9 North Carolina Waterfalls Worth the Hike, Ranked by the Hikers Who’ve Made the Climb
North Carolina has more than 250 named waterfalls in Transylvania County alone.
The falls locals send visitors to don’t always match the postcard everybody already knows.
These are the waterfalls the state’s oldest hiking club has already vetted as worth the trail, ranked by the hikers who’ve made the climb.
1. Rainbow Falls
Rainbow Falls drops 150 feet into the Horsepasture River, and reaching it is the whole reason it tops this list.
Hikers on AllTrails rate the route 4.8 stars across nearly 9,800 reviews, the highest mark and the largest crowd of any hike-required waterfall in the mountains.
Reaching it means about 4 miles round trip through Gorges State Park and into Pisgah National Forest, rated strenuous, with wet rock and a hard climb back out.
Worth it.
Turtleback Falls sits just upstream, a smooth granite slide that looks like a reward after the climb.
It isn’t one anymore.
Why Rangers Now Warn Hikers Off Turtleback Falls
Turtleback Falls sits directly above Rainbow Falls on the Horsepasture River.
Gorges State Park rangers now warn hikers against swimming or sliding there at all.
The current above Turtleback has swept people downstream and over Rainbow Falls’ 150-foot drop, which has no survivable landing.
A Charleston man died trying to save his dog at Rainbow Falls on June 23, 2018, and a 16-year-old died at the same falls on July 4, eleven days later.
Multiple warning signs now line the trail between the parking area and Turtleback Falls.
2. Triple Falls
Triple Falls stacks three tiers inside DuPont State Recreational Forest, a 40-foot lower drop below two smaller ones that add up to about 125 feet, and hikers rank the trail to it just as high as Rainbow Falls.
Nearly 5,800 AllTrails reviews back the Triple Falls Trail’s 4.8-star rating, tied for the top score among every hike-required waterfall on this list.
The loop runs 2.6 miles, rated moderate, past Hooker Falls and High Falls along the way.
Triple Falls charges no permit and no entrance fee.
Free, every time.
Film crews used the middle tier as a backdrop for both The Last of the Mohicans and The Hunger Games, and locals still bring first-time visitors here before anywhere else in the forest.
3. Catawba Falls
Catawba Falls tumbles 205 feet down its lower cascade in Pisgah National Forest, just outside Old Fort.
The Catawba Falls Trail’s 4.7-star AllTrails rating comes from more than 7,300 reviews, the biggest crowd of any 4.7-star falls in the state.
The Forest Service rebuilt the trail in 2024 with 580 new stairs and a 60-foot observation tower, and the hike now runs as a 3.5-mile loop: An easy 2.2-mile round trip reaches the lower falls, then an intermediate climb continues on to the upper falls before looping back down the new Catawba Falls Ridge Trail.
McDowell County locals treat the upper falls as the payoff, not the lower cascade everyone photographs from the bridge.
Fewer hikers climb that far.
4. Crabtree Falls
Crabtree Falls drops 70 feet off the Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, about 45 miles north of Asheville.
Nearly 4,900 hikers have rated the Crabtree Falls Trail on AllTrails, keeping it at 4.7 stars with more traffic than any other falls on this list besides Catawba.
The loop covers 2.6 miles, rated moderate, through rhododendron thickets thick enough to block the view until the last turn.
Fall hunting season overlaps the best hiking weather here, so wear bright colors on an October trip.
Locals know that trick.
5. Linville Falls
Linville Falls drops a total of 150 feet in stages, the main plunge alone falling 90 feet into Linville Gorge.
More than 3,000 AllTrails reviews now back the Linville Falls Overlook Trail’s 4.7-star rating, enough to edge it ahead of Glen Falls and Mingo Falls on this list.
The route runs 2 miles round trip from the visitor center, rated moderate, past two named overlooks before the gorge opens up.
Burke County residents call this stretch the Grand Canyon of the East, and the overlooks explain why.
Every camera comes out.
6. Glen Falls
Glen Falls stacks three separate drops on its way down a gorge outside Highlands, the tallest of them dropping 70 feet.
Just over 3,000 AllTrails reviews put the Glen Falls Trail at 4.7 stars.
Getting there and back covers 2.8 miles, rated moderate to strenuous, with enough stone steps that Highlands locals call it a workout, not a walk.
Bring good shoes.
The third tier holds a swimming hole calmer than anything upstream.
Macon County families treat it as the reward for the climb down.
Every falls on this list carries its own trade-off between height, distance, and drive time, and the table below lets you sort by whichever detail you care about before you pack the car.
7. Mingo Falls
Mingo Falls climbs 120 feet on the Qualla Boundary, land held in trust for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians near the town of Cherokee.
The Mingo Falls Trail holds a 4.7-star AllTrails rating from more than 2,600 reviews, the smallest crowd among the 4.7-star falls on this list.
The trail itself is short, just 0.4 miles round trip, but it climbs 161 wooden steps straight up from the parking area.
No shortcut around them.
The Eastern Band calls the falls Big Bear Falls, and no permit is required to hike it.
8. Harper Creek Falls
Harper Creek Falls spills 50 feet across three sections in the Wilson Creek area, well outside the crowds that fill Linville Falls on a Saturday.
The Harper Creek Falls Trail keeps a 4.6-star AllTrails average despite pulling in barely 750 reviews, a fraction of the traffic the more famous falls on this list pull in.
About 3 miles of trail separate the parking area from the falls and back, rated moderate, along a route that crosses the creek more than once and loses cell service early.
Caldwell County hikers treat the light crowds as the whole point.
A paper map beats a dead phone on a route like this.
No signal out this far.
9. Graveyard Fields
Graveyard Fields holds two waterfalls off the Blue Ridge Parkway, and the short walk to the lower one isn’t what earns this spot on the list.
Its Upper Falls loop holds a 4.5-star AllTrails rating from more than 5,100 reviews, the lowest score here despite pulling in more traffic than half the falls ranked above it.
The full loop runs 3.3 miles, rated moderate, past the lower falls before climbing to the 40-foot upper drop.
Skip the loop and stop at the lower falls. The hike barely counts.
That’s the difference that counts.
Beyond the Top Nine
North Carolina’s most famous waterfalls didn’t make this list because reaching them barely counts as a hike.
The main overlook for Upper Whitewater Falls sits a short paved walk from the parking lot, even though the 411-foot drop below ranks as the tallest east of the Rockies.
Transylvania County alone holds more than 250 named waterfalls, and many of them, like Looking Glass Falls, sit close enough to the road that a driver never gets out of the car.
Those falls earn postcards.
They don’t earn a spot on a hiking club’s list.
How Locals Earn Their Patch
North Carolina’s hiking clubs turned this whole idea into a formal challenge years before any tourism website tried to rank waterfalls.
The Waterfall Challenge run by the Carolina Mountain Club, the oldest trail-maintaining club in the Southeast, asks hikers to visit 100 falls off its official list.
Membership is required.
Completion runs on the honor system, with no ranger checkpoint involved.
Finishers get a patch and a certificate, sometimes handed over in person at the club’s annual dinner.
Only a small number of hikers have finished the full 100 since the challenge began in 2008.
The Real Reason North Carolina’s Mountains Turn Blue in the Distance
A hiker on any of these waterfall trails eventually looks up and notices the ridgelines fading into blue in the distance, and many guess it’s just the sky or the altitude.
It took scientists more than a century to explain it.
The Real Reason North Carolina’s Mountains Turn Blue in the Distance
8 North Carolina Roadside Finds That Aren’t Automatically Finders Keepers
A waterfall trailhead isn’t the only place a North Carolina drive turns up something interesting on the way home.
Some of what turns up on the shoulder legally belongs to somebody else, no matter how empty the road looks.
8 North Carolina Roadside Finds That Aren’t Automatically Finders Keepers
