Balanced Rock, Rock formation in Garden of the Gods, Colorado Springs, United States

Balanced Rock is a sandstone formation in Garden of the Gods park in Colorado Springs, Colorado, one of the park's noted features alongside Steamboat Rock and the Three Graces. The red, pink and white sedimentary beds were deposited horizontally, then tilted vertically and faulted into fins by the uplift of the Rocky Mountains and the Pikes Peak massif; Pleistocene glaciation and erosion shaped the present forms.

This formation developed over millions of years as surrounding rock layers were carved away, with harder layers resisting erosion while softer material gradually disappeared. The result displays geological layers from different periods stacked and shaped by natural processes.

The name Garden of the Gods comes from an August 1859 exchange between surveyors Melancthon S. Beach and Rufus Cable, who rejected "beer garden" for a place fit for gods to assemble. An 1893 Colorado Transcript account instead credits Helen Hunt Jackson, who named it after a garden tended by servants called Jupiter and Juno. Ute oral traditions place their creation at the site, and petroglyphs typical of early Utes have been found in the park.

Balanced Rock stands in the Garden of the Gods park in Colorado Springs, not in Colorado National Monument. The 1.5-mile Perkins Central Garden Trail is paved and wheelchair-accessible, running through the heart of the park's largest red-rock formations. Parking lots fill quickly in peak season; the park is open year-round and free.

Balanced Rock is one of the formations named in the park's geological inventory alongside Steamboat Rock and the Three Graces. Its cap sits on a pedestal of the same deep-red, pink and white sandstone, conglomerate and limestone beds that were deposited horizontally, then tilted and faulted into fins during the Laramide Orogeny and later eroded during the Pleistocene Ice Age.