Summer and sleepaway camps in Maine
Maine camps are shaped by lakefront settings, residential traditions, and long-established summer rhythms, within one of the oldest camp networks in the country. Compare 85 camps across Maine: nearly all are overnight camps, about half are coed, and the rest are boys or girls camps.
At a glance
Tuition
Overnight camps
- Typical per night
- $330 to $440 / USD
- Lowest per night
- $120 / USD
- 41 camps offer financial help
- 22 camps offer payment plans
From the 2027 sessions of 64 camps
Session lengths
Overnight camps, per session
1 week
10 camps
$2,000 to $4,400 / USD
2 weeks
28 camps
$3,900 to $6,300 / USD
3 to 4 weeks
Half summer · 50 camps
$8,000 to $10,800 / USD
6 to 8 weeks
Full summer · 45 camps
$12,600 to $18,000 / USD
37 camps offer both a half and a full summer
26
camps founded over 100 years ago
Browse Maine camps
A selection of Maine camps
Brother and sister camps in Maine
Boys and girls camps paired as brother and sister camps, both in Maine.
Field Guide
Summer camp in Maine
A field guide to what a camp summer looks like in Maine: the forms it takes, how the landscape and climate shape it, and what it asks of a family.
Field notes
Weather in Maine
Maine runs a short, mild summer rather than a hot one. The core camp weeks are comfortably warm by day and cool by night, with the chill deepening inland and up north, so an evening campfire earns its place even in high summer. Inland lake water warms enough for real swimming by the later weeks; the Atlantic stays cold all season, which is why a coastal swim is quick and bracing. Expect black flies and mosquitoes in the early woods, fog along the shore, and long northern daylight that keeps the day going late.
camp season (June-August (representative core camp season)) runs highs of 74-80°F (23-27°C) and lows of 55-61°F (13-16°C).
Getting there in Maine
Most families reach Maine camp country through Portland International Jetport (PWM), the state's main airport, down in the south. For central lake country and the gateway to the north woods, Bangor International (BGR) can sit closer to the destination, and plenty of out-of-region families instead fly into Boston (BOS) and drive up the interstate and turnpike that run the length of the state.
From any of these, camp is a drive out of the city, sometimes an easy one and sometimes long, and the pattern holds: highway gives way to secondary roads, and for the wilderness forms the secondary roads give way to gravel and then to no road at all, where contact ends by design. Coastal and day camps invert this, sitting close to where families already are. Specific pickups, shuttles, and timing are things to settle directly with the camp.
The Parent Side Quest in Maine
Whether your Maine summer means a mailbox and a visiting day or a child home every evening, the parent has a whole experience of it running alongside the child's. There is the drive and the handoff, the slow information loop for the send-away forms, and, in the lake towns and along the midcoast, the low hum of other camp families moving through the same weekends, filling the same inns and tables, living the same waiting.
That waiting, and the strange work of trusting a place with someone you love, is its own thing worth understanding, separate from any single camp or child. The [Parent Side Quest](/field-guide/parent-side-quest) is the part of the Field Guide about exactly that experience.
Questions about summer camp in Maine
For 2027, overnight camp tuition in Maine generally runs $330 to $440 USD a night, from about $120 USD. Tuition at boys camps generally runs $390 to $450 USD a night, and at girls camps generally runs $370 to $440 USD a night. Tuition for a half summer (3 to 4 weeks) is typically $8,000 to $10,800 USD and for a full summer (6 to 8 weeks) is typically $12,600 to $18,000 USD. Based on the 2027 sessions of 64 camps. These are planning estimates; each camp confirms its own tuition.
41 camps offer financial help, and 22 offer payment plans. Each camp sets its own terms, so ask the camp directly.
10 camps offer 1 week, 28 camps offer 2 weeks, 50 camps offer 3 to 4 weeks (a half summer) and 45 camps offer 6 to 8 weeks (a full summer). 37 offer both a half and a full summer.
Most take campers from about 7 to 16.
Both: 41 are coed, 22 are girls camps and 22 are boys camps.
Yes: 10 camps offer day sessions.
2027 sessions run from late June to mid August.
12 camps with a claimed profile show an in-date ACA accreditation.