This museum was a great family experience. We mostly went for the Children's Museum but ended up spending a lot of time walking through the rest of the museum. All the exhibits were really well done, but the highlight was all the exhibits featuring Indigenous perspectives, history, and culture. Our kids (7 and 8) loved it too. Highly recommend.

A pretty good museum for history/anthropology buffs. Don't miss nice views back across the river to Parliament Hill from the museum grounds. Admission does not include parking; there is a separate fee for parking (even though the museum has its own dedicated lot). One can park on the streets just north of the museum, but be warned the Ville de Gatineau police department has a STRONG reputation (according to staff at a couple hotels in Ottawa) for issuing parking tickets to cars with plates from Ontario or the U.S. (i.e., not Quebec), even when parked legally. It may be safer to park in the museum lot.

Our family of four spent the Canada Day long weekend in Ottawa and we visited the Canadian Children’s Museum on Sunday, June 30. The museum was celebrating their 35th anniversary and ticket prices were set to 1989 prices, so we got a great deal! Our ticket time was at 10 am and they allow you to enter within an hour from your allotted ticket time. So we were able to enter between 10-11 am. This is the coolest children’s museum. They provide the kids with a family passport which guides them to visit all of the various countries and places that are exhibited. Each exhibit are miniature homes, buildings, vehicles that you can find in countries around the world. For example, there was a traditional Japanese home with a Japanese garden. Children and adults can walk in, take pictures, learn some information about it. There were also activities within the exhibits such as making origami, making a paper marionette doll, playing chess. Admission includes access to the Museum of History, which has exhibits on the 1st, 3rd and 4th floors - the Children’s Museum is on the 2nd floor. We only made it to the 1st floor which included Native Canadian artifacts and totem poles. This exhibit was breathtaking. The totem poles are beautiful and majestic. We didn’t want to leave! We had lunch at the My Bistro cafe which was on the first floor. The food was delicious and we sat outside on the patio which had a beautiful view of the Ottawa River and downtown Ottawa. Overall, I would highly recommend visiting this museum. Our children (ages 11 and 8) enjoyed it very much. We were staying at a hotel in downtown Ottawa and it was only a 5 minute drive to the museum in Gatineau. There is also a water taxi that takes you from downtown Ottawa to Gatineau which we only learned about after, otherwise we definitely would have taken it!

Bus #15 ($3 senior rate, coins needed, no change given) has a stop right at the entrance which was so convenient to use. Coat check is free with personnel in attendance. Cafe has several stations like grilled food ($12 for perioges), soup stations ($7-8 for a cup), cold sandwiches and salads location ($10), drinks and sweets. Tickets were readily available at the door in early May so no need to buy ahead of time, online. The museum has 3 different levels each presenting an important aspect of Canadian history, chronologically. The main floor - entrance level - has an area for special presentations. Its title in early May, " Early Royals in Europe" was misleading for me as the display wasn't about Western royalty but about highly esteemed people from Eastern Europe (Romania and Bulgaria) and Grecian areas whose jewellery (very good workmanship of gold), weapons, and pottery had been found in their graves. The main floor also offers films in a theater which we didn't leave time for and a display area of interest to children. The displays at ground level focus on BC's Pacific Coast natives (old totem poles, fronts of housing, many many carved and painted old masks, modern carvings and jewellery including some by Bill Ried). Level 2 displays focus on Early and Colonial Canada. Level 3 displays focus on Modern Canada. There is plenty of staff circulating the levels should one want information on the location of a display on a certain issue in Canadian history. It would be difficult to devote just 1 hour per level - at least for me. We spent all day at this modern, informative museum - one of THE attractions to visit in Ottawa. All displays were interestingly presented and briefly explained with numerous bilingual nformation boards and the expected labelling. The lower Level with its focus on BC's Pacific Coast natives occupied our interest for the longest time with its magnificent display of tall old totem poles erected in front of this native housing which were built by the various native tribes represented in the display. However, the display doesn't show how the natives used the interior space of their housing. This space is given to shelving with displays of native skills in carving masks of various sizes - from small to spectacular. In front of the housing entrances, besides the totem poles, was a display of a potlatch platform, a rack for drying fish (the small oolichan fish), and a rock pool. The employee at this display was a good source of information about these exterior displays, especially about the one native house that had a most unusual exterior. Level 1 also had a room set aside to show a collection of Canadian stamps from Victorian to present times which was easy to just stroll through. Levels 2 and 3 showcased political issues in Canadian history. Probably I found Level 2 the most interesting and time consuming with its focus on Early and Colonial Canada. The issues for Modern Canada included topics like the FLQ crisis (see P. Trudeau giving his famous "watch me speech), Canada's Constituion and Meech Lake Accord, design of the Canadian Flag, Residential Schools and their long lasting effects on the pupils (videos of interviews of now elderly native women) with some social/cultural displays as well (Justin Blieber gets a mention, for example). We thought our time well spent at this museum.

Came a few years ago when thus was known as the civilization museum, quite a few changes since then. Some really good exhibits but no rhyme or reason to how you move around so you find yourself unable to follow the timeline. Staff very knowledgeable and helpful. Don't use the second cup Cafe though, so expensive for pretty awful fare.

It doesn't really feel like a museum - it is a walking tour through several floors of subtle and not-so-subtle indoctrination.

An excellent museum. The exhibits are very well done, and interesting. I would recommend this museum to anyone who has interest in Canadian history.

Finally I have a half day free , so stopped by the Canadian Museum of History to learn , and seen the heritage of Canada and history of First people , relocated here in 1989 ,over 810,000 sq feet , just a crossed the Parliament Building and must visit , lot of wonderful Totems Poles and variety First national pictures and story , also on the third flour is the history of World War one and two , and the Stamps section is on the lower flours , just amazing building ! must visit these magnificent museum , give yourself lot of time , coffee shop on site and clean washroom too !

Great museum. A little pricy (honestly this should be free for Canadian citizens IMO), a little hard / confusing to navigate and and they closed really early, so we never got a chance to see everything we wanted to. Despite all that, it's a great museum and every Canadian should visit it if in the area to learn more about our history.

Although we had to pay a premium to buy it online at Tripadvisor.ca, the tickets worked right at the exhibit counter and we didn’t have to wait in line at box office. In addition, the website for the Canadian Children’s Museum is running like it’s from the 1980s with Transfer Control Protocol/Internetwork Protocol (TCP/IP). It rendered so much we had to look at additional options to get the tickets. Great spot for a few hours of fun with a couple of toddlers!

I was a member of this museum back in 2009-2011, and those were the glory days of the museum. I absolutely loved the interactive Canada Hall, with large scale whaling boats, Ukranian store fronts, the Wildcat lounge, and more. However, when the name change from Civilization to History happened, this hall was renovated. Pros: I really like the emphasis on Indigenous history and marginalized peoples in Canada's history. Cons: The Interactive components have been removed with the exception of one church. It's now a boring museum, words on the wall to read and that's it. It used to be an experience, and now it's a book. I'm disappointed. The vibrancy is gone, the heart is gone. It's a hollow place that's really boring now and not captivating. The children's museum is still good, but most of the props and supplies were put away due to COVID. The lower level Indigenous People's Hall remains beautiful and wonderful and I encourage a visit for these two areas.

I enjoyed The Museum of History in Ottawa more than the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto because it focused solely on Canada and wasn’t as overwhelming. My favorite exhibits were the totem poles and house fronts of the First Peoples of the Northwest Coast in the Grand Hall. The museum houses the world’s largest collection of totem poles. I also liked the Canadian stamp collection (yes, postage stamps). I thought the use of stamps was a clever way to chronicle the history of Canada. If you want to learn about Canadian history, check out this museum.

Basically this is a nice museum targeted at foreign visitors to Canada or for children who are just learning about Canada’s history. But as a “national” museum - which to me demands something more sophisticated and in-depth - this museum fails miserably. I was particularly disappointed in the upper floor which supposedly tells the story of modern Canada. This is basically a meandering corridor of bits and pieces of Canadian memorabilia on display - with few connections between the tableaux. Major omissions make one wonder who decided to display what and why. Just two: Where are mention of the Prime Ministers during this period, including the first woman Prime Minister, Kim Campbell. There is mention of the Nobel Prize to Lester Pearson, but no mention of a Nobel Prize for Literature for Alice Munro. Other glaring omissions abound as you wander the narrow corridor. Canada’s modern history is equally rich to that displayed on the lower floors, and it deserves a much better treatment. For a relatively modern museum the entire display seems dated and tired. With all the empty space and huge corridors in the museum, surely staff can be much more creative in displaying Canada’s modern history.

We walked across the Alexandra Bridge into Gatineau (Hull) and spent five hours at this museum, until our brains were overloaded. It is so well laid-out, doesn't sugar-coat the things that happened here to immigrants and First Nations, and should be seen by anyone going to Ottawa. There are some interactive displays which are fun, and truly imaginative set-ups.

This was previously a really good museum, however, the decision to change the upper level was a terrible one. The children's museum is excellent (please don't change it) and the bottom level is fine. But the top level use to be so much more interesting. Now it is a bunch of boring, non-interactive exhibits that show absolutely no imagination or creativity. So disappointing.