Even on a tight schedule, American Museum of Natural History earns the hours.
Allow 2.5–4 hrs.
A genuine all-day museum: the dinosaur halls, the suspended blue whale, dioramas, and the Hayden Planetarium are reliably awe-inducing, and the 2023 Gilder Center added a striking cavernous atrium. It's huge and can overwhelm — pick two or three halls. The single best museum in the city for kids.