Ruby Falls — Attraction in Chattanooga

BRUTALLY HONEST AND UNBIASED REVIEW — I have no complaints about the caverns and the waterfall itself, both are beautiful and a sight to marvel in the wonder in. However, THE ISSUE lies within the way the tours are set up and the way things are run, which AFFECTS YOUR VIEWING EXPERIENCE.

When you reserve a tour time, you’re actually going to go down with up to 38 people at once. That seems to be the maximum when booking online. However, it could be more than that, as tour times are set within ten minutes of one another. So add on to that. We booked a 10:40am time slot, and we ended up going down with the 10:30am crew as well. When we got to the bottom of the elevator, they were waiting for us. There’s not enough time in those ten-minute slots to have other groups going ahead, I guess? Or perhaps it has to do with the fact they want to just go ahead and shove “smaller” reserved groups with another one so they don’t have to have more “guides?” Either way: PACKED LIKE SARDINES. HEED THE WARNING.

After being packed like sardines, you’re shoved into a singular elevator with as many people as possible. You will be touching strangers with your buttocks, your chest, tummy, and whatever other body part they decide to squeeze against.

Getting into the caves, you’re stuck into a single file line, of course. No complaints about that. HOWEVER, when there are potentially 38+ people within your little group, it gets messy. If you’re at the back, you can barely hear anything the guide is saying, if they are saying anything at all.

WARNING TWO: If you book the 26$ ‘walk to Ruby Falls’ package, you won’t get ANY INFORMATION ON THE CAVE OTHER THAN TWO PRERECORDED BITS INSIDE. The guide does nothing but tell you the rules and make a few witty comments. The first bit of anything informational is two TV screens with a semi-informative video about how the caves were found, but it’s framed like a commercial. Trying to get you hyped rather than feed you important info. The second one is quite literally a pre-recorded audio played over the speakers that’s it.

Because there’s nothing informational whatsoever, that also means there’s NO TIME TO STOP AND LOOK AT ANY FORMATIONS. IT IS AN HOUR LONG SPEED WALK TO THE FALLS. The guide is just there to make sure you don’t do anything stupid, I guess. Otherwise, there’s no point in them being there. They don’t do anything but rush you through the pathway. And if you do stop to take photos or anything, you risk being COMPLETELY LEFT BEHIND and rushing to catch up with the rest of your group.

THE FALLS — seeing the waterfall itself is TIMED. You probably get five minutes MAXIMUM TO LOOK AT IT. The room is completely pitch black to where you CANNOT see it until they do their little light show, and after the five minutes is up, no more falls, turn back. Because of this, if you’re at the back of the group, YOU WILL NOT GET ANY PHOTOS WITH THE FALLS AT ALL. We were lucky and ended up managing to squeeze a few in, but a few at the very back of our group weren’t so lucky. Especially when you have larger families wanting to take 20 different variations of one photo. (No shade, just a fact.) The waterfall IS very beautiful though, it honestly felt like a rush of adrenaline seeing it for the first time, but with the time limit, it’s like taking candy from a baby. Luckily, you see the same stuff on the way out so if you miss something, you’ll see it again, but you’ll also be RUSHED out while passing other groups headed in. We passed four groups on the way back out, us squeezed on one side and them on another. Barely any room to pass. SARDINES. Crazy.

TLDR: It’s a VERY rushed, uncomfortable experience and you don’t learn anything worth noting. We left googling questions about the discovery of the caverns. The falls and the rock formations are very beautiful and luckily, make the trip somewhat redeemable. Heed this one with caution folks. It’s very much greedy tourist trap vibes, trying to turn and burn as many people as they can through the caves. That aside:...

We took the Ruby Falls nighttime lantern tour. Certainly a worthwhile thing to do. I was worried it would be a little touristy/cheesy, because we have taken several cave tours before, but we have taken them in countries, like Mexico and Nicaragua and Belize, where we are actually go into a cave with a guide, and you pay a few dollars to somebody and they bring you in (and it may or may not be the safest situation) and it is either somebody’s private property or a very off-the-beaten-path situation, often only accessible by boat and very remote.

This was not that type of tour!

So, we prepared ourselves for it to be highly touristy, since it was something that had been around for decades (I remember touring Ruby as a child). Our expectation was that the guide would be a little bit goofy, and that the experience would have a lot of displays and maybe be catered more for younger children. We were pleasantly surprised when this felt very much like an actual cave tour. Not cheesy at all. The guy had clearly done this… a lot… and he had his well-worn sayings and jokes that I'm sure he recycled over and over again. But the cave itself was fascinating. And the element of touring it at night with just our lanterns on added a little specialness to it. The lanterns were battery operated, and I thought those two would be a little silly, but they were lovely as well. There were two modes, a brighter mode, and a dimmer mode. We were in a larger group, which is what I feared, maybe 15 of us. But if we kept close to the guide, we could hear what he was saying. He stopped periodically to point out various formations. But this did not feel like the type of kid tours I took growing up as a child, that patiently explained stalactite versus a stalagmite. It was definitely geared toward an older audience, which we were, and he spent more time talking about the history of the cave, and the discovery of the cave than I thought he would. Which was actually really educational.

When we arrived at the Falls itself, it was really beautiful. They did a great job of hoisting a lantern to the top of the falls, and so that it lit it up, and then slowly bringing the lantern down so that it would illuminate the faces of the people standing near the falls, so we could get photos. And the guide took turns taking everybody’s photographs while he staged this. That was really delightful. He recognized the fact that most people did want their photos taken. And arranging a photo-op was really sweet. We spent a lot of time at the falls. I could not help wanting to swim!, Which I know we could not. In other countries, of course, you would be able to swim. Was it touristy? Yes? Just the sheer amount of people there made it touristy. And our guide (who clearly conducted many tours a day over many years) felt like he knew that he was supposed to do this for a tourist crowd. But overall, again, hearing about the history was really pleasant! A nice way to spend an evening! 4 out of 5 stars! Tip: bring a little cash for the tour guide...

We visited on Sunday 7/20/25. You have to buy your tickets online. Sky was our tour guide - we LOVE her. She was funny, kind, and knowledgeable. We learned a lot during our trip, including other ways to see the cave (lantern walks, slower tours). She kept us engaged in the history while we were in awe of what we were seeing - which had to be a hard thing to do. It is obvious that she loves what she does.

Wear comfortable shoes.

The group size is definitely too large. This is not the tour guides fault, but there are many reasons the tour could’ve been better and pretty much every reason goes back to group size. Our tour guide made sure to check for the caboose before she ever spoke on the microphone, but even though she did this, we still couldn’t hear her over half of the time just because of distance. I believe our group size was 42 and there were many times we had to stand/walk single file. I think we counted 5 times that we had to get against the cave wall single file to let another group pass us in the opposite direction. Some people had babies in baby carriers. Then coming back, we had to be the crowd that passed through 5 times again. It didn’t seem like we were in a well-known place like Ruby Falls when that happened over and over. It was awkward and that made us feel more rushed than anything. I know businesses like to get as many people as fast as possible but this is an aspect that is unchanged, will likely keep more people from coming more than once. The elevators are so extremely crowded and no one I know wants to have their nose that close to another persons forehead after paying to be somewhere.

The cave is well kept. There are many areas that have slick flooring and very narrow spaces - be advised.

We ate before the tour. The quesadillas in the cafe are really good. The pizza grilled cheese is bland I didn’t like it. My daughter had a hot dog and ate it all. For 5 people, we got one chicken quesadilla, one cheese quesadilla, one pizza grilled cheese, one hot dog, and nachos along with 5 fountain drinks. It cost $72, so pretty average price for a tourist attraction. The wait time for your food is pretty long. The guy assembling the trays wasn’t nice. I asked for our cups and he huffed, grabbed the cups, stuck his hand out. I said thank you, he said nothing. I told him I was sorry for bothering him. Still nothing. Pretty much anywhere gives your drink before your food. I didn’t get what his deal was.

The pictures are good quality but expensive. I brought home the QR code because I couldn’t make up my mind. Our tour guide took a ton of pictures for us at the falls at different angles and we were happy with those.

Overall, this was a favorite among all 5 of us. It was breathtaking, beautiful, and an experience we will never forget. Thank you...