Lucas Museum of Narrative Art: Tickets, Hours and How to Plan a Visit to LA's New Museum

Booking your slot

Weekends are the hard part, so if your trip allows a weekday, book one of those. Over-65s pay $21, and entry is free for members and active-duty military.

Doors open at 10 a.m. and close at 5 p.m. On Friday and Saturday the museum stays open until 9 p.m., and Saturday also starts at 9 a.m. It is closed on Tuesdays. Last entry is 45 minutes before closing, so a 5 p.m. day really ends at 4:15 p.m.

You can see a fair amount of the place without a ticket. Ma Yansong's curved white building stands on sculpted legs above the park, and the roof is planted with native species. The outdoor campus is open to anyone from 8 a.m. until sunset. The gardens, library, shop, cafe and restaurant need no ticket either.

Inside the galleries

The galleries are grouped by comics, children's stories, fantasy, history and community, not by period or country. Norman Rockwell and Winsor McCay hang near Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera.

The Lucas Archives are the rooms most people come for. They hold props and costumes from the first six Star Wars films and the first four Indiana Jones films.

Two cinemas on the ground floor show shorts and documentaries, and both are included in your ticket. Leave half an hour for one if the programme suits you.

The rest of Exposition Park

Book the first Lucas slot of the day, give it the morning, then walk across the park.

California Science Center is the other reason to be here. Space Shuttle Endeavour now stands bolt upright in a full launch stack, with its solid rocket boosters and ET-94, the last flight-qualified external tank. It sits in the new Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center, which opens to the public on 13 November 2026. Entry is free, as it is to the rest of the Science Center, and the doors are open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Reserve a timed slot anyway, because demand for Endeavour is very heavy. Booking costs $4 a person.

Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County is in the same park, in a 1913 building with a stained-glass dome over the rotunda. The Dinosaur Hall is the draw, where a Tyrannosaurus and a Triceratops are mounted mid-confrontation behind glass. Adults pay $18 and ages 3 to 12 pay $7. It opens daily from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., though it shuts on the first Tuesday of most months. The spider pavilion and the 3D films cost extra on top of admission.

If you were planning on the La Brea Tar Pits museum as well, it closed in July 2026 for rebuilding and is not due back until 2028.

If Lucas is sold out

The Broad is the easiest fallback, at 221 South Grand Avenue downtown. General admission is free and walk-up tickets are sold every day, so you can decide on the morning. It opens at 11 a.m. and closes at 5 p.m., with a late night to 8 p.m. on Thursday and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. at weekends. It is shut on Mondays. Yayoi Kusama's Infinity Mirrored Room is free too, but it needs its own reservation, booked separately from your admission, and those slots go quickly.

LACMA opened the David Geffen Galleries on 4 May 2026. The collection now sits on one raised floor that bridges Wilshire Boulevard. Works are grouped around oceans and seas, with no national or departmental divisions. People either enjoy that or find it disorientating. Adults pay $30, or $25 with Los Angeles County photo ID, and everyone gets in free on the second Tuesday of the month. It opens from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., until 8 p.m. on Friday and 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. at weekends, and closes on Wednesdays.

Academy Museum of Motion Pictures is across the road from LACMA at Wilshire and Fairfax, in Renzo Piano's glass sphere grafted onto a 1939 department store. Adults pay $25, or $18 if you arrive after 4:30 p.m. and buy on site. Marilyn Monroe: Hollywood Icon runs to 28 February 2027 and Studio Ghibli's PONYO to 21 March 2027. It opens 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and closes on Tuesdays. One gallery on Level 3 is shut until 12 December 2026.

Before you go

The Lucas museum and the Academy Museum both close on Tuesdays. LACMA closes on Wednesdays and The Broad closes on Mondays. Fix your dates around whichever one you came for. Book the Lucas slot and the Endeavour reservation before you travel. The Lucas museum also shuts on Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.

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