The Cheapest Way to Spend a New York Summer
By Katie MacDougall
Recently, while commiserating over the uncertainty around internships: Would it be so bad if we didn’t land an internship for the summer? With so many unpaid and underpaid internships on the job market, affording the city can become a real concern. Is it even possible for an intern to spend a summer in New York without paying an arm and a leg?
The bad news is that New York City will likely remain exorbitantly expensive for the summer. The good news is that, between the overpriced rooftop drinks and concert tickets that cost as much as bail, there are plenty of free events that can show you the best of New York City in all five boroughs.
Get to Know NYC’s Museums and Galleries
If you’re trying to fill your days without draining your bank account, New York City’s museums are the first place to start. Manhattan’s Metropolitan Museum of Art is “pay what you wish” for New York State residents, thanks to its longstanding agreement with the city. There are “pay what you wish” museums in every borough: Uptown, the Bronx Museum of the Arts champions marginalized artists. The Queens Museum is home to a famous scale model of the city. In the Brooklyn Navy Yard, BLDG 92 outlines the borough’s industrialization. A short ferry ride over to Staten Island gets you to the Snug Harbor Cultural Center and Botanical Gardens.
Even better, a number of museums offer free admission on specific days of the week. The Whitney Museum of American Art is free from 5 to 10 p.m. on Fridays, and the second Sunday of every month. The Whitney Biennial free for Columbia students, is on display through August 23, 2026. This year’s biennial examines what it means to be “American,” featuring 56 artists from across the U.S. and countries shaped by U.S. military intervention. The Morgan Library hosts live jazz every Friday, between 5 to 8 p.m.—though advance reservations are encouraged. Across the river, the Noguchi Museum hosts Free First Fridays, and they are always free to Columbia students.
If you’d rather build your own art adventure, New York’s art galleries are some of the best places to see what artists are creating for free, before they end up in museums or Upper East Side homes. Chelsea galleries open on Thursday nights, often with free wine. Pace Gallery is currently hosting CHAIR SHOW through May 23, which playfully examines the roles that chairs have assumed in art.
You can explore art while making new friends at Arts in Bushwick’s meetup on the last Thursday of each month, featuring an art crawl of more than 40 local artists. There’s no better opportunity to engage with a more avant-garde art scene, and to meet fellow New Yorkers outside of school or professional circles.
Beyond museums and art galleries, a New York Public Library (NYPL) card is the key to a low-cost summer beyond free books and air-conditioning. You can make a CulturePass reservation for free access to places like the Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, and get free tickets to over 100 major cultural institutions in every NYC borough, which can easily fill entire weekends for free.
Parks, Performance, and Public Space
When the weather finally cooperates, the city’s public green spaces become its best and cheapest venues. There are more than 1,700 parks in NYC, each with ample summer programming.
Shakespeare in the Park, hosted by the Public Theater, offers free productions each summer. It’s one of the city’s most iconic experiences, and tickets go fast. To score a seat, you’ll either have to wait in line to pick up tickets starting at noon at the Delacorte (which often means getting in line at 8 a.m.), testing your luck with the lottery, or heading to one of the ticket distribution centers in other boroughs. If you’re in luck, you can see Romeo and Juliet through June 28, and The Winter’s Tale between July 25 and August 23.
Numerous parks and public spaces across the city, like Bryant Park and Hudson Yards, also host free outdoor movies. Last summer’s viral videos of crowds cramming into Bryant Park for movie night are a testament to how in-demand free events can be.
Meanwhile, the Department of Parks and Recreation hosts annual events as part of “Summer on the Hudson”, featuring free classes and guided tours along the river. In May alone, they offer 50 events ranging from Mat Pilates to Jazz in the Park.
Public pools at Central Park, pickleball courts in Riverside Park, and countless run clubs also offer free or low-cost ways to stay active or try a new activity without a gym membership. Whether you’re spending time in parks to see a concert, join a run club, or check out a jazz show, the city’s parks make it easy to spend time without spending all your money.
Don’t Just Watch Something, Do Something
In addition to culture and nature, New York offers plenty of opportunities to give back to the community.
The City Parks Foundation offers many community events and park cleanups across the city. These provide an opportunity to get outside and touch grass while making your local park a better place. You can also get involved with your neighborhood’s Mutual Aid chapter, where you can help distribute food and plug into a hyper-local network of New Yorkers looking out for one another. The Upper East Side Mutual Aid chapter—my local one—hosts a monthly social at neighborhood bars. It’s a great way to get to know my neighbors and rank my local bars.
Put simply, a “Hot Grad Summer” is possible, even on a limited internship budget—if any. It’s an opportunity to see more of the city’s best cost-effectively. Personally, I’m looking forward to checking out Summer on the Hudson’s Bird Walk and making the trek out to Staten Island for the Snug Harbor Cottage Row Curiosities. You can find more free events by subscribing to newsletters like City Happenings, on Instagram accounts like @nyc_forfree, or even through Partiful’s Free Events. At its core, whether you’re checking out an up-and-coming artist in one of the city’s myriad galleries, an established artist whose work is on display in a museum, or a show in the park, it’s a reminder that the best parts of the city don’t require a ticket. So regardless of whether you landed that internship, a New York summer can still be full—it just doesn’t have to be expensive.