The international art magazine The Art Newspaper has published a ranking of the 100 most visited museums in the world for 2025, providing a clear picture of tourist flows and the cultural weight of countries on the global stage.
The Louvre Museum in Paris remains at the top of the list, with over 9 million visitors last year. This is despite the crisis caused by the sensational jewelry theft in October and the resignation of director Laurence des Cars, who was replaced by Christophe Leribault.
In second place are the Vatican Museums with more than 6.9 million visitors.
This year's biggest surprise comes from Asia: The National Museum of Korea in Seoul has climbed to third place with around 6.5 million visitors, leaving behind the British Museum in London, which ranks fourth.
The top ten also includes some of the world's most renowned art institutions, such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Tate Modern and the National Gallery in London, and the Shanghai Museum East in China.
The report highlights that museum visits have stabilized following the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, reaching a total of over 200 million visits to the top 100 museums alone during 2025.
Meanwhile, the strongest growth has been recorded outside Europe. Asia and Latin America are increasingly emerging as new centers of cultural tourism. In Seoul, the National Museum of Korea has recorded a spectacular growth of over 70%, going from 3.8 million visitors in 2024 to 6.5 million in 2025.
In Europe, major museums continue to attract visitors in large numbers. The Prado Museum in Madrid has surpassed 3.5 million visitors for the first time, while the Uffizi museum complex in Florence reached 5.3 million visits during 2025.
According to the report, the growing interest in Korean culture – from K-pop music to the cosmetics industry – is also affecting cultural tourism, attracting more and more visitors to the country's museums and historical heritage.
In the United States, the most visited museum remains the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York with nearly 6 million visitors, while in Latin America the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City leads with a record 5.1 million visitors.
The report concludes that, while institutions in Europe and the US have remained relatively stable in numbers, the most dynamic growth of museums and visitors is occurring in Asia and Latin America, gradually changing the cultural map of the world.
