Make sure you leave some gaps in your 2026 bucket list, because the adventure experts at Lonely Planet have revealed the 25 best places to visit next year — and two are in the U.S.
Lonely Planet says that Maine feels like a “renewed state” and that its largest city, Portland, has become the spot in New England to open a new restaurant, “particularly for chefs who have big-city training and cred, yet fear the price of entry in Boston and New York.”
The result? “A James Beard award or nomination on every downtown corner,” says Lonely Planet.
The guide also urges vacationers to explore “seaside towns teetering on stilts and offshore emerald islands, including those in Maine’s crown jewel: Acadia National Park.”
The guide concludes: “Maine has it all, from a great culinary scene to art and architecture, to a beautiful coastline.”
Theodore Roosevelt National Park, meanwhile, is where visitors will find “roaming bison, prairie dog colonies so large that they might as well be metropolises, painted canyons, bizarre rock formations, and dark-sky gazing.”
It adds: “These are the North Dakota Badlands sights that enraptured the 26th US President Theodore Roosevelt… and inspired him to buy a cattle ranch in 1883, then to retreat there following the deaths of his mother and wife.”
Today, the park honors the president by protecting 70,000 acres of prairie.
The North American continent is also represented on the list by Mexico City — home to “world-class museums, cheap rideshares and cocktail bars” — and British Columbia, Canada, “a land of mossy forests, saw-toothed mountains, white water rivers and wildlife-rich ecosystems.”
Other hotspots for 2026 include Botswana, Africa; Sardinia, Italy; Tipperary, Ireland; and Phuket, Thailand.
The 25 best places to visit in 2026
- Peru, South America
- Jaffna, Sri Lanka
- Maine, USA
- Cádiz, Spain
- Réunion (Indian Ocean)
- Botswana, Africa
- Cartagena, Colombia
- Finland, Europe
- Tipperary, Ireland
- Mexico City, Mexico
- Quetzaltenango (Xela), Guatemala
- British Columbia, Canada
- Sardinia, Italy
- Liberdade, São Paulo (Brazil)
- Utrecht, Netherlands
- Barbados, Caribbean
- Jeju-Do (Jeju Island), South Korea
- North Island, New Zealand
- Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota, USA
- Quy Nhon, Vietnam
- Siem Reap, Cambodia
- Phuket, Thailand