The Most Spectacular Cliffs in the United States
6 places · updated 14 October 2026
In short: By our ranking, the most spectacular cliffs in the United States are Nā Pali Coast, Glacier Point and Waterpocket Fold. The list covers 6 cliffs. Last updated 14 October 2026.
The United States spans volcanic islands in the Pacific, granite ranges carved by Ice Age glaciers, glacial clay on the Atlantic coast and sandstone shores on the Great Lakes. Each of these settings breaks into cliffs differently, so American cliffs range from green, fluted sea walls to banded walls of coloured clay and rock faces stained by minerals.
The Nā Pali Coast on Kauai rises in knife-edged green ridges up to about 1,200 m straight out of the Pacific, reachable only on foot, by boat or from the air. Glacier Point is a granite ledge roughly 980 m above Yosemite Valley, facing Half Dome across the gulf. The Gay Head Cliffs at Aquinnah on Martha's Vineyard are layered clays in red, white and grey, sacred to the Wampanoag people. Pictured Rocks on Lake Superior in Michigan are sandstone walls streaked with iron and copper minerals, protected as the first national lakeshore in the country.
In this list
| # | Place | Type | UNESCO |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nā Pali Coast | Cliff | |
| 2 | Glacier Point | Scenic viewpoint | |
| 3 | Waterpocket Fold | Cliff | |
| 4 | Vermilion Cliffs | Cliff | |
| 5 | Gay Head Cliffs | Cliff | |
| 6 | Pictured Rocks | Cliff |
01 Nā Pali Coast
Nā Pali Coast State Park
United States · 36.3 km from Līhuʻe22.183° N 159.642° W
Jmblanco74 · CC BY-SA 3.0 Much of the coast can only be seen from the water or the air, which is part of its spell. The one way in on foot is the Kalalau Trail, which runs for about 11 miles from the end of the highway at Kēʻē Beach to Kalalau Beach at the foot of Kalalau Valley, crossing five major valleys on the way, with camping by permit at Hanakoa and Kalalau. Boat trips along the coast, from rigid inflatables to catamarans, as well as kayaks and helicopter flights, reveal the stretches that no path reaches.
Did you know? Honopū is nicknamed the valley of the lost tribe after archaeologists in 1922 found skulls they wrongly took to be from a pre-Hawaiian people.
02 Glacier Point
United States37.731° N 119.573° W
Image by Pexels from Pixabay Glacier Point is also a trailhead for some of the finest walking in the park. The Four Mile Trail (in fact about 4.6 miles) drops the full 3,200 feet to the valley floor in tight switchbacks, and the Panorama Trail runs about 8.2 miles along the rim and down past Illilouette Fall to Nevada Fall and the Mist Trail — a descent that keeps Half Dome in view almost the whole way. The Pohono Trail heads west along the rim toward other viewpoints above El Capitan and Bridalveil Fall.
Did you know? By around 1920 the crews had settled on red fir bark as the best fuel, because it burned down to an even bed of glowing coals.
03 Waterpocket Fold
United States38.022° N 111.121° W
Slick-o-bot · Public domain The best way to understand the shape of it is from above or alongside. Utah Highway 24 cuts through the fold east of Fruita. The Notom-Bullfrog Road follows the eastern foot of the escarpment south, paved for its first 15 miles, while the Burr Trail Road climbs across the fold in a set of switchbacks that gain about 800 feet in half a mile. From the Burr Trail a walk of around seven miles return, or a high-clearance road, leads to the Strike Valley Overlook, where the tilted layers run to the horizon in both directions.
04 Vermilion Cliffs
United States · 31.3 km from Kanab36.925° N 112.842° W
Image by igormattio from Pixabay History runs along the base of the wall too. The Mormon pioneer Jacob Hamblin ranched in House Rock Valley beneath the cliffs, and the present highway through the valley follows the route of the old pioneer wagon road. Driving it, the cliffs keep you company for mile after mile, changing colour with the light.
05 Gay Head Cliffs
United States · 35.2 km from New Bedford41.350° N 70.836° W
Image by shannynkm from Pixabay The cliffs belong to the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah), for whom this headland is ancestral land, and are protected jointly with the town of Aquinnah and local conservation bodies. In 1997 the town voted to replace the name Gay Head with Aquinnah, a Wampanoag word meaning "land under the hill". Wampanoag tradition attributes much of the island's landscape to Moshup, a giant ancestral figure. Above the cliffs stands Gay Head Light, a conical brick tower of 1856 that once held a first-order Fresnel lens; in 2015 the whole lighthouse was moved about 129 feet inland to keep it from falling with the eroding edge.
Did you know? The first light above the cliffs, an octagonal wooden tower lit in November 1799, was the first lighthouse ever built on Martha's Vineyard.
06 Pictured Rocks
United States46.533° N 86.488° W
Gpwitteveen · CC BY-SA 3.0 The cliffs are the centrepiece of Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, established on 15 October 1966 as the first national lakeshore in the United States. The protected strip runs 42 miles from Munising to Grand Marais and also includes the Grand Sable Dunes, which rise about 275 feet above the lake, and the Au Sable Light station of 1874. A section of the long-distance North Country Trail follows the clifftop for the full length of the lakeshore.
Did you know? Around 1850 developers planned a tourist resort named Grand Island City beside the cliffs, near the site of present-day Munising.
How this list is ranked
Places are chosen for how they look, not for how famous they are: each one has its own description and a photograph credited to its author. The order is a single world ranking that weighs the beauty of the place in curated photography together with how widely it is documented — the number of language editions of its encyclopedia article and how often that article is read in a year. The list is rebuilt as places are added, so the order and the counts on this page are always current.
Questions people ask
- What are the most spectacular cliffs in the United States?
- On our list, Nā Pali Coast ranks first, followed by Glacier Point and Waterpocket Fold.
- Why are the Pictured Rocks colourful?
- Groundwater seeping through the sandstone carries dissolved minerals and leaves streaks on the cliff face: iron gives red and orange, copper blue and green, manganese brown and black, and limonite white.
- How high are the Nā Pali cliffs?
- The Nā Pali Coast rises to about 1,200 m (4,000 ft) above the ocean along a stretch of roughly 27 km on the northwest shore of Kauai.
- How many cliffs are on this list in the United States?
- The list covers 6 cliffs.