About this guide
A traveler's guide to the hot springs of the American West, built so you spend less time researching and more time soaking.
Planning a hot springs trip usually means a dozen open tabs: a forum thread from 2017, a blog post with the old prices, a map pin that may or may not be a real pool. This guide tries to close most of those tabs for you. For every spring we cover, you get what kind of place it is, how you get there, what it costs, when it's open, how hot the water runs and who manages it, plus the advice that makes the day go better.
A word on what we are and aren't. We're researchers rather than soaking critics. Every fact here comes from the operator's or land manager's own page, and we don't pretend to have sat in every pool, so you won't find gushing about sunsets. What you will find is the stuff that decides your trip, stated plainly, with a link to the source so you can check it yourself.
How we put it together
- A spring makes the guide only when we can read a page from whoever runs it or manages the land: a resort, a town, a national forest, the BLM, a state park or the Park Service. Springs that exist only on forums and blogs aren't listed, however good they sound.
- Fees, seasons, temperatures and rules are the operator's. We sort springs by type and access ourselves. When they don't publish a water temperature, we say so rather than borrow a number from somewhere else.
- Within a state, springs are grouped by type and never ranked. A resort pool and a creekside rock tub aren't competing for the same afternoon. City pages are sorted by rough drive time from downtown.
- Free means free to soak; parking passes and donation boxes are noted where they apply. Clothing-optional is marked only when the operator says so or the land manager acknowledges the custom.
- Every entry shows the date we last read its source. Hot springs change quickly, so that link is always the final word.
How we make money
Some lodging links may earn us a commission if you book, at no cost to you. The affiliate disclosure says which are live. A commission never moves a spring up a list, because the lists aren't ranked, and the "Check hours and fees" button under every entry always goes to the operator's own page, never to a booking partner.
Spotted a change?
If a fee has gone up, a road has closed or a spring has been gated, please tell us through the contact page, with a link to the page that shows it. We'll fix it at the next rebuild, and you'll have saved the next traveler a wasted drive.