Seven Amsterdam museums where children are meant to touch things, with current prices, the ages each actually suits, and how long to allow.
Two of them are free for under-12s, which matters when you are buying four tickets.
1) NEMO Science Museum
The green ship-shaped building on the water east of Centraal Station, with five floors of exhibits built to be pulled, pumped and switched on.
Electricity, water pressure, chain reactions and a chemistry lab and Maker Space aimed at ages 6 and up.
Entry is €17.50 for everyone aged 4 and over, and free for children 3 and under.
Oosterdok 2, and it is a ten-minute walk from Centraal along the waterfront.
The rooftop terrace is free to enter without a museum ticket and has a water-play installation in summer, plus the best free view of the city centre.
Allow two to three hours, and expect the youngest to stay on the lower floors.
Best for ages 4 to 12; it sells out in Dutch school holidays, so book ahead.
2) Rijksmuseum
Under-18s enter free, which turns the most expensive museum on Museumplein into the cheapest family outing on this list.
Museumstraat 1, open daily 9:00 to 17:00, adults €25.
Pick up the family route at the information desk on arrival - it is a set of mini-quests that gives children a reason to walk through the Gallery of Honour.
Family guided tours with drawing and clay-modelling tasks run at set times and need booking in advance.
Ninety focused minutes ending at “The Night Watch” works far better than trying to see the whole building.
Best for ages 7 to 12.
3) Wereldmuseum Amsterdam
This is the museum formerly called the Tropenmuseum, renamed in 2023 when it merged with the ethnographic museums in Leiden and Rotterdam.
It sits on Linnaeusstraat in Oost, opposite Oosterpark, and covers how people live across the world through reconstructed streets, rooms and interiors you walk into.
Wereldmuseum Junior, the children’s wing, is the oldest children’s museum in the country, but its guided sessions are now aimed mainly at Dutch school groups.
Check the public activity calendar before you travel rather than assuming a family session will be running, and confirm the language.
The main museum works for children on its own account, since most of it is walk-through rather than glass cases.
Allow ninety minutes, and reach it on tram 14 or tram 19.
Best for ages 6 to 13.
4) Het Scheepvaartmuseum
The National Maritime Museum occupies a 17th-century naval storehouse on the Kattenburgerplein, with a full-size replica of a Dutch East India Company ship moored alongside.
Children can go aboard, climb below deck, sit in the captain’s cabin and work through the cargo hold.
Adults are €18.50, ages 13 to 17 are €8.50, and children 12 and under go free.
Doris the Diver is a sensory room built for ages 2 to 4; The Tale of the Whale suits 5 and up.
Allow two hours to do the ship and the indoor galleries properly.
It is a fifteen-minute walk from NEMO along the same stretch of water, so the two combine into one long day.
5) JCK Junior at the Jewish Museum
Part of the Jewish Cultural Quarter on Nieuwe Amstelstraat, the children’s section is laid out as a walk-through family home rather than a gallery.
Children move room by room through daily Jewish life - the kitchen, the table, the festivals - and sessions often include baking small challah rolls.
The scale is intimate, which makes it a good choice for a child who shuts down in a large museum.
Allow an hour, and check when booking which sessions are running in English.
Best for ages 6 to 12.
6) Van Gogh Museum
Museumplein 6, adults €25, under-18s free, and timed-entry tickets must be booked online.
The children’s programming is better than the building’s reputation suggests.
Ages 4 to 6 get a hunt for the rabbits hidden in Vincent’s paintings; ages 6 to 12 get a treasure-hunt booklet from the information desk and a family audio tour written for their age.
Painting workshops for 6 to 12s run at weekends and must be booked in advance.
An hour is enough with children, and it is a two-minute walk from the Rijksmuseum.
7) WONDR Experience
Not a museum at all: fifteen themed rooms in Amsterdam-Noord built for jumping into, including a ball pit and a confetti room.
Meeuwenlaan 88, open daily from 10:00, closing at 19:00 most days and 20:00 on Fridays and Saturdays, with last entry two hours before close.
It is a two-minute metro ride from Centraal Station, or a free ferry across the IJ if you would rather make the journey part of the outing.
Sixty to ninety minutes covers all the rooms.
Buy tickets online, because walk-in space is not guaranteed.
Best for ages 4 upward and for teenagers, who will treat it as a photo studio.
Choosing Between Them
By Age
Ages 2 to 4 are served by Doris the Diver at the Maritime Museum and by WONDR, and by very little else on this list.
Ages 4 to 8 get the most from NEMO and the Jewish Museum’s children’s house.
Ages 8 to 12 do best at the Rijksmuseum family route, the Van Gogh treasure hunt and the Wereldmuseum.
By How Much Touching Is Involved
NEMO and WONDR are entirely hands-on and need no persuading.
The Maritime Museum is hands-on outdoors on the ship and conventional indoors.
The Rijksmuseum and Van Gogh Museum are looking-with-a-task, which works for children who can already read.
By Time Indoors On A Wet Day
NEMO fills three hours; the Maritime Museum and the Rijksmuseum take about two each.
The Van Gogh Museum, the Jewish children’s house and the Wereldmuseum take an hour to ninety minutes.
Two of the shorter ones make a full day without exhausting anybody.
Before You Go
Booking
NEMO and the Van Gogh Museum sell out days ahead in June, July, August and Dutch school holidays.
Book both at least a week in advance in those periods; the others can usually be bought the day before.
Getting Between Them
The Rijksmuseum and Van Gogh Museum share Museumplein and are two minutes apart on foot.
NEMO and the Maritime Museum are both on the eastern waterfront and fifteen minutes apart.
The Wereldmuseum is in Oost on trams 14 and 19, and WONDR is over the IJ in Noord.
Facilities
Prams are allowed at NEMO and the Rijksmuseum, though NEMO gets tight at weekends.
The Rijksmuseum and the Maritime Museum both have cafés inside that will feed a child without a detour.
GVB trams are low-floor and take prams without folding them.
