The most visited museum in the world is the Louvre

Paris/London/New York - The largest number of art lovers last year was attracted by the Louvre in Paris, which has once again topped the ranking of the most visited museums in the world. Nearly ten million people found their way to it, which is one million more than in 2011. London museums took the next three spots. This is evident from the order published by the specialist magazine Art Newspaper.
The magazine has been compiling a ranking of the most popular galleries since 2007, and during that time, the Louvre has never dropped from first place. However, last year was particularly successful for this institution: thanks to the newly opened wing showcasing Islamic art, it gained a full million visitors. No gallery in the top ten can compete with the ten million visitors to the Louvre's collections. The second place, New York's Metropolitan Museum, was visited by just over six million people.
The strongest five most popular galleries include three institutions from London - the British Museum, Tate Modern, and the National Gallery. Their attendance also increased last year, which their management attributes to the summer Olympics, which attracted hundreds of thousands of tourists to the British capital.
The ranking of the most visited exhibitions is surprising: none of the exhibitions in the top twenty took place in any of the five most popular museums. The highest number of visitors last year was recorded in Tokyo, Japan. The exhibition of Dutch masters at the local Metropolitan Museum of Art was attended by an average of 10,500 people daily. Crowds were attracted there by the famous Vermeer painting Girl with a Pearl Earring.

Ranking of the ten most visited museums exhibiting visual arts in 2012

ranking	museum	country	number of visitors
1.	Louvre, Paris	France	9,720,260
2.	Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York	USA	6,115,881
3.	British Museum, London	United Kingdom	5,575,946
4.	Tate Modern, London	United Kingdom	5,304,710
5.	National Gallery, London	United Kingdom	5,163,902
6.	Vatican Museums	Vatican	5,064,546
7.	National Palace Museum, Taipei	Taiwan	4,360,815
8.	National Gallery of Art, Washington	USA	4,200,000
9.	Centre Pompidou, Paris	France	3,800,000
10.	Musée d'Orsay, Paris	France	3,600,000