Arkansas has at least 7 documented hot springs, all clustered in the town of Hot Springs around Bathhouse Row in Hot Springs National Park. 3 are free public thermal fountains and cascades, and 4 are paid historic bathhouses or spas. Buckstaff Bathhouse and Quapaw Baths & Spa are the two operating bathhouses on the row, drawing water from the same 47 springs that gave the town its name.
Every documented soak sits in Hot Springs, where the national park protects the thermal water piped to the historic bathhouses. Buckstaff Bathhouse and Quapaw Baths & Spa operate as working baths on Bathhouse Row, a short walk apart along Central Avenue.
The free thermal features sit steps away in the same downtown core. Hot Water Cascade and Dripping Spring (Hot) let visitors see and touch the 143-degree spring water the park channels through the hillside, with no fee and no hike.
Lodging with its own thermal access rounds out the row, including Arlington Resort Hotel & Spa and the restored Hotel Hale In-Room Thermal Soaking Tubs, both drawing on the same protected source.
Arkansas is unusual because its hot springs are urban, protected, and historic rather than wild. Hot Springs National Park is the oldest federally protected thermal site in the country, set aside in 1832, and the water reaches the surface near 143 degrees before the park cools and distributes it. Visitors soak in century-old marble-and-tile bathhouses or sip from free public fountains, a contrast to the backcountry pools that define most western states. All 7 documented sites are wheelchair-accessible and easy to reach on foot downtown.
Highlights are drawn from the hot springs documented in this directory. Others may exist beyond the Hot Springs National Park core.
Oldest operating bathhouse: Buckstaff Bathhouse has run continuously on Bathhouse Row since 1912, the longest-serving documented traditional bathhouse in our records, offering original-style thermal baths and packing in Hot Springs.
Restored row bathhouse: Quapaw Baths & Spa reopened the 1922 Spanish-revival building on Central Avenue as a modern spa, with four thermal pools at graduated temperatures in Hot Springs National Park.
Grand historic hotel: Arlington Resort Hotel & Spa anchors the north end of Bathhouse Row with in-house thermal baths and twin spa towers above downtown Hot Springs.
Free public cascade: Hot Water Cascade sends 143-degree spring water over a tufa hillside beside the Grand Promenade, free to view and touch with no hike required.
Family-friendly free fountain: Hill Wheatley Plaza Jug Fountain (Hot) lets visitors fill jugs with cooled thermal water downtown at no cost, a freely accessible thermal-water source in our records.
In-room thermal soak: Hotel Hale In-Room Thermal Soaking Tubs occupies a restored 1892 bathhouse inside the park, a rare lodging with thermal tubs in each guest room.
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