About the Museum

A living memorial to the Holocaust, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum inspires citizens and leaders worldwide to confront hatred, prevent genocide, and promote human dignity. Federal support guarantees the Museum’s permanent place on the National Mall, and its far-reaching educational programs and global impact are made possible by generous donors.

Located among our national monuments to freedom on the National Mall, the Museum provides a powerful lesson in the fragility of freedom, the myth of progress, and the need for vigilance in preserving democratic values. With unique power and authenticity, the Museum teaches millions of people each year about the dangers of unchecked hatred and the need to prevent genocide. And we encourage them to act, cultivating a sense of moral responsibility among our citizens so that they will respond to the monumental challenges that confront our world.

Today we face an alarming rise in Holocaust denial and antisemitism—even in the very lands where the Holocaust happened—as well as genocide and threats of genocide in other parts of the world. This is occurring just as we approach a time when Holocaust survivors and other eyewitnesses will no longer be alive.

Through our William Levine Family Institute for Holocaust Education, the Museum works closely with many key segments of society who will affect the future of our nation. By studying the choices made by individuals and institutions during the Holocaust, professionals from the fields of law enforcement, the judiciary, and the military, as well as diplomacy, medicine, education, and religion, gain fresh insight into their own responsibilities today.

In addition to our leadership training programs, the Museum sponsors onsite and traveling exhibitions, educational outreach for teachers and students, and Holocaust commemorations, including the nation’s annual observance of the Days of Remembrance in the US Capitol. Our Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies fosters the continued growth and vitality of the field of Holocaust studies. Our Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide works to educate, engage, and inspire the public to learn more about past genocides—such as those in Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur—and to consider what they can do to prevent these atrocities in the future. The Simon-Skjodt Center also works to galvanize policy makers both in the US and around the world to create the tools and structures needed to avert the next crisis.

Since its dedication in 1993, the Museum has welcomed more than 47 million visitors, including 100 heads of state and more than 11 million school-age children. Our Holocaust Encyclopedia, the world’s leading online authority on the Holocaust, is available in 19 languages and was visited in 2021 by more than 21 million people representing 238 countries and territories.