Best Kennedy Space Center Day Tour from Orlando

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The center offers a variety of tours, all of which include a launch viewing area. But there are also more specialized trips for those who want to go even deeper into space exploration.

In this post, we'll outline the best tours from Orlando: what each includes and its relative cost so you can pick one according to your preference and budget.

The Signature Tour offers visitors a chance to go as close to the launch pad as NASA allows. Though the 8-acre pad is only about 20 feet from the tour path, NASA does not allow guests to stand on it.

Blue Origin, Virgin Galactic, and SpaceX have their pads outside of Kennedy Space Center, but this tour is considered the best (even though people have been arrested for walking on SpaceX's pad).

The tour starts with a bus ride from the visitor's center, where you'll get an orientation and discussion about the Space Center.

Then it's on to the first launch site, Launch Complex 39A (where rockets like Apollo 11 took off). You can even see a shuttle launch from this pad if you come during a launch window.

After this, you'll reach the second launch pad, Launch Complex 39B. You'll watch the rockets roll out and head back to the visitor's center.

The tour takes about three hours and runs on a limited schedule (only four or five days a week from mid-April through mid-September). The cost is $35 for adults, $30 for children (3-12), and military personnel. You can also buy a combination ticket to the Kennedy Space Center and the Shuttle Launch Experience.

The Apollo/Saturn V Center Tour is a more in-depth look at how NASA sent people to the Moon, including a trip to an actual lunar module. While the Kennedy Space Center does have its own Moon rock, this tour goes where others do not work for its rare artifacts, like a lunar module and an Apollo command module. The tour includes three bus trips (you'll see Launch Complex 39A twice) and lasts 3.