Statue of Liberty & Ellis Island Tickets: Ferry & Crown

Every ferry ticket to the Statue of Liberty already includes both islands, both museums and an audio tour, so the only real decisions are whether to buy the interior upgrade and which side of the harbor to sail from. General admission is $26.00 for an adult; the pedestal or the crown adds thirty cents. The catch isn’t the price. It’s that those two upgrades sell out months in advance while general admission almost never does.

The National Park Service charges nothing to set foot on Liberty Island or Ellis Island, and nothing for the museums on either one. Everything you pay is the boat. Statue City Cruises is the only ferry company the Park Service authorizes, and the only legitimate on-site ticket window in Manhattan is inside Castle Clinton, the round brick fort in the middle of The Battery. Whoever is selling “Statue of Liberty tickets” on the footpath outside is not selling you a landing.

The three tickets, and what thirty cents buys

Three products, and the operator sells them under names that don’t quite explain themselves: General Admission is the plain ferry ticket, while Pedestal Reserve and Crown Reserve are the two interior upgrades. “Reserve” here means a reserved interior slot, not a better class of boat.

Children 3 and under travel free and don’t need a ticket at all.

Those figures come from the operator’s own table, checked in August 2026. The Park Service publishes the same thing a different way: it prints a base child fare of $17.00 and describes the pedestal and crown as a thirty-cent surcharge on every age category. Same upgrade, same thirty cents, a 30-cent gap on the child base fare between the two pages. Glance at your total at checkout rather than assuming either number, and don’t let the interior upgrade be the thing you skip to save money - at thirty cents it never is.

The crown: 162 steps and one shot every six months

Crown Reserve is the hardest ticket in New York Harbor to get, and the rules around it are stricter than most people expect.

• The climb is at least 162 steps on a confined spiral staircase, and there’s no elevator on that stretch. From the ground it comes to 377 steps.
• One reservation per person per six-month period. Book it, and you can’t book another until half a year has gone by.
• Maximum four reservations per order, and tickets are non-transferable.
• Photo ID matching the name on the ticket is checked at entry, minors without ID excepted.
• Minimum height 42 inches, about 107 cm. Children under 4 aren’t admitted at all.
• The Park Service advises against the climb for anyone with heart or respiratory conditions, claustrophobia, acrophobia or vertigo. That isn’t boilerplate: the stairwell is narrow, warm and two-way.

What waits at the top is small and strange: twenty-five windows set in a copper crown, a view up the harbor, and the inside of Bartholdi’s head close enough to touch. It’s an experience rather than a viewpoint, and if that distinction matters to you, read the next section before you fight anyone for a slot.

The pedestal is the right answer for most people

Pedestal Reserve costs the same thirty cents extra and is far easier to get. It’s 215 steps, roughly ten stories, and there’s an elevator for anyone who can’t take the stairs, which the crown does not have. You come out on the observation level at the top of the granite base, looking straight up the statue and straight across at Lower Manhattan.

Traveling with children, older parents, or anyone who would rather not commit to a two-way spiral staircase? Book the pedestal and stop worrying about the crown. Pedestal tickets do still sell out ahead, and same-day availability is close to nonexistent, so buy the moment your dates are fixed.

The Statue of Liberty Museum stands a short walk from the dock, and inside it sits the statue’s original 1886 torch, replaced during the 1980s restoration. It’s the most affecting object on the island and it’s a few steps from where the boat lets you off.

Battery Park or Liberty State Park

Both departure points sell the same tickets at the same prices and land you on the same two islands. What differs is the order, and the getting there.

The Battery, Manhattan (1 Battery Place). Will-call is inside Castle Clinton, and you’ll need photo ID plus the card you booked with. Parking is private lots under the FDR, and the Park Service tells you plainly to take the subway instead. Boats from here call at Liberty Island first, then Ellis Island, then home.

Liberty State Park, Jersey City (1 Audrey Zapp Drive). Ticket office and will-call sit inside the old CRRNJ Terminal. There’s paid parking on site at around $7 a car, which is the whole argument if you’re driving, and the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail stops at Liberty State Park station with a PATH connection from Hoboken or Newport. Boats from here call at Ellis Island first.

The choice in one line: sail from Manhattan if you’re staying in the city and want the statue first, while your energy and the morning light are both still good; sail from Jersey City if you’re driving, if you want Ellis Island unhurried, or if you’d rather not spend the first hour of the day in a screening line at The Battery. The New Jersey travel guide covers the wider Jersey side of the harbor.

Ellis Island is not a side trip

Plenty of visitors treat Ellis Island as the bit tacked on at the end and give it forty minutes. That’s the most common mistake on this itinerary. The Registry Room, where roughly twelve million people were processed between 1892 and 1954, is bigger, quieter and more human than any photograph of it suggests, and the National Museum of Immigration around it takes one to two hours to do properly.

There’s also the Ellis Island Hard Hat Tour, a guided walk through the abandoned hospital complex on the island’s south side, at $81.00 for adults and $78.00 for seniors, ages 13 and over only. It doesn’t include pedestal or crown access, and its timings can collide with a pedestal or crown slot, so check both before you book either.

Timing: what a 2 p.m. ticket actually gets you

Ferries between the islands run roughly every 20 minutes, which sounds generous until you add up the day: security at the departure point, the crossing, the statue, a second crossing, the museum, and the crossing home.

The operator’s own guidance is the number worth carrying. With an entry time of 2 p.m. or later, expect to see one island properly rather than both. Morning slots fit the whole thing, and the earliest sailings also give you the shortest security line. Ticket windows open half an hour before the first boat and close half an hour after the last.

Budget most of a day for both islands plus the pedestal. Budget a half day for Liberty Island alone.

What you can’t carry

Getting onto the ferry means airport-style screening, and the pedestal and crown add a second screening on the island. Peak-season lines at the first one can run over an hour.

Backpacks, drawstring bags including backpack-style purses, suitcases, strollers, laptops, long umbrellas and tripods can’t go into the pedestal or crown. Food and drink can’t either, apart from a clear plastic water bottle. Lockers on Liberty Island near the monument entrance take 25 cents, but there are no lockers at the pre-boarding screening facility, so anything you meant to stash still has to travel with you on the ferry first. Pack for the crown the way you’d pack for a rollercoaster, because functionally that’s the rule.

If the pedestal and crown are sold out

They will be, if you’re booking inside two months in high season. That’s less of a disaster than it feels.

General admission still lands you on both islands, gets you into both museums including the original torch, and lets you walk the full perimeter of Liberty Island directly beneath the statue. The interior adds a staircase and a view; the island itself is the visit.

And if what you actually wanted was the photograph, the Staten Island Ferry is free and passes close by on every run - our guide to things to do in New York City covers that swap along with the observation decks and the subway fare. For the evening once you’re back on dry land, Broadway tickets unpicks the discount mechanics the way this page unpicks the ferry.

Read also

• The city around it: things to do in New York City
• Pick a base near the ferry: where to stay in New York
• The Jersey side of the harbor: New Jersey travel guide
• The other New York ticket puzzle: Broadway tickets in NYC
• Fit it into a corridor trip: East Coast 7-day itinerary