Top of the Rock tickets — what each tier actually buys
The four tiers
| Ticket | From | What you get | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|
| Timed Admission | $42 | The three decks — 67th, 69th, 70th — at a slot you choose. | The one to buy. The views are the product and this is all of them. |
| The Beam + Admission | $57 | Admission plus the staged photo on a recreated 1932 girder. | A roughly $15 increment for a studio photograph with a skyline behind it. Skip it. |
| All-Inclusive | $72 | Admission, The Beam, and SKYLIFT — the rotating glass platform above the 70th. | Only if SKYLIFT is the reason you came. It is $30 over the plain ticket. |
| VIP Pass | $185+ | Guided access, priority elevator, lounge, private Beam, champagne. | The issuer’s own pages have quoted this inconsistently. Read the checkout page, not a review. |
Prices from Rockefeller Center's own ticket page, checked 2026-08-30. Admission is dynamic, so treat every figure here as the floor rather than the price on your date.
Where to buy, and who charges more than the venue
Four places sell this deck, and they do not cost the same. The venue's own site is the baseline. Rockefeller Center also lists its official ticket on GetYourGuide, which is the same product with free cancellation attached — worth something in a city where the weather decides whether there is a view at all. Go City sells a single ticket at $60, which is more than the venue charges; its pass price is only good if you use the pass. Resellers further down the search results quote in euros and publish hours that contradict the venue's own.
Official ticket #1 selling ticket New York City: Top of the Rock Observation Deck Ticket Sold by Rockefeller Center — the venue itself The passes that include it — and when they actually pay off
Every New York multi-attraction pass includes Top of the Rock, which is why the pass sellers rank so heavily for this search. None of them will tell you the break-even, so: a pass wins only when you genuinely visit three or more of its attractions, at full price, on the days it is valid. Two attractions and a good intention is how people lose money on these.
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New York CityPASS®: Save up to 42% at 5 Top Attractions -
New York Explorer Pass: Top Attractions including Edge -
New York Pass®: 100+ Attractions including Edge NYC -
NYC: Pick 3 Top Attractions, Including Yankees Ticket -
New York Essentials - 1 Observatory + 2 top NYC attractions -
New York C3® by CityPASS: Tickets for 3 Top Attractions
Top of the Rock tickets — the questions people actually ask
Timed admission starts at $42 for an adult. Adding The Beam brings it to $57, all-inclusive with SKYLIFT is $72, and the VIP pass runs $185 and up. Prices are dynamic — a quiet weekday morning is the $42; a Saturday sunset is not.
For a sunset slot, yes — those go two to three weeks out in high season. For a weekday morning or a late evening slot you can usually book the same day.
Yes. Admission is timed rather than capped for the day, so walk-ups are sold, but the slot you want may not be available. The sunset window is the one that sells out.
The venue directly, or GetYourGuide, which carries Rockefeller Center’s own official ticket from $46 with free cancellation. Go City lists a single ticket at $60 — more than the venue charges. A multi-attraction pass only wins if you will genuinely use three or more of its attractions.
There is no general public discount code. Children under 5 are free, and children 6–12 and seniors 62+ pay less. The real saving is choosing an off-peak slot, or a pass if you are doing several attractions.
New York CityPASS, the New York Explorer Pass, the New York Pass, C3 by CityPASS and several "pick 3" bundles all include it. They differ in how many attractions you must visit before they pay for themselves — see the comparison below.
Not sure it is the right deck yet?
This page is about buying the ticket. Whether you should is a different question, and it depends on which of the five New York decks suits your visit — the full Top of the Rock guide ranks it against Edge, SUMMIT, the Empire State and One World, from the one deck you can see all four of them from. If you already know you are comparing, the deck-by-deck comparison has the real all-in prices including the fees nobody lists.