NEED TO KNOW
- Dollywood has been named the No. 1 amusement park in the U.S. by Tripadvisor
- The theme park co-owned by Dolly Parton has topped the 2025 Travelers’ Choice Best of the Best Awards’ category for amusement parks
- “It is all due to the hard work of our hosts who ensure our guests feel welcome and cared for,” the park’s president said
A beloved theme park in Tennessee has once again topped an annual ranking of the country’s best amusement parks — and employees are working “9 to 5” to make sure its just what fans deserve.
Tripadvisor announced its 2025 Travelers’ Choice Best of the Best Awards this week, and coming it at No. 1 in the amusement park category was Dollywood, the Pigeon Forge park co-founded by country music legend Dolly Parton.
Dollywood, located in the Great Smoky Mountains, opened to the public in 1986 and is still pulling in fans from around the world as it now beat out Disney World’s Magic Kingdom, Disneyland and Universal Studios in the 2025 list.
The ranking is determined by which parks get a high volume of “above-and-beyond reviews and opinions” from the Tripadvisor community over a 12-month period, according to the site. As for the best theme parks across the globe, Dollywood came in at No. 11 on Tripadvisor’s list, which was topped by Ferrari World Yas Island in Abu Dhabi.
The latest chart-topping moment for Dollywood marks the third time it has done so in the past four years, per Tennessee’s Knoxville News Sentinel. Ranked underneath it this year were Magic Kingdom at No. 2 and Knoebels Amusement Resort at No. 3.
Dollywood President Eugene Naughton told the outlet that the recognition is “humbling.”
“Because it is derived from real reviews left by our actual guests describing their time here at our parks and resorts,” Naughton said. “We’ve earned a number of honors this year from national organizations, and it is all due to the hard work of our hosts who ensure our guests feel welcome and cared for while they are here. We feel — and these awards continue to show — the Dollywood Parks and Resorts experience truly is best in class.”
Naughton added, while speaking with the Daily Mail, that Dollywood doesn’t “provide the best guest experience in the country to try to win these awards.”
“We do it because it is the right thing to do,” he said.
The Tripadvisor nod isn’t the only recent recognition for Dollywood, either. In May, the National Amusement Park Historical Association named it America’s favorite theme park for the third year in a row, as voted for in the 39th annual NAPHA Amusement Park and Attractions Survey.
The park, co-owned by Parton and Herschend Family Entertainment, attracts over 2 million visitors each year and spans 165 acres with over 50 rides and attractions. Speaking at its 40th anniversary celebration in March, Parton revealed she was “a little bit nervous” on opening day and was “just hoping that people would really want to come visit a theme park with my name on it.”
As an honoree for National Geographic’s 2024 Travelers of the Year, Parton told PEOPLE last year that the people behind the scenes are what gives Dollywood its magic.
“The Smokies — and the wonderful people who work here—are what make Dollywood so different than many of the other theme parks around the world,” she said at the time. “We’re right on the front porch of the most-visited national park in the country, so we take what God gave us and use it to dream up the big dreams we want our guests to experience while they are here riding rides and making memories.”
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