Key to the Zoo: Premium Insider Tours
Explore the Zoo like never before
Enhance your Zoo experience with a Premium Tour! These tours include their own exclusive offerings, including access to the Zoo while we are closed to the public, entering behind-the-scenes areas, private meet-and-greets with animals, or other unique experiences that you cannot get anywhere else. Throughout your tour, you will be personally guided by experience members of the Conservation Education staff. Each individual tour is uniquely built around the happenings of the Zoo that day. Choose your one-of-a-kind experience below!
Wake Up With Wildlife
Through this exclusive tour option, you can see the Zoo before we open to the public, while our animals are often more active. Each experience will be unique, as guided tours will change locations based on who is awake and what is happening around the Zoo. At the end of your tour, pick up a coffee and head out to see the rest of amazing animals! Each ticket includes Zoo admission, a 75-minute guided tour, and a voucher for a free non-alcoholic beverage at select food service locations. Tickets do not include parking fees.
Wake Up With Wildlife is offered during the warmer and sunnier seasons of the year. Check back for dates in Spring 2026!
Key To the Zoo: Behind The Scenes
In our most exclusive offering, you will spend three hours with a member of our Conservation Education team visiting several behind-the-scenes areas that are not typically available to the public. Each tour will be unique, but will include at least four experiences where you will get up and close and personal with our animals and get to learn about their individual personalities from the keepers who care for them. Your tour also includes a visit to the Solitude, a one-of-a-kind gift from our animals, parking, and regular Zoo admission for the day of your tour. On select dates, the tour will include a meet-and-greet with a few of our world-famous baby Galapagos tortoises. Please be sure to select those dates if you would like to meet them!
Ages 5+
Innovation and History at America’s First Zoo
Philadelphia Zoo is home to an impressive past and an even brighter future! On this tour, you’ll learn about some of the important ways we are using innovative strategies and techniques to help save wildlife, all while being immersed in the historic grounds and structures of America’s First Zoo. Each tour will be unique, but every tour will include a visit inside the historic Solitude building.
Available: This tour is only offered when we are closed to the public. Check back for additional dates in 2026!
Ages 5+