La Brea Tar Pits and Museum

Discover LA's live Ice Age excavation site.

Visit La Brea Tar Pits and Museum with Go City®

• Pay nothing upon arrival – simply scan your digital pass
• Access the museum and permanent exhibitions
• See into an observation pit and learn about the important job that the paleontologists
• Your pass also gives you access to many more attractions in LA, so don't forget to check them out too

Located in the historic Miracle Mile neighborhood of Los Angeles' Museum Row, this excavation site is recognized for having the largest and most diverse array of extinct Ice Age plants and animals in the world.

Inside the La Brea Tar Pits and Museum, you’ll watch the processes of paleontology unfold. Check out the glass-enclosed Fossil Lab where scientists and volunteers prepare fossils excavated from the site and you’ll get to see everything from saber-toothed cats, dire wolves, and mammoths.

La Brea Tar Pits highlights

Observation Pit – this exhibit first opened to the public in 1952 and inside you’ll get a glimpse of what a real La Brea fossil deposit looks like. Identify specimens from iconic Ice Age creatures like giant ground sloths, saber-toothed cats, dire wolves, and even a baby mastodon. 
Live Excavations - watch as our excavators dig through the asphalt and make discoveries every day in our two live excavation sites.
The Fossil Lab – get up close and see how paleontologists clean, study, and prepare the fossils for exhibiting.
Museum tour – this guided tour will take you around all the areas of this unique museum. You’ll get an insiders view of the Fossil Lab, Lake Pit, Observation Pit, and Project 23 and find out more about the amazing work the museum does.