2026 American Alliance of Museums Annual Meeting & MuseumExpo
Each year, the conference is designed to help attendees feel reinvigorated and more deeply connected to our field. At AAM 2026 you won’t find a shortage of opportunities to expand your network and connect with peers over challenges, successes, new ideas, and inspiration.
Time shapes our lives—marking change, preserving memory, and connecting us across generations. It shapes museums too. As timekeepers, travelers, chroniclers, and seers, museums help communities understand the past, make meaning in the present, and imagine the future.
In 2026, as the United States marks its 250th anniversary, museums have a unique opportunity to reexamine the past, embrace the present, and help shape what comes next. Philadelphia—the birthplace of American democracy and home to the nation’s first library, zoo, and combined art school and museum—offers the perfect setting for this reflection.
The 2026 AAM Annual Meeting & MuseumExpo invites museum professionals to explore how museums mark and interpret the passage of time to shape public understanding of our world. Programming will explore time, transformation, and the future of our field through four tracks—Museums as Timekeepers, Time Travelers, Chroniclers, and Seers—in addition to a new track this year, Museum Essentials and Evolving Practices that focuses on core skills and strategies for every area of museum work.
