Lincoln Park Zoo (Chicago) Reviews

Great for little kids that are less than 5. Its was $35 for all day parking and food was expensive. But the zoo was free. Saw the animal close up and active.

Amazing free zoo experience in the heart of Chicago! Clean environment, friendly staff. An excellent place to spend time before heading to a Cubs game!

This is a nice zoo and it's free! You only have to pay for parking

This place is absolutely amazing and completely free. Go early for the coolest jogging experience ever. It was nice and very interesting to see all the animals start to wake up and get moving around. One of my favorite Chicago attractions!!!!

Such a nice zoo and it is free! They have a great small mammal house and primates! They even have a red panda. and lots of big cats. I love coming here. Def a nice place to take your kids. It is better not in the summer because of all the school kids that can be very loud. But other than that it is great. Very helpful staff as well.

There is so much to see and staff is very helpful and friendly.

An amazing FREE zoo. Also is a research zoo that helps understand how to assist these animals in the wild. This place is a win win win for everyone!

The are a lot of anomals and an amazing experience.

Who doesnt love a day at the zoo. Perks ... It's FREE and beautiful here in Chicago. I love that they have included the farm animals and petting zoo. My younger children love that. We sat and watched the monkeys play outside while we ate lunch. How cool is that! Parking can be tricky but we didn't have to walk to far. Great activity for families.

Fun to walk around and catch up with an old friend.

I love Park so munch i just to see all favorite place ever

Cute zoo that's also free to visit! Wonderful place to take kids.

Visit couple times a year. So much to see, great for a family day .

We went there to see the Christmas lights and the trip was worth it. The place looked beautiful and well kept. We also saw some animals (apes, monkeys and seals) and the enclosures looked well maintained and clean.

My only concern was that there were not enough staff to help the crowd navigate around. At times, we were just going around in circles.

It was a little chilly but all the animals were out. Great time!

We went to their winter event. Lots of lights and decor, music and more! Animals were very cute and fun. Especially the monkeys. All the staff was great. A service member even walked with us to the other side of the park so we could get our Uber and then she took our wheelchair we rented so that we didn't have to walk all the way back to return it. Amazing service.

It's nice that the zoo is free. The animal exhibits are great. Everything else is expensive. Like the gift shop and cafe.

I love walking through this free zoo! Along with the animals it is a horticultural experience too.

An amazing place and offers lots of history and opportunity surrounding preservation as well as the care of animals

Zoo lights during Christmas time were beautiful, along with the greenhouse and zoo animals that were out. All free!

It's free, but it's sad to see the male polar bear is sick, but the caretaker told us that it's only bec of what he ate and he's allergic to it, and good to know that the Vets are actually watching him at the moment, but overall, such a good experience for a place that doesn't charge, and good to see wild animals, fun experience for kids as well

A bit small compared to other zoos, but the staff is friendly and helpful, and the events there are fun.

We went to see the Christmas zoo lights for the first time. AMAZING! We'll definitely be back again and with more people (the ones who now regret not going)

I always love coming here. Free admission. African wild dogs exhibit here which makes my daughter's year. They do their best to keep everything possible available despite these trying times.

Wonderful zoo with light show at winter where you can spend couple of hours walking around and take pleasure of different light attractions. Also there's very fast wheel. And ofcourse a lot of animals, even in winter seasons.

Great to see animals from Africa and other southern islands.

This free zoo is huge with great exhibits. My sister and I visited on our Chicago vacation and were very satisfied. Definitely get a map as it was deceptively large and we never would have found some of the exhibits without it. Also, the polar bear training session was the highlight of the visit.

Despite the down pour the park staff was helpful and pleasant

I was surprised at the variety of animals here. Some of which I had not seen at a very large non-free zoo.

Great place to visit for the day. There are plenty of activities and attractions for kids to do and see. Pretty easy to get to from downtown, both the 151 and 156 bus lines make stops right at the entrance. There is no cost of admission. Also if some exhibits seem empty try coming back to them later. There were some exhibits I walked by earlier in the day with no animals and when I pasted them later there were animals out in the exhibit.

Small by many standards but tops in animal care and display. Beautiful. Shade trees line many paths. Memorable experience. Child friendly.

The grounds are beautiful and lush. Exhibits are clean. A lot to see for a free zoo day my three year old daughter really enjoyed herself

In winter shoud wear warm clothes, is colder. The animals are beautiful, however maybe they shoud have more space

We had so much fun I'm going back today with my nieces.

This place is amazing me and my husband love to spend some time there and it is really nice . and the you alway have fun there special if you love animals . and we do love animals :)

Lots of dead space between exhibits. Animals appear happy and active.

Very nice place,animals seem to be well taken care of

Smallish urban zoo with a lot of animals in spaces designed specifically to meet the animal's natural environment. The zoo is free. The gardens are an additional attraction. A definite to-do when in Chicago.

Free admission, perfect for taking the kids out and going for a walk and seeing animal exhibits at the same time.

Great place to spend the day. It's free but very hard to find parking.

Only been there twice for the zoolights. It's a nice show with good music, better be there when it's totally dark and get the free 3D eyewear from the bar to enjoy the glowing lights. They also have a small food court. Staff is really nice and helpful.

It was a beautiful zoo. The problem with going in December is alot of the animals are put away because of the cold weather. The zoo also has beautiful lights at night.

Cool family oriented zoo next to Michigan Lake. It offers some events to attract local and visitors in all seasons. Annual winter light show is truly beautiful.

Great place to visit.wish more animals where out or on display but all and all a good day with the family

My family and I came here on a cold February day and we're shocked at the amount of animals out and active! What a great zoo and views of the city by Lake Michigan. Also...as many have noted it is a FREE ZOO. It was fairly quiet that day so we had no problems finding free parking as well. Our kids loved seeing the rhinos and lions and when we were cold we made it into the botanical gardens and cat exhibits which were very well maintained. I honestly think this might of been our best experience ever at a zoo regardless of price, location and time of year. What a great experience and highly recommend regardless of time of year!

Lots of walking...lots of seating and much to see. Very friendly staff

Have a friend in town from the Netherlands, and after visiting the conservatory, I suggested we take a quick walk through the zoo. Ive been here many times (it was even a birthday request of mine one year). We wound up spending over 3 hours here: he was stunned not only with the quality and the animals but that it is also free.

I would give this more stars if I could! Considering this is a free zoo (yes free!!!), let's say this was paid, I would still give it five stars. Overall this zoon was clean, well designed exhibits, and not very crowded on a beautiful Sunday afternoon. Highlights from this visit was the polar bears, African Safari, and the apes! Very impressed with this experience.

Fun and free. I especially enjoy when they have someone teaching kids about the animals over the megaphone, I think this happens regularly on the weekends but you should probably check online.

It was a very wonderful visit. Even in the cold wind, enjoyed every second of it!

Very nice zoo. Though on the day I went most of the exhibits were closed

This zoo is actually very large and they have lots of different animals. But seeing poor animals depressed and sad gave me a very bad experience. I don't like zoos in general.

Favorite place in the city. Many improvements have been made to the animal enclosures to be more natural (as much as a zoo can be.)

How on earth is this zoo FREE? This is easily one of the better zoo's I've visited and the staff working at the zoo are very helpful and informative. It's on the smaller side, but I also feel that all of the animals that people expect to see at zoo are there - and they are nice exhibits. Not sure how anyone can give this zoo any less than 5 stars - especially since there is 0 cost for admission... UPDATE: After reading a lot of the negative reviews, I did not experience ANY crowding when I went (early December). In fact, I was surprised by the lack of people there, so maybe my experience would have been worse if I went during a busier time. As for the comments about malnourished animals or mistreatment of animals: I did not see ANY of that and the Zookeepers we spoke with and some of the other staff we overheard speaking to groups of people seemed to have a HUGE heart for the animal's well being. The people who are complaining and believe that the enclosures are too small or the animals are depressed are probably the type of people who don't believe in the existence of zoo's in the first place, so take it with a grain of salt. Most of these animals are saved from less than ideal conditions and CAN NOT be re-integrated back into the wild... they weren't stolen from the grasslands of Africa and placed into these enclosures purely for our enjoyment. These PETA hippies need something better to do with their time.

If you are going to Chicago I would definitely recommend going here. The Zoo was beautiful. Great place to walk around and there are a lot of different animals to see. For being a free zoo i was really impressed. The next time i go to Chicago i will be making another trip to the zoo.

Park was kind of clean. Employees were kind and helpful. The food options were not that great, and the quality was mediocre. Overall, a pleasant visit.
A few penguin looked too dirty and a bit sick.

It's a great place to go with the little ones. I've heard about them not having that many animals during the cold months. Not sure about that, but during my summer visit most cages were occupied. We did miss the bobcats, most feline cages were either vacant or not available that day.

1st time visiting. This zoo has FREE admission. Took us awhile to find where some animals were -- some because of construction, some because of cloudy day and many animals were in. Going to the building with animals inside was a great choice. We saw lots of animals there including the giraffes and zebras from the lookout area. That section of the zoo was enough to be worth the $25 parking.

The Lincoln Park Zoo is a great way to spend the day seeing the exhibits, and exploring the newly remodeled South Pond. Don't forget to bring your camera, and some walking shoes!

Came to check out the zoo lights and they we re definitely worth to see.

Fun place to tame the kidos and its free the only thing was the big cats where not out no lions tiggers or the other ones

great for zoo lights and to walk around with a family

LP Zoo is free, easy to find parking on most days and has awesome hot chocolate! We love to check out the Gibbons and the Safari house, is really original.