Everyone wants the best view, but best depends on what you are after: the close roar of the water, the wide postcard, or the bird’s eye. Here is where to stand for each, sorted by what it costs.
Free, and still excellent
- Table Rock, at the brink of Horseshoe Falls, is the most powerful free view. You are right where the river goes over.
- Queen Victoria Park gives you the broad, head-on shot of both the American and Horseshoe Falls, and it is the best free fireworks spot.
- The promenade by the Rainbow Bridge frames the American Falls with the gorge behind it.
Worth paying for
- Journey Behind the Falls trades the wide view for an intimate one, putting you on a deck beside the falling water.
- Niagara City Cruises is the close up. From the boat you look up at the crest from the basin below, inside the spray.
The high view
- The Skylon Tower observation deck lifts you 236 metres for the full aerial layout of both falls, the gorge and, on a clear day, the Toronto skyline far across the lake.
- The Niagara SkyWheel on Clifton Hill is lower and cheaper, with a slow, enclosed ride that is best after dark.
For photographers
Early morning gives soft light and thin crowds. The mist often catches a rainbow over the American Falls when the sun is behind you, roughly midday to early afternoon. For the illumination and fireworks, set up along the Queen Victoria Park railing at least twenty minutes early on weekends.
The honest pick
If you want one view to remember, it is not the highest one. It is the boat, from the water, looking up.
