Running trails in Appleton, WI
Appleton has 16 trails in the directory — 2 paved and 2 on crushed gravel or dirt, 1 boardwalk, 1 with a stated distance, 3 shaded, and 2 open 24 hours. 13 of them post opening hours, so you can check the gate before an early start. They're ranked here by rating weighted by review volume, across 5,357 Google reviews. Filter by surface, loop, distance, shade or lighting to get to the run you're actually planning — no made-up difficulty score, just the facts you'd check before driving out.
Appleton Memorial Park
4.7 ★★★★★ 1,328 reviews
Sizable park filled with fields for baseball & soccer, a pavilion & a picnic area.
Pierce Park
4.7 ★★★★★ 1,265 reviews
Local park with a host of recreational facilities, including a disc-golf field & tennis courts.
Telulah Park
4.6 ★★★★★ 843 reviews
Family-friendly park with picnic tables, walking & biking trails & a 9-hole disc golf course.
Lutz Park
4.5 ★★★★★ 562 reviews
Tranquil riverside park offering a playground, picnic areas with a gazebo & kayak & canoe launches.
Peabody Park
4.6 ★★★★★ 369 reviews
Multi-use facility with numerous sports courts, picnic areas, disc golf, a boat ramp & wading pool.
Derks Park
4.6 ★★★★★ 261 reviews
Green space with an accessible playground & picnic pavilion, plus biking/walking trails & restrooms.
Carter Woods Park
4.3 ★★★★☆ 214 reviews
Ample park offering a playground and sports fields including a baseball field for kids plus pickleball courts, slides and tennis courts.
Prairie Hill Park
4.4 ★★★★☆ 168 reviews
Hilly park featuring a playground, as well as hiking, biking and sledding hills.
Arrowhead Park
4.6 ★★★★★ 119 reviews
Basketball, tennis and volleyball courts at a spacious playground, featuring a boardwalk and a sledding hill.
Old Stone Bridge Trail
3.8 ★★★★☆ 75 reviews
Hiking area around Fox Valley Technical College with a well-maintained, half-mile trail that's dog-friendly.
Bruce B. Purdy Nature Preserve
4.4 ★★★★☆ 39 reviews
Landscaped hiking trails winding through woodlands and around a pond in a nature preserve.
Art Lecker Park
4.3 ★★★★☆ 24 reviews
Hydroelectric Heritage Trailway
4.8 ★★★★★ 9 reviews
No trails match those filters.
How to pick a trail in Appleton
- Match the surface to your legs. Appleton gives you a choice: 2 paved, 2 natural surface, 1 boardwalk, and 1 mixed. Asphalt and concrete are fast, predictable and runnable year-round but the least forgiving; crushed limestone and dirt take the sting out of high mileage; boardwalk is flat and scenic but slick in the wet. If your shins or knees are complaining, the fix that actually works is varying the surface you run on rather than chasing one "best" one. More paved trails →
- Loop or out-and-back? A loop finishes back at the car with no backtracking; on an out-and-back you simply turn round at half your distance. The longest stated distance in Appleton is Bruce B. Purdy Nature Preserve at 3 mi.
- Check the hours before a 6am run. 2 trails in Appleton are open 24 hours — the rest can sit inside a park that gates at dusk and doesn't unlock until well after sunrise. 13 of the 16 listings carry posted opening hours — worth a look before you set an alarm.
- Long run? Check water and restrooms first. 6 have trailhead parking, 7 have restrooms, and 1 has a water fountain in Appleton. Anything over an hour and those stop being nice-to-haves — and in summer, shade counts double.
- The small things that decide it. 3 shaded, 2 with mile markers, 2 that runners describe as quiet, 4 dog-friendly, and 3 smooth and wide enough for a stroller or a wheelchair. Busy or quiet isn't a good-or-bad thing here: a busy path is the safer choice for a solo run at dawn, a quiet one is better for intervals.
More on all of this in the trail-running guides.
Browse Appleton trails by type
Running trails near Appleton
Worth the short drive — the closest towns with trails in the directory.