Best Family Vacation Destinations in Florida

The Sunshine State is easily one of the top destinations for family vacations—not only in the United States or North America, but worldwide. After all, this is the home of Walt Disney World, Universal Orlando, the Kennedy Space Center and more than a few other internationally renowned tourist attractions.

With options ranging from large and bold to outdoorsy and genuine Florida, We’ve chosen these destinations partly to represent the diversity of kid-friendly places to go and things to do in Florida, giving some love to all corners of the Sunshine State and including some more under-the-radar spots that are well worth considering for your itinerary.

Courtesy of Walt Disney World Resort

When discussing top Florida family vacation spots, the first location to come to mind is typically Walt Disney World Orlando. As one of the most-visited tourist destinations in the world, this can be considered the family-vacation getaway of all family-vacation getaways. A place for kids and kids-at-heart, with loads of attractions and entertainment, Walt Disney World is home to Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Disney’s Animal Kingdom, as well as golf courses, waterparks, shopping hubs, restaurants and more.

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The Sunshine State is a global hotspot for sea turtles, with five native species found in its waters: the loggerhead, leatherback, green, hawksbill and Kemp’s ridley (the latter being the rarest of all sea turtles). Florida provides by far the most significant nesting beaches for sea turtles of any place in the continental U.S. and any beachgoer ought to know the basic best practices for avoiding disturbing these ancient marine reptiles as they welcome a precious new generation into the world.

Families can learn about sea turtles at the Loggerhead Marinelife Center in Juno Beach, which rescues and rehabilitates sick, injured and lame turtles for release back into the wild. The center is open for touring seven days a week, with the chance for visitors to get up-close looks at current patients. This is one of the top Florida family vacation ideas for educating youngsters about the state’s wildlife and the importance of sharing sand and surf responsibly with these protected critters.

Courtesy of Universal Orlando Resort

Another of Central Florida’s heavy-hitter family attractions, Universal Orlando rivals Walt Disney World in terms of annual visitation. Encompassing multiple theme parks, including the foundational Universal Studios Florida, Islands of Adventure theme park, the waterpark realm of Volcano Bay and the new Universal’s Epic Universe, the vacation resort is world-famous for such installations as The Wizarding World of Harry Potter and Marvel Super Hero Island, as well as major seasonal events such as Halloween Horror Nights (decidedly not for young children).

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Set on the Emerald Coast of the Florida Panhandle, Destin is widely known by its nickname “The World’s Luckiest Fishing Village.” And, indeed, ready access to a wide variety of inshore and offshore waters and close proximity to the “100-fathom curve” dropoff make Destin one of the premier places in the country for sportfishing, with everything from redfish, king mackerel, cobia and flounder to bluewater stunners such as wahoo and various billfish among the sought-after catches. With a massive charter fleet, this is a great place to introduce kids to the joys of casting a line, whether you’re doing so on the backwaters of Choctawhatchee Bay or foraying out into the open Gulf.

There are plenty of other options for things to do with kids in Destin even if fishing isn’t one of your things. The famous white sugar sands of the Emerald Coast are on full display at spots such as Henderson Beach State Park and John Beasley Beach Park. Incredible snorkeling, scuba-diving and parasailing opportunities are on hand. Crab Island, an underwater sandbar close to the Destin Bridge, is a popular hangout for R&R and water play. Destin boasts some of the Panhandle’s go-to amusement and water parks, from Big Kahuna Water & Adventure Park and Gulfarium Marine Adventure Park to the go-karts, bumper boats and arcade games at The Track.

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One of the crown jewels not only of Florida’s landscape, but the North American landscape as a whole, Everglades National Park protects a singular sheet-flow marsh and associated habitats—from tropical hardwood hammocks, cypress domes and pine rocklands to coastal mangrove swamps—which compose a globally significant subtropical wetland mosaic. An International Biosphere Reserve and UNESCO World Heritage Site, the park actually covers only a portion of the historic Greater Everglades Ecosystem, much of which has been heavily impacted by drainage, agriculture and urban sprawl.

Everglades is an impressively big park and much of it can be tough to access despite its proximity to the Miami metro area. Luckily, there are some great “front-country” hubs that offer family-friendly introductions to its ladscape. Right along the Tamiami Trail, for example, Shark Valley has a visitor center and paved walking path yielding plentiful opportunities to goggle at alligators and waterbirds—as does the Anhinga Trail along Taylor Slough, thronged with cormorants, gators, black vultures, herons and the namesake “snakebirds.” Another good family portal in the park is Flamingo, which lies along the mangrove shores of Florida Bay and often yields sightings of American crocodiles, ospreys and dolphins. Ranger-led hikes and paddling tours are excellent ways to get a bit deeper into this watery wonderland. Developed car camping is available at Long Pine Key and Flamingo, while families with older kids might consider adventuring overnight in the backcountry (as along the Wilderness Waterway)—though keep in mind this is real wilderness and most of the backcountry campsites are boat-accessible only.

Wikimedia Commons / Daniel Di Palma / CC BY-SA 4.0.

A great way to cool off with the fam in the Miami area, the Venetian Pool has been catering to Coral Gables locals and vacationers alike since 1923. It remains a delightful setting, with palms, waterfalls and grottoes conjuring a bit of a dreamy vibe and lifeguards overseeing things via surfboards. Filled with about 820,000 gallons of springwater sourced from the Biscayne Bay Aquifer, the Venetian Pool ranges from two to eight feet deep. Keep in mind that children under three years old are not allowed here.

Courtesy of Visit Tampa

One of the top family attractions in Florida, Busch Gardens Tampa Bay combines a zoo experience with an amusement park. Thrill rides here are of world-class variety, including as they do one of the loftiest free-standing drop towers in North America (Falcon’s Fury), one of the fastest inverted roller coasters in the world (Montu) and among the longest and speediest dive coasters anywhere (SheiKra). Busch Gardens also showcases a variety of live animals, including the African menagerie roaming the groundbreaking free-range Serengeti Plain habitat.

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A sort of sister park to Everglades (and historically linked with the Greater Everglades Ecosystem), Biscayne covers some 173,000 acres at the far northern end of the Florida Keys, with most of it offshore in Biscayne Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. Lovely subtropical scenery awaits here as well as rich and varied outdoor recreation, from paddling on Jones Lagoon and Biscayne Bay to trying your hands at bonefishing. Some of Florida’s best snorkeling and diving can be found here, not least among the shipwrecks of the Maritime Heritage Trail and the coral heads of the Great Florida Reef.

Throw in some dramatic wildlife—including West Indian manatees, American crocs and a multitude of bird species—and some fascinating pirate lore and you’ve got another of the best family vacation destinations in Florida.

Wikimedia Commons / Gzuraski / CC BY-SA 3.0

Encompassing America’s deepest freshwater cave system, Weeki Wachee Springs State Park is chiefly known for a singular roadside attraction that’s been drawing tourists since 1947: a live “mermaid” show with auditorium seating. The Weeki Wachee mermaids (real live actresses convincingly costumed up and taking hits of oxygen) relay the history of the park and tell the Hans Christian Anderson Little Mermaid story as well. It’s likely to entrance children and grownups will get a kick out of it as well. Taking a paddle on the Weeki Wachee River is much-recommended as well, with good odds of spotting manatees.

istockphoto.com / 6381380

Cape Canaveral is best known for the Kennedy Space Center, where you can explore exhibits on iconic NASA missions, the Space Shuttle Atlantis, the Apollo/Saturn V Center, spaceflight simulators, the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame and nab front-row seats for actual live rocket launches.

There are plenty of other crowd-pleasing family draws here on the Space Coast, including the splendid beaches of the Canaveral National Seashore (which safeguards the longest stretch of undeveloped Atlantic seashore in Florida), the birdwatching at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge and the all-ages charm of the Wizard of Oz Museum.

Courtesy of Visit Tampa

Among the premier institutions of its kind in the country, Downtown Tampa’s Florida Aquarium employs an equal focus on education/interpretation and research/conservation, engaged as it is in important work studying and preserving coral reefs. Although much of its emphasis is on native Sunshine State underwater ecosystems—from freshwater springs to offshore reefs—the aquarium also showcases wildlife and habitats from far away, as in its Journey to Madagascar exhibit.

Other habitat setups include Wetlands of Florida, Stingray Beach and the sprawling Coral Reef, with critters on display including moray eels, stingrays, sand tiger sharks, American alligators, river otters, seahorses and roseate spoonbills, among many others.

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Set on Walton Island, the Miami Children’s Museum ranks among the most acclaimed facilities of its kind in the nation. Established in 1983 and now comprising a 56,500-square-foot facility, the museum welcomes close to half a million annual visitors. Its array of thoughtfully designed, interactive exhibits—which include the Music Makers Studio, Castle of Dreams, Construction Zone and All About Art—foster learning, creativity and exploration and there’s an admirable focus on serving special-needs and bilingual children as well.

Courtesy of Gatorland

Founded in 1949, Gatorland’s another of Central Florida’s downright iconic family attractions. This “Alligator Capital of the World” comes by its name honestly, housing as it does north of 2,000 American alligators—including the unique leucistic individuals visible in White Gator Swamp. These most famous of Florida’s native reptiles are the star attractions, but there are many other animals on display here, including crocodiles (among them descendants of Gatorland’s big American croc “Bonecrusher”), snakes, birds, capybaras, servals and bobcats—plus the barnyard critters of the petting zoo.

Activities at Gatorland include alligator feeding and wrestling shows, the Stompin’ Gator Off-Road Adventure, the venerable Gatorland Express narrow-gauge railroad and ziplining.

Wikimedia Commons / Bobyellow / CC BY-SA 4.0

The National Audubon Society’s Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary, a Ramsar wetland of international importance near Naples, is another of Florida’s ecological marvels: the biggest remaining old-growth bald-cypress forest in the world and a refuge for such imperiled organisms as the wood stork, the Florida panther and the ghost orchid. Situated in the far north of the historical bounds of the Big Cypress Swamp—not one huge continuous swampland originally, but a mosaic of bald-cypress sloughs/strands, pine/palmetto uplands and wet prairies—the Corkscrew Swamp is also part of the Greater Everglades fabric and a rare chance to show young ones what primeval Southwest Florida looked like not so very long ago, before logging and plume-hunting decimated much of the Big Cypress country.

A marvelous boardwalk leads families through the lush, sodden bottoms with their gargantuan conifers. Bring binoculars to spy wading birds, alligators and other wildlife.

Wikimedia Commons / Jeff / CC BY-SA 2.0

There aren’t many more famous racetracks anywhere than the Daytona International Speedway, the “World Center of Racing.” Home to the crowning NASCAR event, the Daytona 500, the Speedway makes an unforgettable destination for any families who count race fanatics—or even just general sports fans—among their number. A NASCAR Kids Zone appeals specifically to the younger demographic at the Speedway. And the fact that children 12 and under often enjoy free or discounted admission to race events is another plus.

Courtesy of Visit Orlando

Orlando’s Florida Mall boasts one of several Crayola Experiences in the country: places where artmaking and other hands-on fun feed children’s creativity and expression. Along with all the interactive exhibits and creation stations, Orlando’s Crayola Experience lays claim to the biggest Crayola crayon on the planet.

Courtesy of Visit Tampa Bay

ZooTampa at Lowry Park is an absolutely top-tier zoo as well as a major hub for conservation work. Accredited with the Association of Zoos & Aquariums, this spacious facility cares for more than 1,000 animals: from African elephants, Bornean orangutans, sun bears, Masai giraffes and Galapagos giant tortoises to such Sunshine State natives as Florida panthers, black bears, West Indian manatees and river otters. Indeed, the zoo specializes in imperiled species from Florida as well as global biomes with a similar climate as the Tampa Bay area’s, with other focus areas being the tropics and subtropics of Africa, Australia and Asia.

Getty Images / Barry Winiker

Much of Palm Beach County and the broader Florida “Gold Coast” is intensively developed indeed, which makes protected preserves such as John D. MacArthur Beach State Park all the more precious—and a great way to get kids out and about in Southeast Florida’s tropically tinted nature. And this is a flat-out gorgeous park, straddling the estuarine flatwater of the Lake Worth Lagoon and the Atlantic shore and encompassing such habitats as tropical hardwood hammock, mangrove forest and dune/beachfront.

Courtesy of the Glazer Children's Museum

Set along the lovely Tampa Riverwalk, the Glazer Children’s Museum has been stimulating young minds for decades. It’s a great stop on a Tampa family vacation, needless to say, what with such exhibits as Light Cloud, Vet Clinic, Pizza Place and Tugboat Tots. A notable addition to the Glazer Children’s Museum attractions is 66-million-year-old “Big John,” the world’s largest Triceratops skeleton, recovered from the Hell Creek Formation of South Dakota and on display in its own special dinosaur exhibit here.

Getty Images / Photo taken by Crawford A. Wilson III

While Key West, with its easy-breezy “Conch Republic” vibes, may be more thought of a grownup-type destination, in fact it can be a great place to visit with kids as well. Famously farflung at the far western end of the Florida Keys, Key West tempts with a number of family-friendly attractions, among them the Key West Butterfly & Nature Conservancy, where hundreds of free-fluttering butterflies representing dozens of species—plus tropical birds and flamingos—delight the eye. Then there’s the oldest tourist attraction on the island, the Key West Aquarium, opened back in 1935 and housing a diversity of sealife, from octopuses and starfish to sharks and sea turtles.

You and the kids can also soak up some botanical luxuriance while getting a bit of low-key exercise along the footpaths and boardwalks threading through the 15.2-acre Key West Tropical Forest & Botanical Garden.

Key West is also the jumping-off point for visits to remote and alluring Dry Tortugas National Park, some 70 miles offshore.

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