Toledo Zoo — Attraction in Toledo

The Toledo Zoo & Aquarium, located in Toledo, Ohio is a member of the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA), and is accredited by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA). The Toledo Zoo & Aquarium houses over 10,000 individual animals from 720 species and participates in around 80 species survival programs. The Toledo Zoo's reptile collection is one of the largest in the country and includes over 150 species with over 60 venomous species. This collection highlights the diversity of sizes, colors, and morphology that exists in the reptiles of the world. See giant Galapagos tortoises, Komodo dragons, tiny whiptail lizards, pygmy rattlesnakes and more at Galápagos Gardens, the historic Reptile House or the recently renovated ProMedica Museum of Natural History.

SOAR AND EXPLORE The Toledo Zoo’s bird collection consists of nearly 100 species from six of the seven continents with a primary focus on Asian and Australian/Oceania species. We endeavor to support and manage breeding programs in cooperation with zoos across the country, while also creating exhibits that are enriching and engaging for both birds and guests.

Swing by and meet the apes Once known as the Rare Mammal Building, Kingdom of the Apes was renovated in 1993 to include an interactive Interpretive Center and visitor favorite, Gorilla Meadow.  It is home to our Gorilla and Orangutan families, including social media icon, young Orangutan, Fajar.

LET THE KIDS EXPLORE A WORLD BUILT FOR THEIR SIZE. TOLEDO ZOO PETTING ZOO! The award-winning Nature’s Neighborhood opened in summer 2009 and is a naturalized nature play space for kids of all ages. Many children don’t have or take opportunities to connect with nature in our increasingly technological world. Nature’s Neighborhood is the perfect place to make those connections. Regardless of the season, there are plenty of imaginative opportunities in Nature’s Neighborhood

THE TOLEDO ZOO Know Before You Go Hours Open daily Mon. - Wed., Sat., Sun: Admission 10 a.m. - 4 p.m. Zoo closes at 5 p.m. Thurs. & Fri.: Admission 10 a.m. – 8 p.m., Zoo closes at 9 p.m.

Please note On Thursday and Friday evenings, some animals may be off exhibit and some buildings are closed, which include special events taking place on those evenings.

Closed during Harvest Fest evenings - Arctic Encounter, Kingdom of the Apes, Aviary, indoors of Nature’s Neighborhood and Primate Forest.

The train is temporarily closed. Polar bears are temporarily off exhibit.

Early building closures Oct. 11: Aquarium closing at 4 p.m. Oct. 12: Africa! Overlook closing at 4 p.m. Oct. 23: Aquarium closing at 3:30 p.m. Oct. 25: Aquarium closing at 3:30 p.m. Oct. 26: Aquarium closing at 4 p.m.

Admission Adults (12-59) $31 Children (2-11) $28

The Toledo Zoo began in 1900 when a woodchuck was donated by Carl Hillebrand to Peter Mettler and the Walbridge Park. By the end of its first year, the Toledo Zoo had a collection of 39 animals, most of which were donated. The park was unprepared for these donations and was forced to use temporary housing such as ravines and boxes for exhibits. In November 1901, the Toledo Zoo nearly lost its entire collection when the winter housing for the animals caught fire. As a result, in 1907, the Toledo Zoo built its first brick building for housing animals, known as the Lion House. During the early years at the Toledo Zoo, most animals were acquired through donations and circuses, and, due to a lack of proper housing, animal escapes were common. In June 1913, the Toledo Zoological Society (TZS) was founded to spur development with William H. Roemer serving as the first president. By 1916, the Toledo Zoo had grown to a population of 471 animals. In 1922, a change to the organizational structure of the zoo occurred when Percy Jones, the TZS president, created the role of Zoo Director, also known as the Curator of the Toledo Zoo & Aquarium. Frank Skeldon was the first curator for the zoo. Jones and Skeldon pushed the zoo towards national...

If you're up for activities, this zoo has lots of stuff to do not offered at other zoos-- even including a zip line. There are many things the zoo gets right, and I appreciate that the walkways were very clean, and I saw workers everywhere making sure that trash was picked up and messes were cleaned up.

Food offerings include plenty of healthy, delicious choices mixed in with the typical junk food that you would expect to find. But there are far more good choices than bad. That's a plus if you're trying to make better choices for your family.

I only used one restroom and it was fairly clean, and there was plenty of soap. I did overhear one woman point out that there should have been more than one diaper changing area in this particular restroom.

Layout of the zoo is a little odd, but I'm sure they're trying to make the most of the available land. What bothered me most were that some of the animals were in extremely small enclosures. It didn't matter how nice the enclosures were if the animal occupying it could barely move around.

Signage was a problem. At each and every exhibit, you should be able to easily look below to the rail in front of you, or somewhere in front of the exhibit, or to the side on a wall to see information pertaining to what you're viewing. At many of the enclosures, there was no signage readily visible to identify the animal or to give any factual information. I was particularly disappointed in the Aviary where signage was so pitiful you had to get a foot away from it to read any of the information. For a zoo that charges $32 per adult to not have better signage is appalling. Signage is important. Font size is important. Even though a lot of parents taking their children will never have the opportunity to read much of anything during a family visit, there are still plenty of us (including lots of children and younger folks) who would like to know what animal we're viewing and a few facts about the animal. Signage placement is important, and I felt like many of the areas completely missed the mark.

If you want to see the collection of animals from Africa, many of the animals are so far away that you have to use an optical viewer to see them up close-- unless you want to pay for the giraffe encounter where you can feed and view the giraffes up close-- and this will allow you to see some other animals from the African Plain more easily as well. Many of the zoos I've been to allow you to buy food and feed the giraffes, but they are in areas where everyone can see them up close and enjoy them. It was sad to only allow those people who could pay the chance to see a giraffe truly up close.

As was the case with many animals, if they weren't outside you didn't get to see them. Some indoor viewing areas were closed off so that you could not go indoors to see the animals if it was too hot for them to be outside. There were many animals that were unable to be viewed, and while I understand that you can't force the animals to be outside, a better job could be done to facilitate viewing by the public during the zoo's operating hours.

Overall, it was an "okay" experience that left me feeling underwhelmed. Operating zoos these days is difficult, and it really is largely...

We visited on a Monday in mid-April 2025.

We arrived at opening and stood in line to wait for the gates to open. There was plenty of parking.

We started at Arctic Encounter which was nice with the harbor seals and grey seals. The polar bear was not on exhibit. We then walked over the Gray Wolves which has a cool house you can go into and watch into their enclosure.

We then walked back to Africa but the Tower Ridge Giraffe Experience was closed. We had to see them through chain linked fence. You can kind of see Africa but from so far away as none of the trails go through enclosure. You have to take the Safari Railway to go to the back.

We then crossed the pedestrian bridge to the other side. We started with Flamingo Key which is nice. They are in a open enclosure you can walk into. Walking behind it you have Tiger Terrance and Kodiak Ridge. We were so early in the morning the large cats were getting fed which was fun to watch and the bears were active. We didn't see the Tasmanian Devils.

We walked over to the Hippoquarium next. We timed it perfectly as we walked up the keeper was telling us the hippos would be out in like 5 mins. We watch them march across the fence directly in front of us following their trail of food to the pool of their enclosure. We watched them bobbing for apples and watermelon. Continuing down Tembo Trail we saw the elephants and the new baby calf. The Rhinos were not open or available for viewing.

The reptile house was closed for construction and sign said it would be open in 2026.

We grabbed lunch at Monarch Market right next to Nature's Neighborhood. The play place was quite busy and packed with a lot of kids.

We then visited the Promedica Museum of Natural History. This was the highlight for me for sure. Tons of aquatic animals down stairs including sturgeon and a large tropical green house. Then up stairs you have the arthropods and venomous snakes. Could've easily spent 2 to 3 hours just in here.

We left and did the aquarium next which was cool but after coming from the natural history museum it was a bit meh. Still worth a visit though.

We did not go to the Galapagos or gorilla meadow or kingdom of the apes. We spent too much time in the natural history museum. The Primate Forest was empty. There were no animals on exhibit at all.

We finished up at the Aviary which was small but still interesting. We stopped at the store right at the front before leaving. Be aware that not all merch available in the zoo is at this store. If you see something else in the park you like, just buy it then.

We would visit again if we were in the area. We did pay for membership tickets. It made sense for our family of five and we were about to visit the Cleveland Zoo too which is a...