Jersey City Skyline Views: Best Spots to See Manhattan

From the lookouts in New Jersey you'll get the best views of Manhattan you can imagine, those movie skylines! It's genuinely worth crossing the Hudson River, especially once the lights of the skyscrapers of New York come on.

So which lookouts have the best view of New York from New Jersey?

In my view there are 6 best New York lookouts in New Jersey, best because they're the easiest to reach from Manhattan. Keep reading to get to know them and find out how to get there.

Here are the lookouts in New Jersey with views of New York, listed south to north:

1. Liberty State Park in Jersey City

Liberty State Park is one of the most spectacular Manhattan lookouts, since it sits in Jersey City directly across from the southern tip of Manhattan, so the views of One World Trade Center, the tallest building in New York, are flawless.

Imagine how awful it was for the people living here on the day of the attack on the Twin Towers. They had a front-row seat.

This Jersey City park is known for several reasons:

🚢 🗽 The Liberty Landing Marina, the New Jersey ferry terminal for visiting the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, is here.

The Statue Cruises terminal dock, the official ferry that takes you to the Statue of Liberty, is already a terrific New York lookout in itself. You'll be just yards from the southern tip of Manhattan, and it's also one of the best spots to see Ellis Island.

🚶‍♂️🚶‍♀️You can walk the Liberty Walk, a long waterfront promenade along the Hudson River with the Manhattan skyline as your backdrop.

🏙️ Don't miss the Empty Sky Memorial, a monument honoring the local victims who lost their lives in the attack on the Twin Towers.

The memorial walls, engraved with the victims' names, point toward Ground Zero, marking the spot where the towers stood before 2001.

Reading the names of so many people whose lives were brutally cut short is a powerful experience, and at the same time, walking through that endless series of reflections is a beautiful way to remember them.

🌸 Liberty State Park has lovely green spaces. If you're traveling during spring in New York, it'll be full of cherry blossoms.

🚆 The Central Railroad of New Jersey Terminal is inside Liberty State Park. It was the station where immigrants arrived after clearing customs on Ellis Island and heading to other parts of the United States (two thirds of new arrivals).

This Jersey City railroad terminal, also known as Communipaw Station, operated from 1889 to 1976. Because of its role in the history of immigration to the United States, it was designated a National Historic Landmark. Even so, it's badly deteriorated and underused.

Outside the station there are a couple of old railcars and locomotives on display, all of it with views of New York behind them.

🔬 The park is home to the Liberty Science Center, with plenty of activities perfect for kids visiting New York. The highlight is the Jennifer Chalsty Planetarium, the largest in the United States!

How to get to Liberty State Park from Manhattan

There are several ways to connect Liberty State Park in Jersey City with the World Trade Center in Manhattan:

⛴️ The fastest option is the Liberty Landing Ferry from Brookfield Place Terminal at the World Trade Center, getting off at the Liberty Island Marina stop. It's a 15-minute ride that costs $10 each way.

🚶🏻‍♀️ Another option is to take the PATH train from the World Trade Center to the Grove Street station in Jersey City. From there it's a walk of a little over half an hour to the New York lookout at Liberty State Park.

🚋 You can also ride the PATH to Exchange Place station in Jersey City and from there take an NJ Transit Light Rail to the Liberty State Park stop. This still involves about a 20-minute walk, but you'll be cutting through the park.

That's what I did, and I loved it because it doubled as a tour of Jersey City 😀.

2. The J. Owen Grundy Park lookout

If you're short on time, one of the easiest and quickest New York lookouts in New Jersey to reach is J. Owen Grundy Park in Jersey City.

J. Owen Grundy Park has a waterfront promenade, benches, a couple of cafes and food carts. It's a great place to wait for night to fall over Manhattan and watch the city lights come on.

In this park you'll also find a 9/11 memorial, the Jersey City 9-11 Memorial. Once again it's moving to realize that locals here watched the attack on the Twin Towers from the front row.

How to get to the J. Owen Grundy Park lookout from Manhattan

Just take the PATH train toward Newark at the World Trade Center and get off at the very next stop: Exchange Place. A few steps from the PATH station you'll find this park along the Hudson River with incredible views of the WTC.

To get back to Manhattan, the easiest thing is to take the PATH back to the World Trade Center

3. The Manhattan lookout at Hamilton Park

The Manhattan lookout at Hamilton Park in Jersey City has those postcard views of Manhattan you're surely after.

From there you'll see the iconic skyscrapers of Midtown Manhattan up front, including the Empire State, One Vanderbilt (home to Summit, Manhattan's newest observatory) and the towers of Hudson Yards, Midtown's newest neighborhood.

How to get to Hamilton Park from Manhattan

Once again, the PATH train from the WTC is the simplest route. Board the PATH toward Hoboken and get off at Newport Station. From there it's about a 15-minute walk to the lookout (read up on how to plan trips on NYC public transit).

4. New Jersey lookouts in Hoboken

In Hoboken, the other New Jersey city across from Manhattan, there are several excellent lookouts.

So which is the best lookout in Hoboken, New Jersey? It's a tough call, because the truth is there are many lookouts in Hoboken all along its waterfront promenade beside the Hudson River: the Hudson River Waterfront.

Along the Hudson River Waterfront there are several piers and small parks with views of different parts of Manhattan. Here are the most important ones, listed south to north:

Pier A

This pier is a beautiful park just steps from Hoboken's PATH station, on Sinatra Drive (yes! this is Frank Sinatra's hometown).

Hoboken's Pier A faces Greenwich Village, but from this angle you also get great views of the Empire State Building.

Pier C

A little north of Pier A, along the same Hoboken waterfront, you'll reach Pier C, another fantastic spot to take in the New York skyline.

From here you can see the Whitney Museum, the floating park Little Island and the skyscrapers of Hudson Yards, where the huge Edge observation deck stands out, one of the newer New York observation decks worth visiting.

Castle Point Lookout

Keep walking north and you'll reach the Castle Point Lookout, which sits on the campus of the Stevens Institute of Technology. It's a public area, at the highest point in Hoboken and directly across from Chelsea.

Best observation decks in New York

If you've made it this far, you clearly love photographing New York, a city so photogenic you never run out of angles.

This guide to New York's lookouts and observation decks will help. There I go through the details of every one of the skyscraper observatories in New York and other places to look at Manhattan from outside Manhattan 😜.

If you're in a hurry, here are the links with all the details for visiting New York's most popular observatories:

🌃 Empire State observation deck, the classic NYC lookout. Did you know it was going to be Manhattan's zeppelin terminal? (Ever watch Fringe? They didn't invent the zeppelin thing, it was actually planned!)

🌆 Top of the Rock observation deck, the Rockefeller Center observatory, bigger and set right in the middle of all the Midtown skyscrapers.

🌃 One World Observatory, the observation deck of the tallest building in New York, built where the Twin Towers once stood.

🌆 The Edge at Hudson Yards, one of the newer New York observation decks and the highest open-air one.

🌃 Summit at One Vanderbilt, the newest and most high-tech observatory in Manhattan, and the one everyone is talking about.

One last tip: bring a portable charger for your phone! You'll be amazed how fast the battery drains with all the spectacular photos and videos you'll take from the Manhattan viewpoints in New Jersey.