Tours are scheduled on a first-come, first-served basis. Applications can be submitted up to three months in advance and no less than 21 days in advance. We recommend that you submit your application as soon as possible, as there are a limited number of spaces available. The visit to the White House is free.
We recommend that you submit your tour request as soon as possible, as tours fill up quickly and there are a limited number of spaces available. Tours are filled on a first-come, first-served basis. All visits to the White House are free. Please note that tours are subject to last-minute cancellations according to official White House schedule.
Public visits to the White House are free and can be scheduled through your congressional representative. Please refer to the ticketing section for more information. Visitors will enter the White House complex from the south side of East Executive Avenue. After passing through the security screening area, guests will enter the east wing of the White House and continue through the eastern colonnade following the route to the residence shown on the White House tourist map below.
Requests for the White House tour must be submitted through your member of Congress, either in the House or in the Senate. Visits to the White House are scheduled on a first-come, first-served basis and must be requested at least 21 days prior to your visit. Applications can be submitted up to three months in advance. Do you want to see the Christmas decorations? Send your Christmas tour requests in autumn.
All tours are free. This post is an article on how to get tickets for the White House tour, with tips for planning your visit, as well as a virtual tour to show you what you'll see. All federal buildings, including the White House, are closed to the public. A tour of the White House is just one of many great things to do in DC.
There is no cost to tour the White House, but you will have to request free tickets. Visitors from home and abroad can tour the White House. To visit the White House, it's important to know that you need to book your tickets in advance, MONTHS in advance. You can apply for White House tours up to 6 months in advance and must do so no later than 3 weeks.
Citizens and residents, applications must go through the office of your district member of Congress (find your member here). If you are coming during the peak tourist season from March to April or from June to August, we recommend you at least 3 months or more in advance to request tickets. If you are from a foreign country, we recommend that you go through their embassy in Washington DC, DC. Not all embassies will be interested or useful in the application.
However, nothing prevents you from requesting a tour through any member of Congress. There is no real requirement that you be a resident of your district or state to do so. Most will ask you for contact information at home and during your stay in DC, available dates for tours and total people in your group. In this section, we review where to enter the White House grounds, how to get there, as well as safety and prohibited items.
We strongly recommend using our Google map to get directions to the entry point of the tour. No White House metro station. The nearest metro stop to the entrance of the tour is Metro Center (red, orange, blue and silver lines) (take the 13th Street exit), which is only a 7-minute walk away. When you go up the escalators, you'll be facing 13th Street.
Take 13th Street south (downhill) and turn right onto E Street and go straight until you reach 15th Street. The McPherson Square subway station (orange, blue and silver lines) is also close to the White House. Mass transit is recommended to get to the White House. If you must drive, you can find a parking spot in a nearby garage through a service called SpotHero.
This website allows you to reserve guaranteed parking spots in advance, often for a cheaper price than the garage itself would charge. If you have been granted a tour, you must arrive before the meeting time at the visitor entrance. The tour lines up along 15th Street NW on the west side of the street next to the statue of William Tecumseh Sherman. It's across the street from where Pennsylvania Ave NW ends up dead end at 15th St NW.
You will check in with the park ranger standing guard outside the temporary fence. There is no specific address or sign, you just have to know that you are in the right place, but since there is often a line, it should be easy to spot. Security is a concern everywhere in Washington, but nowhere else but in the White House. You will need a valid government-issued ID or passport in order to enter the White House for each member of your group.
You'll need to queue for security, so make sure you arrive at least half an hour before your tour time. More time in high season or in a group). There is no dress code for touring the White House, but because of the importance of the building, you must dress well. Smartphones and compact cameras with a lens of no more than 3 inches (still images only) are allowed on the route of the public tour as long as their use does not interfere with the enjoyment of the tour by other guests.
Flash photography or live streaming is not allowed, as well as talking or texting on mobile phones during the tour. If you can't leave your belongings at your hotel, consider a storage service. Once inside, the tour is self-guided and will last about half an hour. Although the White House has 135 rooms in total, you are only shown through several rooms that you use for entertainment.
You will NOT see the family home, the Oval Office or the West Wing. These videos offer virtual tours within various parts of the White House that cannot be seen on public tours of the White House. Situation Room Video Tour Learn About West Wing Marines Watch Marine One Land in the South Lawn You will see many helicopters during your visit to Washington, D.C. And they usually won't transport the president.
Most helicopters fly along the National Mall, over the tidal basin and the Potomac River. When you see three helicopters flying through the National Mall, just after the Washington Monument (that's why there are flashing red lights on top), one of them is Marine One. For advance planning, you can keep an eye on the president's schedule. It will give an approximate time for the president to leave the South Lawn.
Marine One is often used to transport the president to Andrews Joint Base to board Air Force One. The best place to see Marine One land if you want to be as close as possible is on the south side of the White House, an area called The Ellipse. Normally, the circular sidewalk that forms the ellipse is open to the public, but when the president leaves, the side closest to the White House is closed. However, you can walk directly on the grass to the center of the Ellipse.
If you want to see Marine One with some DC landmarks in the frame, stop at the World War II Memorial, opposite the Washington Monument. The three helicopters will fly in front of the Washington Monument, queuing up for a big photo shoot. Officially, any helicopter the president is in is Marine One. That's the call sign for any USMC plane that has the president on board, just like the Air Force, one denotes any plane carrying the president.
Marine One helicopters have standard military anti-missile countermeasures, ballistic armor and can continue to fly even if they lose one of the three engines. It can accommodate 14 passengers, but it is quiet enough that the President can use a normal tone of voice on his secure line to the White House. After extensive renovation, the White House Visitor Center is now open again to the public. There are more than 90 new artifacts on display, many of which have never been exhibited before.
Some of our favorites are the desk where Franklin Delano Roosevelt sat when he gave his famous fireside talks and a scale model of the White House. Inside the White House Visitor Center, you can watch a 14-minute film that takes you inside the White House and the lives of the First Families. Anyone visiting DC can experience the history and art of the White House in person after submitting a visit request through a member of Congress. Public visits to the White House remain temporarily suspended until further notice.
For U.S. citizens, requests for visits to the White House should be directed to their member of Congress. You must submit your application up to three months before and no less than 21 days before the date you wish to visit. It is advisable to submit your request as soon as possible, as schedules are assigned on a first-come, first-come, first-served basis and therefore dates fill up quickly.
Tours are free but subject to last minute cancellations. If you are lucky enough to visit the White House, it is crucial that you follow the instructions given to you. You should also call the 24-hour Visitors Bureau information line at 202-456-7041 to ensure that the tour is still running. To visit rooms that are available for public inspection at the White House, you will need to book a tour in advance.
Tours are free and self-guided, but you must request permission to visit at least 3 weeks prior to your arrival to receive authorization from the U.S. UU. While the standard public tour is interesting for architectural and historical reasons, nothing can beat the excitement of the West Wing Tour. There is a Metrobus stop located on the corner of Pennsylvania Avenue and 14th Street, which is the closest stop to the White House Visitor Center.
Because of this, it was responsible for adding elevators and ramps throughout the White House, making it one of the first wheelchair-friendly buildings in Washington, D.C. A congressional office first issues tickets for guided tours to a hearing-impaired guest and then contacts the Visitors Bureau at least 2 weeks in advance to request interpretation services. In the event that your embassy cannot help you, you can also try contacting a congressman directly to arrange a tour of the White House. The best option for a tour of the West Wing is to befriend a White House staff member and beg him for an invitation.
You will enter the White House on the south side of East Executive Avenue, near the Southeast Gate, where National Park Service rangers will be available to assist you. The app offers three tour experiences, including a virtual tour of the White House (with rooms you don't normally see on the tour), a neighborhood walking tour, and a room-by-room guide for visitors on an in-person tour of the White House. But even if you can't enter the building itself, there are still plenty of attractions, landmarks, exhibitions and open spaces for you to enjoy in the world-class parks and open spaces around the White House. You can request visits up to 3 months in advance through your member of Congress, but there is no guarantee that your application will be accepted.
Tours take place in groups of 10, and you will be placed in a group with other visitors prior to your arrival if there are not enough in your own group. The White House strongly recommends the use of public transportation, as street parking is not available near the White House. . .