid; 9 are dated events and 151 are places you can visit any open day. The most common kinds are museum (113), arts & culture (24), family (6), learning (5) and tour (5). The most listings are in Boston (12), Downtown (12), Cambridge (11), Beacon Hill (4) and Fenway (4).
Yes; free museums carry a FREE badge here. Free-day schedules change, so confirm on the museum's site.
Sometimes. Timed-entry and RSVP rules come from each museum; the official link on every card is the source of truth.
64 of the 160 listings are free to attend or enter; the other 96 show the price from the official site.
Right now: Boston (12), Downtown (12), Cambridge (11), Beacon Hill (4) and Fenway (4).
It is rebuilt from verified listings on every visit and was last updated Sunday, November 8, 2026 at 8:09 AM EST. Ended, cancelled and removed listings drop off automatically.
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