[1] The museum is located immediately adjacent to the royal tomb complex, in an area which also includes the Gyerim forest, Cheomseongdae observatory, Banwolseong palace, and Anapji Pond.

The volume of archaeological and historical artifacts in the collection of the Gyeongju National Museum is so large that most of the objects cannot be displayed and are thus stored out of the view of the general public.

The Gyeongju National Museum has maintained an archaeological research department for decades, and staff there have conducted numerous field surveys and excavations in North Gyeongsang Province.

This role has lessened with the onset of government-funded 'buried cultural heritage research centres' (ko:매장문화재조사연구소) across Korea since the mid-1990s.

However, the role of the museum as a centre of cultural heritage conservation was enhanced when the Korean government built a large warehouse on the museum site in the early 2000s to house the mountains of archaeological material unearthed continuously from Gyeongju and across North Gyeongsang Province.