Best Summer Camp Finder Websites for Sleepaway Camps: 8 Tested and Compared

The short answer: 8 camp finders ranked

1. The Right Camp, 81/100. Best for describing your kid in plain words and getting a shortlist with 2027 prices, free and with no account.
2. ACA Find-A-Camp, 67/100. Best for breadth and detailed filters (special needs, religion, cost, dates); accredited camps, which pay fees, sort first.
3. Sleepawayz, 63/100. Best sleepaway-only directory, if you can live with paid "Featured" camps pinned on top.
4. American Summer Camps, 51/100. Best for current 2027 rates at a small set of premium Northeast camps.
5. MySummerCamps, 50/100. Best for browsing a big mixed directory by activity checkboxes.
6. ActivityHero, 42/100. Best for booking local day camps, not for sleepaway.
7. Best Overnight Camps, 40/100. Best for scanning long state-by-state lists.
8. Tips on Trips and Camps, 39/100. Best if you want to talk to a person and accept that camps pay the advisor.

What the numbers say

• 1 of 8 finders turned a plain sentence about a child into a shortlist on the spot. Four have filters only, one pairs filters with a contact form, one has no search at all, and one starts with a form or a call.
• 50 of 50 first-page results on MySummerCamps were paid "Featured" listings across five state searches, against 7 of 50 on Sleepawayz. ACA shows no ad labels but sorts accredited camps, which pay fees, first.
• 2017 is the median year printed in the dates of Best Overnight Camps listings that show a year, on pages headed "2027". 2 of its 1,028 camp profiles mention 2027.
• 3 of 3 camps in our freshness check matched their own websites' 2027 dates and prices on The Right Camp; Sleepawayz showed none of them, and MySummerCamps showed 2020 and 2026.
• $1,744 a week is the median cheapest 2027 price across 188 camps listed on The Right Camp; Northeast camps run $1,957, Southern camps $785.
• 2,341 overnight camps on ACA Find-A-Camp, more than five times The Right Camp's 428: if you need breadth, start there.

Can a camp finder really match from a description?

Filters are not useless. ACA's are excellent. But they break the moment you stack them: on ACA, adding a $1,500 maximum cost to "overnight, age 11, English riding, theater" took us from 21 camps to one, a camp for children with Type 1 diabetes. ACA prices whole sessions, so a weekly budget can't be entered as such. A description-based matcher trades a smaller catalog for doing that weighing for you, and telling you what doesn't fit.

Comparison table

Scores out of 100, built from five criteria we could check first-hand. The weights and how each score was set are under Method.

All cells checked 10 November 2026. Sources are linked in each review below. Camp counts are each site's own claim, except where we say "our count".

How each finder scored, criterion by criterion

Our test: one child, eight finders

This is the core of the comparison, and it is data nobody else has published: the same child, put through every finder on the same day. Where a site had no description box, we turned her into its filters.

Our test: are the 2027 dates and prices real?

Many directories say "2027" in their headings. We picked three well-known sleepaway camps and compared what each finder showed with the camp's own website on 10 November 2026.

Three camps is a spot check, not a census. It shows the pattern we saw across the wider tests: most directories showed stale or empty dates and prices for camps whose own sites already list 2027. The Right Camp's coverage has gaps too: 236 of its 428 camps have 2027 session dates so far; the rest show older dates or none until the camp posts 2027.

What 2027 sleepaway camp costs: prices from 188 camps

A finder is only as good as its prices, so here is what The Right Camp's data says. Of its 428 camps, 188 had published a 2027 price for a session of at least a week by 10 November 2026. We took each camp's cheapest 2027 weekly price as shown on The Right Camp.

• Half the camps cost more than $1,744 a week, and a quarter cost more than $2,150. A quarter cost $900 a week or less.
• Session length changes the weekly price. Across the 856 priced 2027 sessions that last a whole number of weeks, one-week sessions had a median of $875 a week, two-week sessions $1,954 and three-to-four-week sessions $2,320.
• A $1,500 weekly budget, like our test child's, rules out more than half of the camps that have published 2027 prices.
• Financial aid is common: 68% of the camps with a 2027 price say they offer it.

Source: The Right Camp database, built from each camp's own website, as of 10 November 2026. Region totals exclude camps with no state on file.

By the numbers: what each finder costs camps, and how long it has been around

Who pays a finder shapes what it shows you. We collected each one's published price for camps and its first appearance in the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine.

Who pays to be on page one

We ran the same overnight-camp search for five states (Maine, North Carolina, California, Texas, Wisconsin) on the three biggest directories and counted the paid labels among the first 10 results each time. The Right Camp is in the table for comparison: it shows a shortlist of 3, not a list of 10, and camps cannot pay to appear in it.

On MySummerCamps we also opened the first 10 listings for Maine and North Carolina: 2 showed 2027 dates, 1 showed 2019, 8 said to visit the camp's website, and 9 were iD Tech listings linking straight to idtech.com.

Clicks from the homepage to a named camp

Only The Right Camp's first click returns camps chosen for the child described; elsewhere the first camps you see are featured or sponsored placements, a category or a state list.

Speed on a phone

Most parents search on a phone. We ran Google's Lighthouse 12.6 on each finder's homepage with its mobile settings (simulated mid-range phone on a slow 4G connection), three runs each, on 10 November 2026, and kept the median.

"Main content visible after" is Lighthouse's Largest Contentful Paint under its simulated slow connection, so real phones on Wi-Fi will be faster. Speed is not part of the scores above.

Audit: every listing on Best Overnight Camps

On 10 November 2026 we downloaded all 52 state and Canada pages of Best Overnight Camps and read the "session dates and fees" field of every listing: 1,520 entries, or 1,028 distinct camp profiles once camps listed in several states are counted once. The site's homepage claims "over 1,257".

Among the 238 profiles that print a year, the median year is 2017, and the oldest go back to 2013. Every one of those pages is headed "2027". The listings' outbound links hold up better: of the 48 distinct camp websites linked from the North Carolina page, 46 loaded; smcamp.org returned "not found" and soccerkix.com did not respond.

The 8 camp finders, reviewed

#1 of 8 · Best for plain-words matching · 81/100

1. The Right Camp

What it is	A free sleepaway camp finder: you describe your child and get a shortlist
Describe your kid?	Yes, in plain words, results in seconds
Cost and sign-up	Free, no account
Paid placement	None. The ranking uses only fit, ACA accreditation and Google rating
Camps	428 sleepaway camps in 48 states, ages 7–17; 187 ACA-accredited
Dates and prices	2027 session dates on 236 camps; weekly price on 256
Where the data comes from	Each camp's own website, re-checked regularly, plus phone calls to camps

You type what you would tell a friend: age, what your kid loves, what worries you, budget, where you live. The Right Camp turns it into a profile, ranks its 428 camps against it and shows three, each with checks for what fits and warnings for what doesn't. In our test it read the sentence correctly (age, girl, budget, Philadelphia, horses, theater, first time away) and returned three camps under budget within driving distance. It did not find a horse camp among them, and it said so instead of pretending.

What we liked

• The only finder that understood a plain sentence and answered instantly
• Each pick explains what fits and what is missing
• 2027 dates and session prices matched the camps' own sites in all three of our spot checks
• No account, no paid placement

What we didn't like

• 428 camps is far fewer than ACA's 2,341 or Sleepawayz's 2,219, so niche combinations (horses and theater, under $1,500) may not be covered
• Not every camp has 2027 dates or a weekly price yet
• Three picks at a time; browsing everything takes an extra click

Verdict: the best place to start if you know your kid better than you know camps. Use ACA next if you need a bigger pool or a specific condition or affiliation.

Sources: test at therightcamp.com, 10 November 2026; camp counts from The Right Camp on the same day; how it collects data.

#2 of 8 · Best for breadth and filters · 67/100

2. ACA Find-A-Camp

What it is	The American Camp Association's directory; ACA is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit
Describe your kid?	No. Filters, plus a camp-name search
Cost and sign-up	Free, no account needed to search or read profiles
Paid placement	No ad labels; default sort is "Accredited", and accreditation fees start at $808 a year (ACA membership FAQ)
Camps	3,929 camps of all types; 2,341 overnight, of which 1,401 accredited
Dates and prices	Per session, not per week; 2027 for some camps, only 2026 for others
Filters	Distance from ZIP, about 150 activities, about 40 special-needs conditions, religious affiliation (or none), gender, age, dates, duration, cost, accommodations

ACA's tool is the one directory parents name in forum threads, and it earns that. The filters are the deepest we saw, accredited camps are clearly marked. They also sort first, and accreditation is not free: camps pay from $808 a year. It has no idea who your child is, though: it filters, it doesn't weigh. Stacking filters drops results to almost nothing, prices are per session, so a weekly budget has to be worked out by hand, and searches can't be shared by link.

What we liked

• Largest overnight catalog in our test
• Detailed special-needs and affiliation filters

What we didn't like

• No description matching; nothing for "nervous first-timer"
• Costs are per session, so a weekly budget can't be entered; a $1,500 cap left 1 unrelated camp
• Data depends on each camp updating it: Tapawingo still showed only 2026
• Accredited camps sort first, and accreditation costs camps from $808 a year

Verdict: the best directory if you already know your must-haves, and the one to use for special needs or a specific affiliation.

Sources, all checked 10 November 2026: Find-A-Camp home and counts; filters and overnight counts; Laurel South 2027 sessions; Tapawingo 2026-only sessions; how camps are listed.

#3 of 8 · Best sleepaway-only directory · 63/100

3. Sleepawayz

What it is	A sleepaway-only directory founded in 2023, with free and paid camp listings
Describe your kid?	No. Filters and an activity text filter
Cost and sign-up	Free, no account
Paid placement	Yes. Camps pay $0, $252 or $504 a year; the top tier buys "Highest search placement" and a "Featured Camp" badge
Camps	2,219 sleepaway camps; 242 "Verified"
Dates and prices	Weekly price on 48 and a 2027 season on 49 of the top 50 profiles we opened; none for the three camps in our freshness check
Filters	Region, about 200 activities, ages, gender, session length, about 60 disability options, diet, religion, ACA-accredited, LGBTQ-inclusive. No price filter

Sleepawayz is clean and sleepaway-only, and its listings are rich: when we opened the first 10 results for five states, 49 of 50 profiles showed a 2027 season and 48 showed a weekly price, along with staff ratio, diet and health details. The catch is that featured camps pay to sit at the top. In our horses-and-theater search the first five results were all Featured; across five state searches, 7 of the first 50 results were. Only 242 of about 2,217 camps are verified. Coverage is uneven, though: the three well-known camps from our freshness check had no description, dates or prices at all, and one carried a note that its unclaimed profile may not be correct.

What we liked

• Sleepaway camps only, nearly as many as ACA
• Prices shown per week on full listings
• Paid placement is at least labeled

What we didn't like

• Paid camps pinned to the top of results
• No price filter, no description matching
• Some listings are empty shells; a brother/sister camp showed under "all girls"

Verdict: good for browsing sleepaway camps by activity, as long as you scroll past the Featured block.

Sources, all checked 10 November 2026: search and filters; camp pricing tiers and counts; about; sample claimed listing; sample unclaimed listing.

#4 of 8 · Best for premium Northeast camps · 51/100

4. American Summer Camps

What it is	A curated network of partner camps plus a human "Camp Concierge", run by a camp marketing firm
Describe your kid?	Yes, in a free-text box on an inquiry form that staff answer later
Cost and sign-up	Free; browsing is open, matching needs your name and email
Paid placement	Camps pay listing fees (not public)
Camps	About 44 on the search page (our count), mostly PA, NY, ME, MA, NH, CT, VT
Dates and prices	2027 rates on both listings we sampled

A small, polished catalog with real 2027 rate pages: Camp Danbee's full season at $16,600 and Laurel South's first session at $10,800, which matched the camp's own site. The pool is small and premium, every camp in it is a paying partner, and the "help me find the right camp" path means handing over your contact details and waiting for a person.

What we liked

• Current 2027 rates and dates
• Useful filters for session length and specialty

What we didn't like

• About 44 camps, all paid partners
• No budget filter; the samples ran $9,000–$17,000 a session
• Matching is a lead form, not a tool

Verdict: worth a look if your budget and region fit its Northeast traditional camps. Not a neutral finder.

Sources, all checked 10 November 2026: search and filters; inquiry form; camp listing fees; Camp Danbee 2027 rates; Laurel South 2027 rates.

#5 of 8 · Best for a big mixed directory · 50/100

5. MySummerCamps

What it is	A long-running camp directory owned by Internet Brands (which also runs KidsCamps.com)
Describe your kid?	No. Simple search and keyword search
Cost and sign-up	Free, no account
Paid placement	Yes. Featured (price on request), Gold $849/yr, Silver $649/yr, Bronze $349/yr; free listings can't show a website, email or phone
Camps	694 overnight results for age 11; day, online and travel programs mixed in
Dates and prices	Whatever the camp last posted: 2020 for Rockbrook, 2026 for Wyonegonic
Filters	Camp type, region, distance, age, gender, activity, religion, special needs. No price, session-length or accreditation filter

MySummerCamps has plenty of listings and decent activity checkboxes, but paying camps come first: across five state searches, all 50 first-page results were Featured, and 34 of them were camps outside the state searched. The listings we sampled carried 2020 and 2026 data, and the "Last Updated" date in the footer is simply today's date added by the page's script, not a sign of fresh data.

What we liked

• Large pool, free, no account
• Public, exact listing prices

What we didn't like

• Featured camps fill the top of results
• Stale sessions and prices
• Mixed with day camps and teen tours

Verdict: fine for discovering names; check every date and price on the camp's own site.

Sources, all checked 10 November 2026: overnight search, age 11; listing prices; FAQ on free listings; Rockbrook listing; Wyonegonic listing.

#6 of 8 · Best for booking local day camps · 42/100

6. ActivityHero

What it is	A booking marketplace and registration software for kids' camps and classes
Describe your kid?	No. Our sentence returned 0 results
Cost and sign-up	Free to search; account required after 8 results; $0.99 service fee per registration of $20 or more
Paid placement	"Sponsored" results; basic listing free, paid plans at $49/month or 15% per registration; paid newsletter boosts
Camps	3 overnight activities in our nationwide search
Dates and prices	Yes, including 2027, where a camp has open sessions

ActivityHero is built for booking local day camps and after-school classes, mostly in California. Where a camp sells through it, dates and prices are current and you can register in a few clicks. For sleepaway it has very little open inventory: the Overnight filter set to nationwide returned three overnight activities, two from the same provider.

What we liked

• Live dates, prices and booking
• Early-bird and scholarship filters

What we didn't like

• Very little open sleepaway inventory in our search
• Account wall, booking fee, sponsored results

Verdict: great for local day camps; skip it for sleepaway.

Sources, all checked 10 November 2026: overnight search, nationwide; service fee; provider pricing; paid boosts.

#7 of 8 · Best for long state lists · 40/100

7. Best Overnight Camps

What it is	Static state-by-state lists, part of the TheBestCamps network of directory sites
Describe your kid?	No. No search or filters at all
Cost and sign-up	Free, no account
Paid placement	"Prime Position" listings at the top of state pages, plus sponsored ad boxes; prices not public
Camps	"Over 1,257 Overnight Camps" claimed
Dates and prices	Headings say 2027; listing text on the North Carolina page dates from 2014 to 2023

Every heading says 2027, but the listings underneath are whatever camps wrote years ago: we counted dates from 2014 to 2023 on the North Carolina page, including a 2021 session price presented on a "Summer 2027" page. To search, the site tells you to use your browser's find feature.

What we liked

• Long lists per state, free, no account

What we didn't like

• No search, no filters, no matching
• Years-old dates and prices under 2027 headings
• Paid placement on top

Verdict: a list of names to research elsewhere, nothing more.

Sources, all checked 10 November 2026: home and camp count; how to search; North Carolina page; advertising options.

#8 of 8 · Best for talking to an advisor · 39/100

8. Tips on Trips and Camps

What it is	A free human advisory service for overnight camps and teen programs, founded in Baltimore in 1971
Describe your kid?	Yes, to a person, after a contact form or a call
Cost and sign-up	Free for parents; the form requires email and phone; the online camp fair requires a login
Paid placement	Camp directors pay a referral fee if you choose their program
Camps	"Over 600" programs represented, camps and teen trips mixed
Dates and prices	Not shown publicly; recommended programs average "$1,200 and up per week"

Of everyone here, a good advisor is the closest thing to describing your child to someone who knows camps, and Tips has decades of experience. But its list is built around the 600-plus programs it represents, and those programs pay it when you enroll. Parents in forums are blunt about that model with camp advisors in general. When an AP reporter tried it, the adviser sent six options after a phone interview, one of them a camp Tips didn't represent (AP via Butler Eagle, 2016).

What we liked

• Real people who handle special needs and odd questions
• Free for families; the referral model is stated openly

What we didn't like

• Its list centers on programs that pay referral fees
• No public database, dates or prices
• The request form requires email and phone; otherwise you call an advisor

Verdict: useful for a second opinion, as long as you remember who pays the advisor.

Sources, all checked 10 November 2026: home; FAQ on fees and referral model; history; request form; camp fair login and price note.

Also checked, not ranked

• CampAlign markets AI camp matching and "70,000+ camps indexed", but every page with camps on it, including the homepage's "Browse Camps First" button, requires a Google sign-in first, and the site doesn't say whether it covers sleepaway camps (campalign.com, checked 10 November 2026).
• CampNavigator was down: the site returned "Service Unavailable" (HTTP 503) on 10 November 2026.
• Sawyer is live but lists local classes and day camps; we found no sleepaway camps (hisawyer.com, checked 10 November 2026).
• My Summer Plan does real AI matching, but for local day-camp weeks in six cities (mysummerplan.com, checked 10 November 2026).
• SummerCamps.com is a mixed directory with an overnight category and paid tiers from $147 to $997 a year (listing prices, checked 10 November 2026).
• KidsCamps.com, MySummerCamps' sister site, showed day programs at the top of its overnight category (overnight category, checked 10 November 2026).

What parents and the press say

About finding a sleepaway camp

• Free advisors are popular and openly doubted. Parents recommend camp advisors, and others point out that the advisors are paid by camps and only suggest camps that pay them (DC Urban Moms, 2022).
• Great camps can be invisible in paid channels. One parent noted that many strong camps fill every year by referral alone and never pay advisors, so advisors never mention them (DC Urban Moms, 2022).
• The details that matter don't filter well. Session length, total price and facilities like air conditioning are what parents end up asking each other about (Ask MetaFilter, 2017; DC Urban Moms, 2024).
• ACA is the one directory parents name, usually for its filters (Ask MetaFilter, 2017).
• Camp advisers are mainstream. A 2014 ACA survey cited by the AP found nearly 30% of accredited camps had worked with advisers (AP via Butler Eagle, 2016), and Boston Magazine described heavy use of free, camp-paid consultants among Boston parents (Boston Magazine, 21 May 2019).
• Ask who pays the adviser. SmartMoney's advice: ask each camp about its relationship with an adviser, and prefer advisers paid a flat fee rather than per referral (SmartMoney via Fox News).

How to choose a camp finder

• You know your kid but not camps: start with a description-based finder like The Right Camp.
• You need a specific condition, diet or affiliation: ACA Find-A-Camp's filters.
• You want a person to talk to: an advisor like Tips on Trips and Camps, knowing that camps pay the advisor. Ask which camps they don't represent.
• You want to book a local day camp: ActivityHero.
• Whatever you use: treat every finder as a shortlist. Confirm dates, total price and refund terms on the camp's own site, then call the director.

Method and limits

How we picked the eight

We started from the finders that parents name in forums and that come up when parents search for a sleepaway camp finder, plus the ones AI answers mention for this question (CampNavigator, Sawyer, ActivityHero). We ranked eight that are live and usable for US sleepaway camps, and list the rest under Also checked.

How we scored

• Matching from a description, 25 points. 5 = understands a plain sentence, returns a shortlist on the spot and covers every need in our test. 4 = the same, but missed a stated need (The Right Camp missed horses). 3 = takes a description, but a person answers later. 2 = rich filters only. 1 = filters that failed our test. 0 = no search.
• Current dates and prices, 25 points. From our sample listings and the freshness check: 5 = current 2027 data on every listing; 4 = current 2027 data in our samples, with gaps elsewhere; 3 = 2027 data on most listings we sampled, with gaps or a mix of 2026 and 2027; 2 = 2027 data on some listings only; 1 = stale or not shown.
• Neutrality, 20 points. 5 = no paid placement in the ranking. 4 = none seen, but camp-side terms not public. 3 = no ad labels, but camps that pay the directory itself, such as for accreditation, sort first. 2 = paid placement, labeled. 1 = paid by the camps it lists or recommends, through listing fees or referral commissions.
• Access, 15 points. 5 = free, no account, no form. 3 = browsing open, matching behind a form. 2 = account wall or contact details required.
• Sleepaway coverage, 15 points. 5 = 2,000+ sleepaway camps. 4 = roughly 650–1,300. 3 = several hundred, mixed with other programs. 2 = several hundred, sleepaway only. 1 = under 50.

Each criterion is scored 0 to 5 and multiplied by its weight (a 4 on a 25-point criterion is 20 points). Change the weights and the order changes: on breadth alone, ACA and Sleepawayz would lead.

Dates and limits

• All sites were checked on 10 November 2026 (US time), logged out, on desktop.
• The freshness check covers three camps; a larger sample could change the picture for any one site.
• Ratings and counts are what each site or review platform showed on the day. They change.

FAQ

Which camp finder lets me describe my child in plain words?

Of the 8 finders we tested on 10 November 2026, only The Right Camp turns a plain-language description of your child into an instant shortlist with no account. Tips on Trips and Camps and American Summer Camps also take a description, but through a contact form that a person answers later. ACA Find-A-Camp, Sleepawayz, MySummerCamps and ActivityHero use filters, and Best Overnight Camps has no search at all.

What is the biggest sleepaway camp directory?

ACA Find-A-Camp showed 2,341 overnight camps on 10 November 2026.

Are camp directories neutral?

Not all of them. On 10 November 2026, Sleepawayz, MySummerCamps and Best Overnight Camps sold placement at the top of results, ActivityHero showed sponsored results, and American Summer Camps and Tips on Trips and Camps are paid by the camps they list or recommend. ACA Find-A-Camp sorts accredited camps, which pay accreditation fees from $808 a year, to the top, and The Right Camp has no paid or featured placement.

Do free camp advisors cost anything?

They are free for parents because camps pay them. Tips on Trips and Camps says camp directors pay it a referral fee if you choose their program, and that it represents more than 600 programs.

Which camp finders show 2027 dates and prices?

In our spot check of three camps against each camp's own website, The Right Camp matched the camp's 2027 dates and prices in all three cases. ACA Find-A-Camp and American Summer Camps had 2027 data for the camp we could check there. Sleepawayz showed no dates or prices for any of the three, though 49 of the top 50 Sleepawayz profiles we opened in state searches had a 2027 season, and MySummerCamps showed 2020 and 2026 data. Always confirm on the camp's own site before you enroll.

What should I check before booking a sleepaway camp?

Check the session dates and full price on the camp's own website, including extras like transport and riding fees, the refund policy, whether the camp is ACA-accredited, how it handles first-time and homesick campers, its phone and contact policy, and its health staff. Then call the director with your child's specific questions.

Final verdict by need

• Fastest route from "here's my kid" to a shortlist: The Right Camp.
• Biggest pool and deepest filters: ACA Find-A-Camp.
• Sleepaway-only browsing: Sleepawayz, scrolling past the Featured camps.
• A person to talk to: Tips on Trips and Camps, knowing who pays.
• Local day camps you can book now: ActivityHero.