Most visits to Asheville, North Carolina wouldn’t be complete without touring the Biltmore Estate. This estate is massive and a highlight is touring its over the top mansion. In this post, I’ll cover everything you need to know about planning your trip, plus give you my best tips for visiting the Biltmore Estate.
About the Biltmore Estate
This massive project originally begun in 1889, but the estate did not open for another 6 years. It wasn’t until 1895 when George Vanderbilt moved his family into the estate. For the next 35 years, the house only open to family and friends of the Vanderbilts. In 1935, the Biltmore Estate finally opened its doors to the public. Now days, as many as 1.4 million people tour the estate and grounds every year.
Buying Your Ticket
While it may be possible to buy your ticket at the entrance, you should book your ticket online as soon as you know when you’ll visit. Your ticket includes the timed entry for the house, but you can tour the grounds at any point on the day of your ticket.
When you go to purchase your ticket, you may get sticker shock. These tickets are not cheap. While the ticket prices will vary by day and by season, don’t expect to have a cheap visit to the Biltmore Estate. When my mom and I visited in October 2022, we paid $105 per person for our tickets—and yes, we got the basic tickets.
A basic ticket includes entrance into the main house and grounds, the included audio guide, parking, and wine tasting at the Antler Hill Winery (although wine tasting requires an additional reservation). So the good news is, most of what you want to see and do will be included. On my visit, the only additional thing we purchased was ice cream at the creamery (no regrets!).
Tickets are nonrefundable and nontransferable. However, I found that staff was willing to bend this rule in certain circumstances (such as replanning your entire East Coast road trip to because of a hurricane), but I would not count on it. Only book once you are sure of the date of your visit. But do book in advance as tickets can and do sell out.
Getting to the Biltmore Estate
To have the best experience, you’ll want a car, especially if you plan to drive the grounds or visit Antler Hill Village. The property is 8000 acres so while you can walk to some places, you won’t get everywhere.
The Grounds
The grounds of the Biltmore Estate are massive. As mentioned earlier, the entire estate is approximately 8000 acres, so it’s not possible to see it all. Most visitors limit their visit to the main house, the gardens located near the main house, and the Antler Hill Village. Just visiting these three areas can take several hours. During our visit, we spent about five and a half hours on property visiting just these three areas, so that’s what these Biltmore Estate tips will focus on.
Biltmore Estate – Touring the Main House
You’ll only be allowed to enter the house at the time on your ticket reservation, regardless of when you enter the property. So make sure you give yourself plenty of time to get here. If you have a reservation in the afternoon, it’s even more important that you get here early since you’ll likely have to park further away and take a shuttle to the main house.
The Main House is huge and while you’ll certainly see a lot, you won’t see everything on your tour. The main level is the most over the top in my opinion. That makes sense because this is where the owners would entertain guests. You’ll walk through the main entrance, the library, the dining room, and so much more. Each room is filled with incredible art and detail, so take your time.
Eventually, you’ll head upstairs will tour some of the bedrooms. While not as over the top as the main level, they are still exquisitely decorated, even if they are sometimes on the verge of gaudy.
The tour continues into to the lower level. You’ll see areas that the family used, including the bowling alley and indoor swimming pool (that can no longer be filled because it leaks). However you’ll also see the kitchen and laundry areas, as well as the living quarters where the staff would sleep and live.
Your ticket includes an audio guide which provides context to all of the rooms, art, and decor you are looking at. While it was clear some people didn’t really care for it and just wanted to look around, one of my biggest tips for visiting the Biltmore Estate is to take advantage of the audio guide.
The Gardens
Just off of the main house is the entrance to the beautifully kept gardens. There are numerous walking paths and depending on where you go, it can get easy to get turned around. That’s ok because the area is beautiful. Some areas are filled with other people, but I didn’t find it hard to escape the bigger crowds and find places that you can have all to yourself (or with only a small number of people). To really escape from the crowds, continue on some of the walking paths further back in the gardens. It seemed most tourists didn’t go past the greenhouses.
Food and Drink
There are several restaurants on property, but I can’t speak to most of them because I only ate one thing at Biltmore Estate. The only place I ate at was the creamery because I had to try their homemade ice cream. My mom and I split an ice cream sundae. The ice cream was great, but splitting it is a really good idea because the sundae was pretty big.
Shopping
You’ll find several opportunities for shopping. Just off the main house, there’s a few shops selling all kinds of souvenirs. But if you want some more shopping, head to the Antler Hill Village where you’ll find much more than just Biltmore Estate souvenirs. Yes, there’s souvenirs, but there’s also clothes, wines, home decor, and more.
Wine Tasting
Wine tasting is included in your ticket, but in order to have the best experience you should make reservations in advance. It may be possible to do the tasting without a reservation, but you may be stuck waiting around until there are spots available (this is what happened to my brother and his girlfriend on their visit). I didn’t do the wine tasting on my visit, so I can’t speak to it.
However, one of the best Biltmore Estate tips is to make your reservation in advance if you plan to do wine tasting.
Biltmore Museum
In the Antler Hill Village, there is a museum that I do recommend visiting if you want to learn more about the Vanderbilt Family. It doesn’t take long to go through, but it gives more information beyond what you get in the audio guide tour through the main house.
Sleeping On Property
While it’s perfectly easy to just stay in Asheville during your visit, there are also hotels on property. You can find more information on the Biltmore website.
Biltmore at Christmas
It’s said that the Biltmore Estate at Christmas is spectacular. I was here in October, so I can’t truly speak to it. However, if you want a peak at what Christmas at the Biltmore Estate may look like, plan your visit in early October. A few Christmas decorations had already started going up. We heard that it takes the staff six full weeks to get everything decorated for Christmas. Based on the few Christmas decorations we saw on our visit, it’s easy to see why. Plus it really makes you wonder what the mansion looks like at Christmas.
How Much Time Do You Need?
You could easily spend an entire day at the Biltmore Estate. My visit lasted about five and a half hours. We arrived about an hour before our ticket time to take some photos from the outside. Then we toured the interior of the home, walked through the gardens, sampled the ice cream, and visited Antler Hill Village. This was the perfect amount of time to see everything we wanted, but to not feel rushed.
Final Thoughts
The Biltmore Estate is essential to any visit to Asheville, North Carolina. And with these tips, visiting the Biltmore Estate will be a great experience.
Continue Your Adventure
More Over the Top Mansions: If the highlight of your visit is the mansion itself, consider a visit to the mansions of Newport, Rhode Island.
South Carolina: Continue your adventure to South Carolina with it’s popular historic city of Charleston. Or visit Congaree National Park.
Virginia: We stopped in Asheville after our visit to Virginia which included time at Shenandoah National Park and Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello.
Itineraries: Asheville, North Carolina and the Biltmore Estate was just one stop on my road trip from Washington DC to Savannah, GA.