By Michael Lanza
At precisely 8 a.m. Mountain Time on Jan. 7, many thousands of Americans logged into recreation.gov/permits/4675342 hoping to reserve a backcountry permit for backpacking sometime this year in Grand Teton National Park. That enormous virtual crowd included me and probably dozens of my blog’s readers, many of whom I’ve heard from. For many, perhaps most, the experience was confusing, frustrating, and unsuccessful.
They saw backcountry camping availability for dates throughout the summer backpacking season disappear within anywhere from five to two minutes (which is exactly what I saw). Some succeeded in selecting nightly camps on specific dates to create an itinerary, only to watch the page freeze when they clicked to book and purchase their reservation—and they subsequently received a message indicating that their itinerary was no longer available.
By that point, just a few minutes after the reservations page opened, many or probably most users saw no more backcountry camping availability for building a multi-day Teton Crest Trail itinerary on any summer dates this year.
And here’s the thing: It doesn’t have to be that way. In fact, other large and popular national parks have recreation.gov permit pages that function much more smoothly. Those parks employ methods in their reservation systems, like lotteries, that clearly help eliminate the chaos seen every January when Grand Teton National Park (GTNP) opens reservations.
To provide a little background: In recent years, many large national parks with vast areas of wilderness moved their backcountry permit reservation systems over to recreation.gov. That move has replaced internal national park reservation systems that were often clunky and frustrating for countless users.
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I’m deeply familiar with current and past permit reservation systems in our national parks. I have personally reserved scores of backcountry permits over three decades working as a professional backpacker, including the 10 years I spent as a field editor with Backpacker magazine and even longer running this blog.
From what I’ve seen in many parks, the switch to recreation.gov has been a resounding success, easing what can be an inherently difficult process for users—as well as making it more equitable and speeding up both the reservation procedure itself and the confirmation of permits. Under past permit reservation systems, it could take several weeks for some parks to notify applicants whether they had been issued a permit reservation—and even into this decade, at least one major national park required permit applications to be faxed in. (To anyone born in this century, a fax machine is… well, never mind, it’s not important.)
Now, for many parks using recreation.gov, that takes anywhere from several days to just minutes. As much as anything, these permit reservation systems in recreation.gov have mostly become more transparent, clear, and consistent, greatly reducing the stress of trying to use a system that doesn’t operate efficiently and keeps you waiting for weeks to learn the results.
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That’s the good news.
The bad news is that, while GTNP also moved its permit reservations over to recreation.gov a few years ago, it has not adopted some of the most effective improvements to the process of reserving a backcountry permit that other parks employ.
And it’s frankly difficult to understand why Grand Teton does not emulate any of those existing, working examples of a well-functioning permit reservation system.
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Frustrated Users
Since Jan. 7 of this year (2026), I have heard from many readers of this blog who’ve purchased either my e-books to trips in Grand Teton (and other national parks) or my Custom Trip Planning service to get my personalized help planning their trips (including navigating the permit-reservation process in many parks), all of them sharing their experience with GTNP’s recreation.gov page.
Few of those experiences were positive.
Susannah Clark, of Melrose, Mass., attempted to reserve a permit for five nights in camping zones along the Teton Crest Trail in September, logically figuring she would see less demand for permits than in August. It “was a complete disaster,” she wrote to me. She observed that because everyone who wants to reserve a permit sees the page to view camping availability at exactly the same instant, many are undoubtedly trying to figure out how to navigate it while availability is rapidly disappearing.
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And it appears that, as one would expect, huge numbers of users select the exact same camping zones for the exact same dates. They might then believe they have completed an itinerary, but upon clicking the Book Now button, only a small number can receive confirmation of that specific itinerary; the rest receive a message that their itinerary is no longer available.
Clark was not able to reserve a permit at all.
“Holy smokes, is this system distressing!” Clark wrote. “People who are not comfortable with computers, are unfamiliar with the system, are not available at those exact five minutes, are never going to get an advance permit to hike the Teton Crest Trail; and if you don’t live nearby (I live on the East Coast), just jetting out and hoping for a walk-in permit is a risky investment.”
Doug Bagley, of Salt Lake City, also had a Teton Crest Trail itinerary built that was suddenly “not available” when he clicked the Book Now button. He started over repeatedly with other camping zone options and dates from early July to late September and had them in his cart but kept receiving a “not available” message. He wrote to me: “I put in a lot of time to familiarize with three different four-night backpacking itineraries. I used your guide, which was awesome. I read every thread about the online process.
“I had no chance,” Bagley wrote. “Way too many moving parts even though I thought I understood the process. I have applied for and gotten backcountry permits in Yosemite. I would rather go into a lottery like that than compete for them (in this way).”
Dennis Gawlik, of Bainbridge Island, Wash., who used my Custom Trip Planning and managed to reserve a permit on Jan. 7 for part of the Teton Crest Trail, hopes to modify it walk-in when he arrives at the park—and his dates are late September, when he realizes new snow could force him to either cancel his trip or alter his itinerary. He described to me a GTNP permit reservation experience that was “fast and hectic.”
As with other people, Gawlik attempted numerous dates and camping zone options but saw availability repeatedly disappear, destroying his various itineraries. “Yes, 8:05 a.m. was when things went really south—all booked.”
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Five minutes after GTNP opened reservations, it had become impossible to reserve a Teton Crest Trail permit.
Brothers Richard Serpe, of Cream Ridge, N.J., and Ed Serpe of Cambridge, Mass., both repeat users of my Custom Trip Planning, were among a group of people attempting to reserve a permit in January 2025—hoping that at least one of them would succeed.
They told me: “During the first 60 to 120 seconds (after reservations opened), we were each able to get one or two of our desired camps but failed to get everything we needed. Pretty much after the 120-second mark there was no going back, everything was booked solid at the camps on the desirable itinerary for the dates we were looking for.”
But while the rest of the group was attempting to reserve a standard permit for up to six people, Richard tried for a group permit for seven—and succeeded. “Honestly? It was almost anticlimactic. I got it with no trouble at all,” he wrote to me.
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Full disclosure: I was able to build a three-night Teton Crest Trail itinerary on Jan. 7 and lock it in after clicking Book Now, but I did not complete the purchase because the early September dates I chose conflicted with other plans I have; I mainly wanted to see how the system was functioning (and I immediately canceled my chosen itinerary). But I’m also much more familiar with recreation.gov and GTNP’s reservations page and camping zones than most people. And I also found virtually everything booked up for the entire summer season by 8:05 a.m.
“You should not have to be a professional permit seeker to be able to hike the national parks,” Susannah Clark wrote to me. “I really like the Grand Canyon system (on recreation.gov). It’s a little more cumbersome” because Grand Canyon National Park, like some other parks, uses an early-access lottery (more on that below), “but it is so much easier and relaxed, and you are less likely to have a heart attack from the stress of getting a permit,” Clark added.
(If you’ve had a recent experience trying to reserve a backcountry permit in Grand Teton National Park or other parks on recreation.gov, however well or poorly it went, please share it in the comments section at the bottom of this story.)
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How Grand Teton Compares to Other National Parks
Many large and popular parks, like Grand Teton, receive far greater demand for permits than they have backcountry camping availability every year. That, of course, creates an unavoidable, competitive situation: Many people will fail to obtain a permit simply due to demand.
However, GTNP’s permit system is such an outlier in how it’s organized that it seems to compound the difficulty of reserving a permit—all while there are examples of national park permit systems that are set up to eliminate or at least minimize chaos.
To understand the issue better, it’s helpful to compare GTNP’s permit reservation system with those of other large, wilderness-based parks that are very popular with backpackers:
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- In Yosemite, wilderness permit reservations are issued based on trailhead quotas, with 60 percent of permit reservations available through a weekly rolling lottery at recreation.gov/permits/445859. You can enter the lottery anytime during any weeklong period and you will find out two days after that lottery ends whether you got a permit reservation; if not, you have time to enter the following week’s rolling lottery for a specific window of dates. The remaining 40 percent of permits are made available at recreation.gov/permits/445859 seven days in advance of a trip start date.
- Since the beginning of 2024, Grand Canyon has issued about 80 percent of backcountry permits through a monthly, two-week-long, early-access lottery at recreation.gov/permits/4675337, and everyone who enters a lottery, no matter when, will have an equal chance of being selected. The lottery awards up to 750 applicants a date and time between the 4th and 17th of the following month when they can attempt to reserve a backcountry permit before reservations open to the general public; and the park expects that most of those 750 people will get a permit. The park issues about 20 percent of backcountry permits walk-in.
- Also in 2024, Glacier started conducting two early-access backcountry permit lotteries at recreation.gov/permits/4675321, on March 1 for large groups of nine to 12 people and on March 15 for standard groups of one to eight people, and all applicants during these 24-hour lottery periods have an equal chance of being selected. Standard group lottery winners will get an email on March 17 with a date and time between March 21 and April 30 when they can attempt to make one permit reservation, competing against a small group of other lottery winners, before reservations open to the general public. Glacier makes 70 percent of backcountry campsites available for reservations and 30 percent of campsites for walk-in permits no more than one day in advance.
- Mount Rainier issues permits for two-thirds of backcountry campsites through an early-access lottery held from Feb. 10 through March 3 for preferential time slots to reserve a permit at recreation.gov/permits/4675317 for trips from May 1 through Oct. 11. Lottery winners are awarded a date and time on or after March 21 to make a permit reservation competing against a limited number of other applicants, giving them much better chances of getting a permit for the Wonderland Trail and popular climbing routes. The remaining one-third of backcountry permit availability is issued walk-in.
- Yellowstone also conducts an early-access lottery from March 1-20 for backcountry permit reservations at recreation.gov/permits/4675323 for trips between May 15 through Oct. 31. Lottery winners will receive a date and time between April 1-24 when they can reserve a permit competing against a limited number of other lottery winners, providing the best chance of getting a permit for a popular backpacking trip like Bechler Canyon. About 75 percent of backcountry campsites can be reserved and the remaining 25 percent are available for walk-up permits issued no more than two days in advance of a trip.
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In sharp contrast to those parks, in Grand Teton, for trips between May 1 and Oct. 31, permit reservations opened for everyone at recreation.gov/permits/4675342 starting at 8 a.m. Mountain Time on Jan. 7, 2026. (The date sometimes varies slightly each year.) Everyone seeking a permit flooding that page simultaneously has resulted in the system getting overwhelmed and popular backcountry camping zones, like those along the Teton Crest Trail, getting booked up for the entire season within minutes.
Plus, unlike other parks that open a majority of their backcountry permit availability to reservations (the examples above range from 60 to 80 percent), GTNP allows just one-third of available permits to be reserved, leaving two-thirds available first-come, for walk-in backpackers, no more than one day before a trip begins.
By not making a larger pool of backcountry permits available to reserve in advance—and not spreading out the demand over a longer period of time, or conducting an early-access or other type of lottery, GTNP effectively amplifies the chaos of trying to reserve a permit.
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Why is It Like This When It Could Be Better?
From what I’ve seen, it has been standard practice for many years within the National Park Service (NPS) to allow individual parks to manage backcountry permit reservations as they see fit. There are reasons for enabling local control: Most parks have trails and trailheads that see much higher demand than other areas—examples would include the John Muir Trail through Yosemite, Grand Canyon’s corridor trails (South and North Kaibab and Bright Angel), and Glacier’s Northern Loop. Parks may issue permits based on trailhead quotas or on backcountry camping quotas. Their peak seasons for backpacking may vary a bit or significantly from one another.
Still, having backpacked multiple times in all of the parks mentioned in this story as well as many others, I cannot imagine a logical reason why Grand Teton National Park could not adopt strategies employed successfully in other, similarly large and popular parks—strategies that have made the process of reserving a backcountry permit smoother, faster, and more equitable. Those parks have accomplished that despite the inherent challenges of seeing more demand than there is backcountry camping availability throughout their peak season.
It seems to me that by allowing individual parks to determine how their own backcountry/wilderness permit reservation system functions, the NPS essentially allows each park to repeat the mistakes of other parks. The argument that allowing each park to experiment with different ways of issuing permits makes sense only when all of them are adopting recreation.gov at the same time—or at least in the same year—and none have any real-world experience with it yet.
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But that’s not the case now. Some parks have been using recreation.gov for at least a few years—and some popular parks that see huge demand for wilderness permits, like Yosemite, use a system that works remarkably well. This begs the question: If examples exist of successful systems, why stick with a system that real-world experience has demonstrated is flawed?
I reached out to the National Park Service’s Office of Communications via email with my questions for this story, hoping they could educate me or at least make sense of GTNP’s permit system. They told me that GTNP staff estimate about 38,000 to 42,000 backcountry “user nights” each year, with roughly one-third coming from advance reservations.
Beyond that statistic, the NPS communications staff response, frankly, did not address the specific critiques and questions I had submitted regarding GTNP’s permit system. In fact, their response was so vague that it could be describing permit reservation systems in any national park.
Here is part of their response, lightly edited, but it captures the overall content of their response:
“The high-demand and limited opportunity nature of permits often make them difficult to obtain. Park staff evaluate the effectiveness of their permit operation and adjust over time to improve the customer experience. Demand for permits varies from park to park and by specific areas within each park. In some cases, local managers will receive thousands of permit applications for just a few dozen opportunities. Popularity and high demand for the permit is a primary reason a park will decide to utilize a lottery system to allocate permit reservations. People looking for a very specific hike (such as particular sites on the Crest Trail) may not always find those exact options available.”
The Tetons are Beloved by Many Backpackers
The Tetons are one of my very favorite mountain ranges. I’ve taken probably at least two dozen trips there over the years since my first one more than 30 years ago: backpacking, dayhiking, climbing several peaks, backcountry skiing—even paddling a canoe on String and Leigh lakes. I’ve seen black bears, several moose, certainly marmots and pikas, even a huge bull elk right outside my tent late one night (on my very first Teton Crest Trail hike).
I will return again to backpack; and at some point, with some amount of luck, I’ll reserve yet another Grand Teton National Park backcountry permit.
I’ve been thinking about writing this story for a few years but had previously held off in the hopes that GTNP would change for the better “this year.” That has not happened yet and the flaws in their permit system only grow more glaring every year.
I’m sure that GTNP managers are trying to create the safest and most enjoyable backcountry experience for all visitors. I fully support the need for a permit system to place controls and limits on the numbers of people camping in the backcountry of America’s major wilderness parks—without such a system, these places would quickly get trashed, trails and campsites overused and heavily eroded, fragile ecosystems damaged and wildlife constantly harassed and stressed by too many humans invading their spaces. I respect all the good, committed NPS employees who protect our parks, who are motivated largely by a love for them.
I’m merely saying that there are obvious, better ways for Grand Teton National Park to run their system for reserving backcountry permits. I hope they will make changes to improve their system at least before the date that they open reservations for 2027.
See all stories about backpacking in Grand Teton National Park at the Big Outside.
I totally agree that the system is a mess. We tried to use the system to book campsites at Arches the first week of April. My wife and I had both practiced using the system, staked out potential campsite options, and were on separate computers to try to get a reservation. The very second we hit 8 AM we tried reserving only to find that they were already booked. Over the next 60 seconds we tried every available campsite with no luck.
Finally, a few minutes later one became available again (I suspect someone else who had two people trying to make reservations released one) so we got extremely lucky and got one site. By two minutes after the reservation system opened everything was long gone. In contrast, booking campsites for our hike across the Grand Canyon was, as you mentioned, much easier (although it did take 3 years to get an October reservation), while hiking the Olympic coast was blissfully easy.
Arches is another good example, Mike, thanks for spotlighting that.
During the maddening 5-minute rec.gov scramble for a Grand Teton NP reservation last year, I was surprisingly able to secure two (separate) backcountry campsites on the 29-mile loop through Cascade and Paintbrush Canyons.
But two years ago it was a humiliating experience. Accustomed to Yosemite/Sierra Nevada’s system of trailhead-centric quota-based permits, I happily but unwittingly nabbed a numbered reservation for Leigh Lake as I had seen on the map that the Paintbrush trailhead started at Leigh Lake. Well…. when I showed up for the permit and offhandedly remarked “it’s going to be a tough 29-mile hike with 5500’ up + down” you can image my shock at the ranger’s response: “Sir, you reserved a camping site on Leigh Lake that requires a boat to get to it!” Say what!?
I hadn’t realized that at rec.gov’s Grand Teton’s reservation page you have to reserve the –>exact campsite(s)<– that you’re planning to stay at, and that they're hiding/listed under the tab “Mountain Camping Zones.” It would be helpful if the rec.gov website gave a heads up about the need to request the exact backcountry campsites under "Mountain Camping Zones" for Grand-Teton-naive newbies like I me.
Thanks for sharing that, Robert. I agree, some of the other parks and wilderness areas have a rec.gov page that’s easier to navigate and use. In fact, your observations and those from other people make a cogent argument for having more consistency between permit reservation systems across all parks.
In 2025 I wrestled with the permit system, going through different versions of the trip I wanted until somehow scraping together a two-night trip (out of the four nights I wanted). Flew in planning on reserving the last two nights the day before. Got in line at about 4 a.m. and put together a four-night trip but only barely. It was an unforgettable trip with my two teenage kids, but did it have to be that stressful? The e-book was very helpful, I will say.
Thanks for sharing the details of your experience with the GTNP permit system, Joseph. Yours is a common story, from what I’ve seen and heard. It is sometimes feasible to add nights to an itinerary walk-in, but that obviously poses the risk of being disappointed after you’ve committed time and expense to get there.
I’m glad that my Teton Crest Trail e-book was helpful to you.
I completely agree with this. Last year I was able to get permits for North Fork Cascade and upper Paintbrush in September. This was right when the permits became available. I missed out on Death Canyon Shelf, which is the other one I wanted but it didn’t affect my trip at all. I was surprised that I was able to even get that! I did a lot of research beforehand of what I wanted so that probably helped. I also think too much is reserved for walk-up permits. It should at least be 50 percent or even more (available for reservations) like some of the other parks. I also don’t like the general layout of rec.gov at all. I find it very slow and complicated to use. It can be very frustrating.
Thanks for your observations about your experience with GTNP’s permit system, Brevin. I suspect that many people agree with your thoughts on it.
I had a similar experience in reserving a permit for a backpacking trip in Olympic NP in 2023, but it ended up working out okay. I had to login on a specific day at a specific time and put the itinerary together, which I did successfully. I put it in my cart and went to pay and it said the itinerary was no longer available, because one of the campsites I selected was full. This was despite the fact that I had successfully selected that campsite only seconds before. I quickly modified the itinerary, replacing that site with my second choice, and I was able to reserve the permit. It was stressful.
That same year, I reserved a permit to dayhike Mount St. Helens, and it worked the same way. Fortunately, demand for that permit apparently isn’t as high, so I was able to reserve the permit when I logged in. Out of curiosity, I checked later in the day and there were still permits available. They do sell out, but not in the first few minutes.
I am thinking of going out to Grand Teton in August or September, but I didn’t try to obtain a permit because I don’t know for sure if/when we are going to go. I know (from reading your blog) that a lot of backcountry permits are held back for walk-ins. Do you think it’s possible to walk in and get a permit for a 4-day, 3-night itinerary on the TCT?
Hi Brian, thanks for sharing your experience; it seems very common. To answer your question, because about two-thirds of backcountry camping zone space is held for walk-in permits, it’s disproportionately easier to get a walk-in permit than to reserve one in advance: Far more people are trying to make a reservation with far less a percentage of permits available to reserve. For walk-in permits, I’m sure demand is greatest in August and it tapers off through September. So the number of people lining up at the visitor center before it opens to be near the front of the line for the backcountry desk will taper into September. The earlier you get there, long before the visitor center opens, the better your chances of getting what you want. But I think you’d still be able to get a permit for a nice hike, even if it’s not for the exact itinerary you’d like.
Thank you, Michael!
You bet, Brian. Good luck.
Recreation.gov is a solid mess. Cancellations on many permits don’t even go back into a pool. The website frequently errors out when paying. I’ve accidently had 2 permits in my cart and paid for both because of the payment error. It’s time to take the contract away from Booz Allen Hamilton Inc.
Thanks for sharing your experience, Brian.