Mission

Opened in 1984, the Monterey Bay Aquarium's mission is to inspire conservation of the oceans. We know that bringing people face-to-face with living marine animals is a powerful way to move them to care about the oceans and ocean life. From the beginning, we planned our permanent exhibits as a walk through Monterey Bay's beautiful natural communities. In 1996, we almost doubled our exhibit space with the opening of the Outer Bay Wing, devoted to the open ocean and deep sea. The main feature is the Outer Bay Waters exhibit, the one-million-gallon tank containing tuna, sharks and sea turtles. The aquarium has an active research program. We have groups working on sea otter conservation and tuna conservation biology. About 1.8 million people visit us each year.