Crested Butte
Crested Butte Mountain Ski Resort is a popular ski destination located in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, in the town of Crested Butte. The resort is located approximately 4 hours from the city of Denver and about 2 hours from the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park.
Crested Butte is known for its high annual snowfall, averaging about 300 inches per season, and the snow at the resort is typically dry and powdery. The ski season at Crested Butte typically runs from mid-November to mid-April, and the resort offers around 1,600 acres of skiable terrain for all levels of skiers and snowboarders to enjoy. Crested Butte also has a number of terrain parks for freestyle skiers and snowboarders, featuring a variety of jumps, rails, and other features.
We recently ranked all of Colorado's ski resorts, so you can see where Crested Butte stacks up against all its nearby ski hills!
Season Passes
Crested Butte is a part of the Epic Ski Pass network. This allows you to buy one season pass, and ski at most of the Vail owned and operated slopes with it throughout the year. There are a handful of types of Epic lift ticket passes available, ranging from 3-7 days, to season-long.
Lodging Options
There are numerous options to stay at Crested Butte around the resort. Check out the available options with the form below.
Crested Butte Mountain Resort Terrain Overview
Crested Butte has a total of 121 ski trails, which are serviced by 15 ski lifts, gondolas and/or trams. The amount of skiable area in this park is huge, with a maximum of 1,547 acres available to skiers. This area is equivalent to 626 hectares, 2.4 square miles, or 6.3 square kilometers.
Crested Butte's slopes see on average 236 inches (6.0 meters) of snowfall a year. That is almost 19 feet every year!
Total Runs
121
Lifts
15
Skiable Acres
1,547(6 km2)
Annual Snowfall
236"(599 cm)
Crested Butte Ski Resort Elevation
Crested Butte Ski Resort has a summit elevation of 12,162 feet, or 3,707 meters. However, not all of that elevation is able to be skied. The base of the ski slope sits at 9,375 feet above sea level, creating a ski hill that is 2,787 feet (849 meters) high. This is referred to as the slope's vertical drop - or a measure of how high the skiable hill is.
The summit of 12,162 feet makes this ski resort one of the highest in the country. The average ski slope summit is around 4,000 feet, so this is extremely high compared to its peers.
Summit Elevation
12,162'(3,707 m)
Vertical Drop
2,787'(849 m)
Base Elevation
9,375'(2,857 m)
Crested Butte Ski Resort Difficulty Level
Difficulty Score™
76.7out of 100
DID YOU KNOW?
At Parks & Trips, we've created a proprietary Difficulty Score that attempts to show how difficult a particular ski slope is. We get to this number by combining a number of metrics for each resort and comparing them to its peers. Most of the score is based off the amount of easy-intermediate-expert slopes by acreage and the maximum vertical drop of the overall resort, but also includes a few lesser-used metrics as well.
Our algorithm compares each resort’s metrics with all others in North America, then assigns each a Difficulty Score, which we use to rank them accordingly. Resorts with a lower score are easier to ski than those with a higher one. However, a high score does not mean that the resort does not have any easy slopes, or vice versa. This is just an overall score given to the resort based on all its metrics grouped together.
Skiable Terrain by Difficulty Level
Crested Butte has 1,547 total skiable acres, which can be broken down into the three main groups of difficulty: Beginner, Intermediate, and Expert.
Seeing as Crested Butte is one of the hardest ski areas in the country, it's no surprise that over 86% of its trails rated as either intermediate or expert-level. This leaves only 14% of its skiable acres as beginner terrain.
Beginner
14%(217 acres)
Beginner trails (identified by a green circle) are the easiest trails on the hill with a gradual 25% or less gradient, and are usually wide to accommodate beginner skiers.
Intermediate
25%(387 acres)
Intermediate trails (identified by a blue square) are usually the most popular and crowded runs, which have a slope of anywhere between 25-40%.
Expert
61%(944 acres)
Expert trails (identified by a black diamond... or two) are the hardest slopes on the mountain, and have very steep gradients over 40%.
Is Crested Butte Ski Resort good for beginners?
This is one of the hardest ski areas in the country to ski at, so it is not great for beginners. Crested Butte Ski Resort ranks in the top 10% of the most-difficult ski resorts in the country. It has 61% of its trails rated as expert, or black-diamond level.
Crested Butte Ski Resort Location
Crested Butte Ski Resort is located in the state of Colorado, USA. This ski area is nearest the town of Crested Butte, CO.
Address:
Crested Butte, CO 81224 USA
View on Google Maps
Website:
skicb.com
GPS Coordinates:
38.87000, -106.99000
Getting to Crested Butte Mountain Resort
By Car: If you are driving, you would set your GPS to either the ski resort's name (Crested Butte Ski Resort), its coordinates of 38.87000, -106.99000 (latitude, longitude), or simply drive towards the town of Crested Butte, CO to get close.
By Air: If you are coming in from across the country, then you may need to board an airplane to get here.
A large airport has scheduled major airline service with millions of passengers per year. This type of airport always accepts international flights. Here are the closest large airport(s) to Crested Butte Ski Resort.
| Name | Code | City | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Denver International Airport | DEN | Denver, CO | 141 mi |
A medium-sized airport has scheduled regional airline service. This type of airport may or may not accept international flights. Here are the closest medium-sized airport(s) to Crested Butte.
| Name | Code | City | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aspen-Pitkin Co/Sardy Field | ASE | Aspen, CO | 25 mi |
| Eagle County Regional Airport | EGE | Eagle, CO | 53 mi |
| Grand Junction Regional Airport | GJT | Grand Junction, CO | 84 mi |
There may also be much smaller regional airports next to Crested Butte Ski Resort, but we didn't list them here due to the fact that no major airlines go through them.
Other Nearby Ski Resorts
Skiers will - especially if coming from far away - try and visit a couple different slopes all in the same trip. Here are the closest other ski slopes within 100 miles of Crested Butte Ski Resort.
| Name | Location | Summit | Difficulty Score™ | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cranor Hill Ski Area | Gunnison, CO | 7,000 ft | 0% | 20 mi |
| Aspen Ski Resorts | Snowmass Village, CO | 12,510 ft | 70% | 22 mi |
| Aspen Snowmass | Snowmass Village, CO | 12,510 ft | 68% | 22 mi |
| Aspen Highlands Ski Resort | Aspen, CO | 11,675 ft | 78% | 23 mi |
| Aspen Mountain Ski Resort | Aspen, CO | 11,212 ft | 82% | 24 mi |
| Sunlight Mountain | Glenwood Springs, CO | 9,895 ft | 66% | 41 mi |
| Powderhorn Ski Resort | Powderhorn, CO | 9,850 ft | 60% | 41 mi |
| Monarch | Salida, CO | 11,952 ft | 53% | 42 mi |
| Ski Cooper | Leadville, CO | 11,700 ft | 56% | 50 mi |
| Beaver Creek | Beaver Creek, CO | 11,440 ft | 64% | 57 mi |
| Copper Mountain | Frisco, CO | 12,441 ft | 69% | 60 mi |
| Lake City Ski Hill | Lake City, CO | 8,847 ft | 0% | 62 mi |
| Vail | Vail, CO | 11,570 ft | 79% | 63 mi |
| Breckenridge | Breckenridge, CO | 12,998 ft | 83% | 67 mi |
| Lee's Ski Hill | Ouray, CO | 0 ft | 0% | 69 mi |
| Keystone | Dillon, CO | 12,408 ft | 76% | 75 mi |
| Telluride | Telluride, CO | 13,150 ft | 90% | 78 mi |
| Loveland Ski Area | Dillon, CO | 13,010 ft | 65% | 81 mi |
| Silverton | Silverton, CO | 13,487 ft | 100% | 81 mi |
| Kendall Mountain Ski Area | Silverton, CO | 9,596 ft | 20% | 82 mi |
| Winter Park Resort | Winter Park, CO | 12,060 ft | 86% | 96 mi |
| Ski Granby Ranch | Granby, CO | 9,202 ft | 32% | 97 mi |
| Wolf Creek | Pagosa Springs, CO | 11,904 ft | 52% | 97 mi |
Crested Butte Ski Resort Mountain Stats
| Name | Statistic |
|---|---|
| Summit Elevation | 12,162 ft |
| Base Elevation | 9,375 ft |
| Vertical Drop | 2,787 ft |
| Trails | 121 (14% Beginner, 25% Intermediate, 61% Expert) |
| Lifts | 15 |
| Skiable Acres | 1,547 |
| Avg. Annual Snowfall | 236 inches |