Mapped: The States With the Most and Least National Park Land

National parks are more popular than ever: in 2024, the National Park Service tallied more than 331 million visits, its biggest year on record. But some states have much more of their land dedicated to national parks than others. To see which states are at the top and bottom of that list, check out the map and data below.

1. Public Lands by the Numbers
2. National Park Lands in Each State
3. States With the Least National Park Land
4. Parks with Benefits

Public Lands by the Numbers

In August 1916, President Woodrow Wilson signed the Organic Act, giving management of the country’s growing system of national parks and other public lands to the newly created National Park Service. According to data collected by the Congressional Research Service and last updated in 2020 [PDF], this government agency oversees more than 85 million acres of land across all 50 states, roughly 3.5 percent of the country’s total area. Those lands include 19 kinds of parks:

National Park Lands in Each State

More than half of those 85 million acres are located inside a single state: Alaska. With a population of less than 750,000, plenty of space is available for federal designation in the Last Frontier, including the five biggest national parks in the entire system:

• Wrangell-St. Elias National Park & Preserve: 13.2 million acres
• Gates of the Arctic National Park & Preserve: 8.5 million acres
• Denali National Park & Preserve: 6.1 million acres
• Katmai National Park & Preserve: 4.1 million acres
• Lake Clark National Park & Preserve: 4 million acres

While Alaska’s public lands encompass glaciers, rainforests, mountains, volcanoes, and frozen tundra, much of California’s national park territory is a lot hotter and drier. With 7.6 million acres, it has the largest area managed by the National Park Service in the lower 48 and its biggest NPS-managed unit is Death Valley National Park—3.3 million acres of scorching Mojave Desert populated mostly by sheep, foxes, kangaroo rats, and the skeletons of prospectors who failed to find their fortunes during the 19th century gold rush. 

The states next in line in terms of national park acreage are Florida (2.4 million), Wyoming (2.3 million) and Utah (2 million): home of the Everglades National Park (1.5 million acres), Yellowstone National Park (2.2 million acres), and Canyonlands National Park (337,000 acres), respectively. 

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Here’s the complete list:

States With the Least National Park Land

On the flipside, there’s Kansas. Though it has roughly the same total area as Florida or Wyoming, only 462 acres of its land is owned by the National Parks Service. In Kansas’s defense, this comparatively small number is due to the fact that the state’s largest park, the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, which covers nearly 11,000 acres of land, is privately owned by the Nature Conservancy and is co-managed with the National Park Service. 

Ranked below Kansas is Illinois, where only 12 of the state’s 37 million acres of land is managed by the National Parks Service. Yes, you heard that right: a mere dozen. Aside from Pullman National Historic Park in Chicago, NPS oversees a pre-presidential home of Abraham Lincoln, the 1908 Springfield Race Riot National Monument, and a few other diminutive sites. 

It may not be surprising that the state with the least national park land is also the smallest in the country. Rhode Island’s five acres are spread across the national memorial to Roger Williams, the Ocean State’s founder, and three other units.

Parks with Benefits

Whether they encompass seemingly endless stretches of untamed wilderness or just a handful of historical city blocks, the lands managed by the National Park Service represent the mindblowing variety of the country’s natural landscapes and cultural history. They also contribute money, jobs, and more to the states where they’re located. In 2023 alone, national park tourism generated $26.4 billion. 

New national parks, historic sites, and monuments are still being established every year. Some of the newest—which may not be included yet the Congressional Research Service’s data—are the Emmett Till and Mamie Till-Mobley National Monument in Illinois and Mississippi, the Carlisle Federal Indian Boarding School National Monument in Pennsylvania, and the Frances Perkins National Monument in Maine.