Are the more than 750 miles of wilderness trails in Yosemite calling you? For many, nothing refreshes the soul like striding off into the mountains for a few days of uninterrupted nature with everything you need tucked neatly into a pack on your back.
In order to make sure your solitude isn’t overrun with hordes of other backpackers, Yosemite National Park has a wilderness permit reservation system that limits how many people can enter the wilderness from a given trailhead on a given day.
You need a wilderness permit to spend the night in Yosemite all year round. However, reservations are only available from May through October.
During this peak season 60% of the daily trailhead quotas for the wilderness permits are available in advance, while the remaining 40% become available on a walk-up basis starting the day before the intended start date.
During this peak season 60% of the daily trailhead quotas for the wilderness permits are available in advance, while the remaining 40% become available on a walk-up basis starting the day before the intended start date.
During the off-season, roughly November through April, you can get a wilderness permit without reservations or fees at self-registration or permit issuing stations.
Just to be clear – the wilderness permits are for backpacking into the Yosemite wilderness only. You do not need a wilderness permit to go for a day-hike. Also, there are other reservation systems if you:
- Want to camp in a campground in or near Yosemite.
- Want to hike Half Dome in a day.
- Are a rock climber and plan to climb a big wall over the course of several days.
How to Get a Wilderness Permit in Yosemite
There are three different time periods to apply for a Yosemite wilderness permit.
- Preseason: Enter the lottery system on recreation.gov up to 24 weeks before your intended trip date. 60% of each trailhead quota is available through the lottery. Each week, you can apply for start dates Saturday through Friday during the newly open period. You can apply for multiple backup options simultaneously to give yourself the best chance of having some itinerary for the dates you’re interested in. NPS has the reservation windows mapped out here so you don’t have to count backward 24 weeks.
- Week Ahead: Starting 7 days before the backpacking trip start date, the remaining 40% of the permits (and any leftover permits from the preseason reservation period) become available on recreation.gov at 7 am PDT. Popular trailheads will fill quickly, so you’ll want to be online precisely at 7 am if you’re interested in one of those trailheads. You can continue to make online reservations until 3 days before the trip start date.
- Start Date: Typically there are very few, if any, permits available same-day. However, any permits not reserved 3 days ahead of the trip, become available at wilderness centers on the start date. Note: The 2023 day-of system is slightly different than the past when you would get your permit to start the following day. This is due to the limited availability of backpacker campgrounds this year since Tuolumne Meadows Campground is closed.
In each case, the trip leader will still need to pick up your permit in person the day before your reservation or before 10 am the day of. This gives wilderness staff a chance to ensure that you know how to help take care of Yosemite’s wilderness environment and answer any questions you might have. If you don’t pick the permit up before 10 am on the day of your trip, your reservation will be canceled with no refund.
Keep reading for more details!
Entering the Lottery System for Wilderness Permits (60% of Permits Released)
Good news for those of you who have tried to get a campground reservation by hovering over your computer/phone at exactly 7am! There is a lottery system for the first 60% of the wilderness permits, so you can relax, sleep in, and stop worrying about whether someone else has a faster trigger finger (or internet connection) than you do.
The wilderness permit lottery for each week (Sunday through Saturday) starts 24 weeks ahead of time.
Here’s an example timeline: Let’s say you want to start a backpacking trip on June 15. Calculate back by 24 weeks, or simply use the timeline reference table created by the National Park Service to see exactly when you need to apply in December. The lottery window opens Sunday at 12:01 am PT and stays open until the following Saturday at 11:59 pm PT each week. Submit your application anytime during that period. You’ll find out if your application was accepted or not on the Monday after the window closes. Keep your eyes open for this notification! You have until Thursday of that week to accept and pay. Otherwise, your spots will be released with all the others the next morning (Friday) at 9:00 am PT for first-come, first-served online reservations also on recreation.gov.
It costs $10/ group application to enter the lottery, plus $5/person once the permit is secured. These costs are non-refundable and non-transferable.
How to Increase Your Chances of Getting a Wilderness Permit in the Lottery
Submit exactly one application.
There are no bonus points for making the nice people at the Yosemite Conservancy sort through multiple permit applications.
You can only submit one application per weekly lottery window. Also, while there is no limit on the number of confirmed reservations you can have each year, you are allowed to have only six active (i.e. future) reservations at any given time, so be deliberate and plan ahead.
- Each application can have up to 3 alternate trip leaders. The trip leader has to pick up the permit in person, so it’s good to have some options in case the trip leader can’t make the trip as planned. Once you pay and accept your permit these trip leaders and alternates are locked in.
- Your name can only be in the weekly application once. If you apply multiple times as the permit-holder or an alternate in one week, all of your lottery applications will be canceled without refund.
Plan up to 8 possible itineraries per application.
You can list up to eight trip options on each application. These can include any combination of dates (or valid date ranges), trailheads, and group sizes.
- So, let’s say that in your perfect world, you have a group of 6 people, and your first choice is the Young Lakes via Glen Aulin trailhead, which only has 6 permits, and you want to leave on a Friday. Great! Put that as option 1. Then in your later options, choose some backup itineraries with trailheads that have higher quotas, a less popular trail-head, a mid-week departure date, or a smaller group size.
- In addition to trip leader information, entry and exit trailheads and dates, you also need to indicate your intended camp locations for each night. This helps to make sure that you are requesting the right permit for your trip, and manage the Yosemite wilderness better.
Watch your email inbox
Once your application is accepted (you’ll be notified on a Monday), you have until Thursday to accept and pay. If you don’t respond in time, your application will be canceled without a refund.
- Yosemite Conservancy staff still reviews all permits to ensure compliance with wilderness regulations. If they notice something is strange, they may try to contact you to fix errors in your application. If they can’t reach you, your reservation may be canceled with no refunds.
Online Reservations After the Lottery is Over
Once the initial flurry over the most popular trailheads is over, you can still reserve any of the remaining permits from this first round online. Just go to recreation.gov.
This reservation option ends seven (7) days before the trip start date.
Week-Ahead Wilderness Permits (40% of Permits Released)
The remaining 40% of the trailhead permits are released at 7 am Pacific Time seven days before your trip start date. This is your standard first-come first served online reservation system, and the popular trailheads will disappear quickly. If you are interested in one of these trailheads, be sure to be online and ready to make your reservation promptly at 7 am.
Online reservation closes 3 days before the trip start date.
Walk-Up Day-Of Permits
Typically there are very few, if any, wilderness permits that are still available after then online reservation process ends. However, any that are left become available in-person at a wilderness center in Yosemite the morning of the start date.
Note: this is different than the normal day-ahead system. In this case, the wilderness permit is only available the morning that you plan to start your trip. This is because of the limited amount of space in backpacker campgrounds while the Tuolumne Meadows Campground is closed.
The fee for walk-up permits is also $10/group plus an additional $5/person during the reservation season.
Wilderness Permit Issuing Stations
Whether you’re planning to enter the lottery, reserve post-lottery, or get a walk-up permit, you need to know where you can go to get your permits in person prior to your trip. There are a few convenient options depending on what is most convenient for you:
- The Yosemite Valley Wilderness Center – between the post office and the Ansel Adams Gallery. (In the off-season you can also get a permit at the Yosemite Valley Visitor’s Center, on the other side of The Ansel Adams Gallery.)
- The Tuolumne Meadows Wilderness Center – east of the campground and Lembert Dome parking area.
- Big Oak Flat Information Station – just inside the entrance gate on Highway 120 West.
- The Wawona Visitor Center at Hill’s Studio – next to Wawona Hotel on Highway 41 in Wawona.
Hetch Hetchy Entrance Station – The entrance station only issues permits until 5pm even if the road is open later. There is no access to Hetch Hetchy trailheads when the road is closed.
Badger Pass Ranger Station – This station is open during the winter months – approximately late December through March. Permits are issued at the ranger station, or A-Frame 200 feet to the right of the main lodge.
For more information on what times each of these stations are open, see the NPS permit station page.
What about Reserving Wilderness Permits that Include Half Dome, Donohue Pass, JMT and etc?
In the past there have been separate quota systems for backpackers that wanted to include a Half Dome summit as part of their itinerary, or wanted to exit the park on the John Muir Trail (JMT) over Donohue Pass.
To simplify the process and close loopholes, those “extra” quotas have been eliminated. Instead, there are now just a limited number of trailheads which are eligible for those destinations.
For example, if you want to exit the park over Donohue Pass, you must now start at either the Lyell Canyon trailhead, or begin at Happy Isles and go past Little Yosemite Valley.
Similarly, if you want to include a Half Dome summit in your itinerary, there are only 7 eligible trailheads. These are the trailheads that are most commonly used when people want to summit Half Dome.
- Happy Isles to Little Yosemite Valley (LYV)
- Glacier Point to LYV
- Happy Isles past LYV (this is also Donohue Pass eligible)
- Sunrise Lakes
- Cathedral Lakes
- Rafferty Creek to Vogelsang
- Mono Meadow
If you are awarded a wilderness permit for one of the eligible trailheads, all you need to do is request the addition when you pick up your permits. The Half Dome permit addition costs an additional $10/person. You’ll pay when you pick up the permits and make the request.
Still have more questions about Yosemite’s Wilderness Permit System?
Be sure to check out the official National Park Service Page on wilderness permits.