Taking in the View from the Willis Tower Skydeck

If you grew up calling it the Sears Tower, so does most of Chicago. The name changed in 2009, when insurance broker Willis Group took space in the building and the naming rights came with the lease, and locals have spent the years since ignoring it. Sears itself moved out to the suburbs in the 1990s. It opened in 1973 as the tallest building in the world and held the title for nearly 25 years. These days it's the third-tallest in the Western Hemisphere, behind two towers in New York, but its deck is still the highest in the US.

Skydeck and The Ledge

Skydeck Chicago is on the 103rd floor, 1,353 feet above Wacker Drive. The elevator takes about a minute, and the visit includes a small museum about the city and the building. On a clear day you can see across the prairie and over Lake Michigan to Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin. On a windy one, you may feel the building move.

The reason people pay for this deck rather than the other one is The Ledge, the glass boxes that stick out about four feet from the side of the tower. They opened in 2009. You walk out, look down between your shoes, and see Wacker Drive 103 floors below. The laminated glass floor of one box cracked in 2014 with visitors standing on it, and again in 2019, and nobody was hurt either time. Every regular and expedited ticket includes The Ledge, and it's the part kids remember.

Most visits run 45 minutes to an hour, museum included.

The Catalog, the tower's new base

If you last visited before the pandemic, the bottom of the building will look different. Owner Blackstone spent about $500 million on a renovation designed by Gensler that finished in 2022. The old plaza on Jackson Boulevard and the boxy Wacker Drive entrance are gone, replaced by the Catalog, a six-story complex of restaurants, shops and a rooftop terrace. The name is a nod to the Sears mail-order catalog. It's a decent place to eat before or after your time slot, which beats wandering the Loop hungry at 8pm on a Sunday.

Tickets and lines

General admission starts at $32 for adults (12 and up) and $24 for kids 3 to 11, and kids under 3 go free. Tickets are sold for a date and a 30-minute entry window, and prices vary with the date and time. Expedited Entry starts at $55 and puts you in a priority line for the elevator. That's a lot for a shortcut, and the fact that it exists tells you how long the regular line can get on a summer weekend. If you only have one afternoon, think about it. Skydeck is also in Chicago CityPASS, which includes expedited entry.

Skydeck's own advice for shorter lines is early morning or around sunset. Sunset is the better view, since you get the city in daylight and then watch the lights come on.

Our attractions page weighs Skydeck against 360 Chicago, the deck in the old Hancock. The short version is that Skydeck wins for height and The Ledge, and 360 wins for the lake view and the bar.

Hours and getting there

Hours: Open every day of the year. Hours change by season, and in summer it stays open until 10pm. Last entry is 30 minutes before closing.

Where: Willis Tower is at 233 S. Wacker Dr., in the block bounded by Wacker, Jackson, Franklin and Adams. The Skydeck entrance is on Jackson Boulevard, on the south side of the building.

Getting there: The nearest L stop is Quincy, on the Brown, Orange, Pink and Purple Lines, a couple of blocks east. If you're coming in on Amtrak or Metra, Union Station is just across the river. Our Loop guide has what else is nearby.

Photo by thomas.merton