NYC’s best audio walking tours.
On the VoiceMap app.
At TellBetter Tours, we tell better stories.
The best stuff.
Dramatic stories, brought to life with actors, music and sound effects. Feel like you were actually there when it happened!
On your schedule.
Start when you want. Move at your speed, not in a group. Pause when you like. We entertain, even as you walk.
So worth it.
Guides charge $25-300 a head. Even amateur “free” guides expect a $20 tip. Our tours are always perfect and just $14.99.
Social distance.
No herd of strangers. No leaning in to hear a tour guide over traffic noise. Just you, your best buds and your earbuds.
Find TellBetter tours on the VoiceMap app:
Our tours:
NEW! “Slumming It” in Five Points, Chinatown and the Bowery.
During the Gilded Age, wealthy swells would leave their uptown mansions and "go slumming" in downtown saloons, dance halls, brothels and opium dens, complete with guide and police escort. We retrace their steps, finding the spots where tattooing, tap dancing, blackface minstrel acts and the term "Jim Crow" originated. Home of the Tong Wars (bloody), the Doctor's Riot (macabre), the Straw Hat Riots (ridiculous), and the Dead Rabbits Riot (seen in Scorcese's Gangs of New York). It might not be NYC's most scenic neighborhood, but it’s surely our most colorful tour. Find a complete tour description at VoiceMap. $14.99
Grand Central Terminal. Hidden secrets and stories.
One of the top ten most visited tourist spots on earth, yet most visitors simply gawk for a few minutes, then leave, unaware of the hidden secrets, scandals and exciting stories. Location for countless famous movies and real-life dramas: Kidnappings and ransoms. Hippie riots and terrorist bombs. Plus a deep dive into the fascinating Vanderbilt clan who built it. Find a complete tour description at VoiceMap. $14.99
The Gilded Age Mansions of Millionaire’s Row
Every mansion has it's story, and we bring them to life in dramatic fashion. With outrageous fortune comes outrageous behavior: extraordinary stories of love and loss, epic battles over status, and deliciously petty squabbles over the rules that govern society. This lavishly produced tour puts you in the ballrooms, carriages and clubs of the Gilded Age elite, including the characters whose lives inspired the HBO series. Find a complete tour description at VoiceMap. $14.99
The High Line. How a park in the air got off the ground.
Everyone wanted the High Line demolished. Yet somehow, two local guys from the neighborhood saw what no one else did: an opportunity to turn elevated train tracks into a park unlike any other, a hidden oasis high above the streets. And against all odds, they made it happen, creating one of New York City's most popular attractions, and helping turn an industrial district into a hotbed of art galleries and daring modern architecture. Find a complete tour description at VoiceMap. $14.99
Times Square: dazzling Broadway to bawdy 42nd St
NEW! Known as the “Crossroads of the World,” it’s the most visited spot on the planet. Why wander aimlessly when you can discover the things others miss: Hidden works of art. Locations where movie scenes were shot. Spots where a famous kiss and a legendary murder happened. You'll learn the fascinating backstories and meet the larger-than-life characters. Find a complete description at VoiceMap. $14.99
Secrets of Bryant Park and the New York Public Library
NEW! In all of NYC you won't find so many fascinating stories packed into a single city block. Tales of spies, opium traders, revolutionaries, tragic deaths and broken hearts. See where Ripley’s found its believe-it-or-not facts and learn how Bryant park magically transformed from a dangerous “needle park” to “the most successful urban space in the world.” Find a complete description at VoiceMap. $14.99
Broadway Theater: hits, flops, divas, drama, stars, and stories
Broadway’s most fascinating, thrilling, uplifting, heartbreaking stories, distilled into one tour. You’ll learn the pivotal moments in the evolution the Broadway musical as you visit historic theaters and hidden alleys to hear hidden stories come alive, from Showboat to A Chorus Line to Hamilton and everything in between. Find a complete description at VoiceMap. $14.99
Central Park: Bethesda Terrace, Strawberry Fields and more
Our most popular tour. Not just a walk in the park, a stroll through time, with exciting stories, fascinating personalities and hidden secrets. Relive the great zoo escape. Decode the Bethesda Terrace. Spot the hidden witch. Learn why Balto is the wrong dog. And more. Tales of love, loss, treachery and tragedy at every turn. Find a complete description of our New York Central Park walking tour, and a sample track, at VoiceMap. $14.99
SoHo: from Hell’s Hundred Acres to NYC’s Cradle of Art
The Cast Iron Capital, once known as Hell’s Hundred Acres, where activists and artists stopped the wrecking ball. Find the well where a woman's body was dumped, America's first true-crime scandal. Experience the Draft Riots. Hear how Yoko Ono asked an audience to cut off her clothes and Houdini made his first escape, from a boring job. Available on the VoiceMap app. Find a description and hear a sample. $14.99
Woodlawn Cemetery: Gilded Age Wonders of Architecture and Art
Just minutes by #4 subway from Manhattan you'll discover one of NYC’s best kept secrets, Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx. This National Historic Landmark is a wonderland of Gilded Age architectural gems, Tiffany stained glass windows, and rip-roaring stories of the rich and famous: Robber Barons, Ziegfeld Girls, and jazz era greats. Available on the VoiceMap app. Read a complete description and hear a sample. $14.99
The Battery: NYC Origins from Bowling Green Park to Stone Street
Where New York City was born. How the world’s most valuable island was bought for a handful of trinkets. The night George Washington cried. The biggest explosion you never heard of. The real life inspiration of Elsa from Frozen. Find a complete description of our Battery Park self-guided walking tour, and a sample track, at VoiceMap. $14.99.
Charging Bull, Wall Street and the Canyon of Heroes
Lower Broadway’s Canyon of Heroes, Trinity Church and cemetery, the birth of the skyscraper, world’s largest gold repository, Federal Hall, Charging Bull & Fearless Girl, The Wall Street bombing. Trump’s other tower. Edison’s big reveal. Find a complete description of our Wall Street and Broadway’s Canyon of Heroes walking tour, and a sample track, at VoiceMap. $14.99
Rockefeller Center: A guide to its History, Art and Architecture
Six blocks of Art Deco architecture, sculpture, art and history, build by the richest family in history with incredible speed in the depths of the Great Depression. From the fabulous Rockettes of Radio City Music Hall to the hidden communist symbolism, we tell you the riveting stories behind it all and point out the cool details that everyone else misses. 1-1/2 hours of fascinating stuff. Find a complete description and sample on the VoiceMap app $14.99.
Boho Greenwich Village and Washington Square's Gilded Age
Fascinating stories and people from the Village’s three creative periods: Gilded Age, Bohemian Era, and the Radical 60’s. Experience the drama of the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire. Gasp at the gripping love-triangle murder of architect Stanford White by the original “It Girl”Evelyn Nesbit’s husband. Find a complete description at VoiceMap. $14.99
Pride and Folk, Greenwich Village from the Stonewall Inn to MacDougal Street.
Meet the provocateurs who made Greenwich Village a hotbed of cultural change. Including the girl who turned Dylan on to politics, then broke his heart. Feel like you’re there on the night of the Stonewall Rebellion. Walk in the footsteps of Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, from Sheridan Square to MacDougal Street. Find a complete description at VoiceMap. $14.99
Flappers, Beats, Freaks and Punks: A West Village Walking Tour to the Jane Hotel
Hidden charms and back alleys. One awesome story after another of the quirky artists, authors and activists who made this “America’s Left Bank.” From Edna St. Vincent Millay, to John & Yoko, to Sid Vicious, to the real-life Auntie Mame. Plus an unhealthy dose of the Beat poets. Take a walk on the weird side. Find a complete description at VoiceMap. $14.99
Listen to a sample.
Hear the dramatic story-behind-the-story of Merchant Mariners Memorial on the edge of Battery Park. Most visitors just walk right by, unaware of its remarkable history. Put on your headphones and check it out!
People say the nicest things.
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"Mind-bogglingly fantastic. Fascinating stories told in the best imaginable way. Seriously."
Eckart — SoHo Tour
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"I dig these tours so much. As always with TellBetter, I learned(!) and laughed and loved the High Line Tour."
Gibby — The High Line tour
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"Just absolutely wonderful. I took this tour by myself, and by the end, I had a tear in my eye. They don’t miss a thing. These tours are so well done. Thank you for making them!"
Happy Customer — Grand Central Terminal tour
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"I love these tours. I’ve now done three of them (2 just this weekend). They teach so much about the city that I’d otherwise never know. For anyone who wants to learn the stories of NYC but throws up in your mouth at the idea of walking around with a big guided group, or getting on a tour bus — this is an amazing way to do your own thing."
Anonymous Explorer — Greenwich Village: Stonewall and Gaslight
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"Brilliant, funny. I laughed a lot. My son is studying history at Oxford University and said he loved this tour! Pitched just right - you don’t need to know history to be entranced by the feuding Astors and Vanderbilts. Our jaws dropped at some of the surprises including very up-to-date badly behaved members of the elite. Highly recommend!
Janet — Gilded Age tour
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Fascinating history of NY’s Central Park! Great storytelling will enrich everyone’s enjoyment of the park! Thanks for a wonderful afternoon! "I’ll definitely look for more TellBetter Tours!"
Listener — Central Park tour
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