Tampa Bay History Center

The Tampa Bay History Center is open every day from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and an adult gallery ticket costs $18.95.

Prices are as the Tampa museum posts them (Tampa Bay History Center, visit page). The college student price is posted as $16.9; the museum desk at (813) 228-0097 answers questions about current prices. The senior rate starts at age 60, and children up to age 6 enter free.

Several programs waive or lower the price. Families showing a SNAP EBT card and photo ID get the cardholder plus three guests in free, library passes are offered through libraries in Hernando, Hillsborough, Pasco and Pinellas counties, active military and veterans get discounted tickets with ID at Visitor Services on the second floor, and the museum takes part in Blue Star Museums (History Center visit page).

The museum stands at 801 Water Street on the Tampa Riverwalk, and visitors park on nearby Water Street area streets or in three garages and lots a five to six minute walk away.

The museum also points to hundreds of street spaces in the Water Street neighborhood, payable by phone, and to pre-purchased passes through ParkWhiz (Tampa Bay History Center, visit page). Drivers heading north on I-275 take the Ashley Street West Tampa Exit 44 and drivers heading south take the Downtown East-West Exit 45A, then follow Jackson Street, Morgan Street and Channelside Drive to Water Street; from South Tampa the route runs up Bayshore Blvd. to the Platt Street Bridge, which becomes Channelside Drive, then right on Water Street; from the Selmon Expressway it is Exit 8, Downtown East, then right on Kennedy Blvd., left on Morgan Street, left on Channelside Drive and right on Water Street (History Center visit page).

Yes: the free TECO Line Streetcar has two stops near the Tampa History Center, and the museum is also served by the Pirate Water Taxi and the Cross Bay Ferry.

The museum lists those options and says it is walkable from all downtown hotels and the Tampa Convention Center (Tampa Bay History Center, visit page); the City of Tampa includes it among the museums on the Riverwalk, alongside the Henry B. Plant Museum, the Tampa Museum of Art and the Glazer Children's Museum (City of Tampa, Tampa Riverwalk).

The streetcar is a 2.7-mile line created as a joint project of the City and HART, linking downtown, the Channelside District and Ybor City, running every 15 minutes from 7:00 AM to 11:00 PM Monday to Thursday, 7:00 AM to 2:00 AM Friday, 9:00 AM to 2:00 AM Saturday and 8:30 AM to 11:00 PM Sunday (City of Tampa, TECO Line Streetcar). HART says the line is now free with extended hours (HART, TECO Line Streetcar System). The city page still frames the free fares as three years of service HART began in October 2018 with an FDOT grant, so it lags behind the operator's own description. The late Friday and Saturday service, to 2:00 AM, keeps the Channelside District connected with Ybor City long after the museum closes at 5 p.m. (City of Tampa; History Center visit page).

The fall 2026 shows are Cinema in the Sunshine State, through March 21, 2027, and Mapping the 14th Colony, closing November 29, 2026, alongside permanent galleries such as Treasure Seekers and the Touchton Map Library.

The listings and dates are the museum's (Tampa Bay History Center, Exhibits). Florida Front and Center and Travails and Triumphs are also listed among the galleries under More to Explore. Because Mapping the 14th Colony closes on November 29, 2026, the film posters are the only temporary show from the October 2026 Tampa listing still on view after that date. Film fans can pair two Tampa museums this season: the Henry B. Plant Museum runs its own Cigar City Cinema exhibit from Oct 3, 2026 to Feb 28, 2027 (Henry B. Plant Museum, Current Exhibits).

It is a Tampa history museum established in 1989 and housed since 2009 in a 60,000-square-foot building on Tampa's Riverwalk, with three levels of galleries covering 12,000 years of Florida history.

The museum describes itself as accredited by the American Alliance of Museums and affiliated with the Smithsonian Institution (Tampa Bay History Center, About the museum). Its exhibits page says it was founded by the Hillsborough County Board of County Commissioners and has presented more than 50 exhibitions in the Wayne Thomas Gallery and the Saunders Foundation Gallery since opening on Water Street (Exhibits).

The collection numbers 90,000 historical artifacts, and the building also holds the Columbia Cafe, which recreates the original Columbia Restaurant in Ybor City (History Center visit page). The organization lists affiliate locations at Chinsegut Hill and at Tampa's Black History Museum, in Encore Tampa at 1213 N. Central Ave. (History Center visit page).

The Tampa museum lends a limited number of wheelchairs free on a first-come, first-served basis and publishes a guide for visitors with autism spectrum disorder.

The guide was produced by the Center for Autism and Related Disabilities at the University of South Florida, CARD-USF, and the museum keeps a profile on the Wheel the World travel service for visitors with disabilities (Tampa Bay History Center, visit page). Visitor Services, where military and veteran discounts are handled, is on the second floor.

For questions before a visit to the Tampa museum, its main line is (813) 228-0097, and the FAQ page covers the History Center and the affiliate locations (History Center visit page).

Last verified: October 18, 2026. Prices, hours, parking and exhibit dates were checked on the History Center's own visit, exhibits and overview pages, and streetcar service on the City of Tampa and HART pages.