Yosemite National Park is one of America’s most iconic landscapes, and millions of people visit each year to get their chance to explore this magical place. The popular park has always experienced crowds, but a timed entry system, which limited the number of people admitted into the park at any one time, helped mitigate the congestion.
Then, in early 2026, the National Park Service (NPS) announced it was abandoning the reservation system, which had been in place since 2020. Memorial Day posed the first real test of how the park would fare without it, and after the busy holiday weekend, many visitors complained that it failed. Yosemite saw long lines at entrances, and getting a parking spot nearly became an Olympic-level sport.
The End of Covid-Era Timed Entry
To address the millions of visitors Yosemite receives each year, NPS staff instituted a timed-entry system in 2020. Essentially, to enter the park via car, you make a reservation online for a 2-hour window on a specific day for a nonrefundable fee of $2. Once you enter the park, you can stay as long as you’d like. Reentry is typically allowed if you decide to leave and come back. Visitors still must pay the entry fee or show a valid parks pass.
This system, which was also in use at Glacier and Arches until recently, essentially capped the number of people entering the park at any one time, helping to avoid long lines at entrance gates, a perennial problem.
Since the system was put in place, Yosemite has only become more popular, rising from 3.2 million visitors in 2021 to 4.2 million in 2025, according to NPS data. In February, the NPS announced that, based on a comprehensive review of park data from 2025, it was scrapping this reservation system.
“Park analysis found that most weekdays maintained available parking, stable traffic flow, and visitation levels within the park’s operational capacity. These findings indicate that a season-wide reservation requirement is not the most effective approach for 2026,” an NPS press release explained. Parking and entering at Yosemite thus became first-come, first-served.
Memorial Day 2026
The Data
As with any holiday weekend, Memorial Day is a popular time to camp, hike, and visit parks. It’s no surprise that Yosemite saw a ton of visitors over the holiday. To track congestion and parking, GJ signed up for traffic and parking text message notifications sent out by the park. Anyone can sign up for these free notifications by texting ynptraffic to 333111.
Many popular parking lots were full before noon on Friday, including Glacier Point and Yosemite Village. Curry Village, a primary parking area by a welcome center, was full by 8:30 a.m. By 11:43 a.m., all parking in all of Yosemite Valley (home to popular sites like El Capitan, Half Dome, Bridalveil Fall, and Yosemite Fall) was full.
The situation only worsened on Saturday. The park said at 11:07 a.m. that anyone looking to access the park via Hetch Hetchy, a main entrance point on the west side of the park, should expect “long delays.” At 11:13 a.m., notifications alerted visitors that the wait to enter at Arch Rock was at least 1.5 hours.
On both Saturday and Sunday, East Yosemite Valley became so congested that park staff were turning around visitors. By 8:41 a.m. on Sunday, all parking in all of Yosemite Valley was full once again.
What Visitors Are Saying
People’s posts on social media confirm the lived reality of this data. In the Yosemite National Park Facebook group, people posted photos of long lines of cars. One visitor said it took 2 hours to drive from Wawona to Yosemite Village, a 27-mile drive. A local news outlet obtained video of trails teeming with people and lines of cars stretching seemingly endlessly at entrances.
Illegal parking was also an issue. The park sent out reminders urging visitors to help “maintain emergency access by parking in designated spots. Vehicles in the roadway will be towed and/or cited.” Visitors reported seeing cars parked on curbs or in unofficial spots receiving tickets.
The Future
While Memorial Day is a particularly busy weekend, the park also experienced full parking and congestion the weekend prior. From May 15 to 17, all of Yosemite Valley filled up twice.
The park’s peak season runs from June through August, so crowds will likely increase, particularly given the fact that they already have. Comparing March 2026 to March 2025, the park saw 70,000 more visitors, a 44% increase.
The most up-to-date data available runs through the end of April. Comparing year-to-date visitor numbers of 2026 to 2025, the park saw 836,458 visitors versus 739,313 visitors, a 13% jump. Should these visitor trends continue, the park will likely experience over 600,000 visitors each month from June to August and set an overall record for visitation in 2026.
Only time will tell the impact of congestion, parking, and crowds on visitor experience, the environment, and wildlife. The NPS currently has no overall strategy to address these issues.
GJ reached out to the NPS for comment, but did not receive a response by the time of publication.
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