The international edition of The Art Newspaper has published its annual list of the world’s most visited museums. Once again, two Russian institutions made it into the top 12: the Hermitage and the Russian Museum in Saint Petersburg. They are thus among the most visited museums on the list, ahead of other world-famous institutions such as the Prado in Madrid, Centre Pompidou in Paris and the Victoria and Albert Museum in the UK. The Art Newspaper writes: “Among Russian museums in the world ranking of museum visitors, the State Hermitage has always been leading: in 2023, it was ranked 10th (3.274 million visitors), as it was the previous year, 2022. However, in the ranking for 2024, the largest Russian museum has slipped to 12th place, behind the State Russian Museum, which has moved up to 11th place.”
The Louvre in Paris holds the top spot on the world ranking with over 8.737 million visitors. “The Vatican Museums are again in second place (6.825 million), followed by the British Museum (6.480 million). Next are the Metropolitan Museum of Art (5.727 million) and Tate Modern (4.603 million)” the newspaper writes. However, there are some surprises in the top ten – for example, the Shanghai Museum, which opened a branch in the new district of Pudong in 2024, has unexpectedly taken the lead. The National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City, which with 3.7 million visitors has never been among the top museums before, is also on the list.