Chicago for families
Willis Tower is the skyline view that reset what a skyscraper was allowed to be. Franklin Center (Chicago) is a twin-towered Loop landmark best read from the sidewalk that carries its address.
Chicago for families with kids, in numbers
- Score for families
- 8.5 out of 10
- Picks on this page
- 24 places across 2 lists, led by Willis Tower, Franklin Center (Chicago), 900 North Michigan
Questions families with kids ask about Chicago
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Family-friendly
Chicago scores 8.5/10 for family friendliness (see the TTDI Family-Friendliness Index). The Museum of Science and Industry, Lincoln Park Zoo (free admission year-round), and Maggie Daley Park's 3-acre climbing playground are genuine full-day draws for ages 2 through 14. Flat lakefront paths handle strollers well. Summer humidity and winter wind are the real asterisks, not the city itself.
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Is it safe?
Chicago is safe enough for a careful solo trip, and TTDI puts its solo-traveler safety at 5.8/10 (see the TTDI Solo-Safety Index). Gun violence is concentrated in West Side and South Side neighborhoods far from the Loop, River North, and Lakeview, so the risks you're more likely to meet as a visitor are phone snatches on CTA trains, late-night robberies, and January ice. Dial 911 in an emergency.
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What to pack
Pack layers for Chicago's lake-driven temperature swings. A June morning at 18°C in Lincoln Park can hit 30°C by noon in the Loop. Bring a packable rain jacket for May-September afternoon storms, broken-in walking shoes for the Magnificent Mile's 1.6 km of concrete, and SPF 50 sunscreen for the 30-km Lakefront Trail. Moisture-wicking shirts over cotton. Skip toiletries. Walgreens stores appear every 4 blocks downtown.
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Getting around
The CTA L train is Chicago's transit backbone. Eight color-coded lines cover most visitor destinations, and the Blue and Red lines run 24 hours. A Ventra card costs $5 and loads with pay-per-ride at $2.50 per train trip. Uber and Lyft fill the gaps after dark and for neighborhoods the L misses.
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Best time to visit
September is our pick for Chicago, with early October a close second. Afternoons reach 24°C (75°F), the lake stays warm enough to swim, and architecture boat tours on the Chicago River run daily. Skip January and February: the wind off Lake Michigan makes -10°C feel far colder.
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Curated for families with kids
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Must-see attractions
Chicago's great attractions are built things, and the dates read like a timeline: Holy Name Cathedral from 1874, Our Lady of Sorrows Basilica (out at 3121 West Jackson Boulevard) from the same year, the Chicago Theatre from 1921, Buckingham Fountain from 1927, the Civic Opera House from 1929, Willis Tower from 1971, the Harris Theater from 2003, and Cloud Gate from 2004. Several carry formal protection. The fountain, the theatre and Navy Pier are all Chicago Landmarks, and the cathedral is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. This list is for the visitor who wants the city's real architecture and public spaces, and who will skip the souvenir circuit. We've mixed the obvious names with places of worship that most itineraries leave out, including Mosque Maryam on South Stony Island Avenue. Go in any order, but do go to all twelve.
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Best museums
Chicago's museum stock is unusually deep for a single American city, and the twelve that follow are the ones a local editor sends visitors to first. Two of them, the Field Museum of Natural History and the Kenneth C. Griffin Museum of Science and Industry, anchor the natural-science end. Two more, the Art Institute of Chicago and the Museum of Contemporary Art, cover the split between the historical canon and the living one. The rest fan out into specialisms: a planetarium on the lake, a settlement house on Halsted, an archaeology museum on the University of Chicago campus, a military library on South Michigan, a broadcast museum near the river, a photography museum inside a college, a Greek-American museum in Greektown, and an architecture center on Wacker. Skip the day-pass hop between the marquee three and pick the four that match your interests; a single museum done properly beats three done fast.
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