London: Public Transportation Guide

London’s transport system is very sophisticated. As a tourist, understanding how to get around London will shorten your travel time and help you have a better experience. You can choose from buses, trams, the Docklands Light Railway, London River Services, the Elizabeth Line and the largest railway in London, the London Underground. The London Underground, also known as the Tube, is one of the busiest metros in the world with 11 lines, around 5 million passengers a day and 272 stations!

Our guide focuses on transport within central London. It will highlight the different options available, interchange stations, the fastest routes and costs.

Heathrow Airport to Central London

By Heathrow Express

The Heathrow Express is a fast direct service from Heathrow Airport to Paddington Station in central London. There are 3 stops at the airport: Terminals 2&3, Terminal 4 and Terminal 5.

Trains leave both Heathrow and Paddington every 15 minutes, with a journey time of 15 minutes.

Trains run approximately between 05:00 and 23:30. We recommend you check the timetable on the Heathrow Express  website before you travel.

Tickets & Prices: The cost will depend on how early you’ll purchase your train ticket.
Tickets purchased on the day will be more costly, starting at £22 for a single, and £37 for a return ticket, while if you purchase a ticket well in advance you can pay as low as £5.50

Tickets & prices can be found at the Heathrow Express website.

At Paddington station, you’ll find taxis, or tubes: the Bakerloo, Circle, District, Hammersmith & City lines.

By Tube

A cheaper but a longer option would be to take the Piccadilly or Elizabeth line (tube) which can take 40 minutes to an hour to central London.
Always check if there are any changes to the service:
Elizabeth line
Piccadilly line
* Heathrow is located in Zone 6

A Taxi

The black taxis are much more expensive, but will be available to you outside the airport, then and there.

Pre-book a taxi or call a taxi company on arrival can save you money!
There are many Heathrow taxi companies out there.
Golden Tours website would be good for a private taxi to & from London’ airports.
Uber is a known company you can also use in and around London.
To book a minicab, we recommend to compare prices using the website – minicabit!

Coaches & Buses

A single direct coach ticket to London’s Heathrow Airport can start at £5.20. Services running day and night from specific pick-up points, across the UK.
Information about Buses From/To Heathrow airport can be found on the National express website.

Gatwick Airport to Central London

Gatwick Express

A direct service runs from Gatwick airport to Victoria station in central London.

Gatwick express and Victoria line, both, departs every 30 minutes, with a journey time of roughly 30 minutes. Trains runs approximately between 5:30am-23:00pm.

Tickets & Prices: Tickets will be cheaper when purchasing online, specially in advance.
Timetables and more option you can find in Omio or Getyourguide.

Overground

The Tube is not available to & from Gatwick airport. However the Southern Eastbourne is, all the way to Victoria station! This journey will take you roughly 45 minutes.

A Taxi

Gatwick airport is in the outskirts of London, so a taxi will be expensive.
The black taxis are much more expensive, but will be available to you outside the airport, then and there.

Pre-book a taxi or call a taxi company on arrival can save you money!
There are many Heathrow taxi companies out there. Golden Tours website would be good for a private taxi to & from London’ airports. Uber is a known company you can also use in and around London.
To book a minicab, we recommend to compare prices using the website – minicabit!

Coaches & Buses

A single direct coach ticket to London’s Heathrow Airport can start at £7.50. Services running day and night from specific pick-up points, across the UK.
Information about Buses From/To Heathrow airport can be found on the National express website.

Trains in London

The London underground, also known as Tube, is one of the world’s busiest metro, with 11 lines, approximately 3.7 million passenger a day and 272 stations!

The Underground is linked to two further trains:
The DLR (Docklands Light Railway) and the Overground. The DLR is a driverless railway network that serves parts of east and south east London and is the only line which connects with London City Airport, while the Overground serves a large part of Greater London.

The National Rail covers major cities and many minor cities throughout the UK.

If you are interested in traveling outside of London (to Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, etc.), the National Rail is a good place to start, although it can be on the expensive side, so make sure to buy in advance and online if possible to reduce costs. Don’t forget, there are some great packages out there to further reduce costs by combining a train ticket with a hotel stay.

If your journey is to take you to mainland Europe, you also have the option of the Eurostar, the train that directly connects London (via St. Pancras International Station) with mainland Europe in the website omio.

London Busses

The red double-decker London bus is surely one of the city’s iconic images and can be spotted on all major roads in London, although some routes run single-decker red busses.

The London bus network is one of the wider bus networks carrying around 6.5 million passengers a day, which is roughly double the number of passengers on the London underground per day.

It is important to note that you can not pay for your bus journey with cash, and you must either have an Oyster card with available balance or a contactless debit or credit card to ride a bus. A single bus journey is the same price no matter which bus you are on or your final destination. The current price is £1.75 per person per journey (£24.70 for a 7 day Bus & Tram Pass), while under 10’s can travel for free.

We recommend you download and use the Citymapper smartphone application to plan your journey in London. The app will help you find the right bus and tell you where the nearest bus stop is.

Trains from London to other parts in the UK and Europe

The National Rail includes several different operators, A good and convenient site for searching and booking long-distance travel (including flights, buses and of course trains) within Europe is omio.

omio has special travel pages for the main destinations:
– From London to Manchester
– From London to Liverpool
– From London to Edinburgh
– From London to Glasgow
– From London to Cambridge
– From London to Brighton
– From London to Bath
– From London to Bristol
– From London to Birmingham
and to destinations outside the UK such as London to Paris by Eurostar and London to Amsterdam.

Return train tickets (two-way tickets) will usually be cheaper than two individual tickets.

Taxis and Minicabs in London

London has two types of taxis: the iconic Black Cabs you see in movies and all over London, which you can stop these anywhere on the street if they have their yellow light on; and minicabs, which are private hire cars that cannot be picked up in the street but must be pre-booked. All minicabs will be registered and you should look for a yellow sticker on the front and back windscreens to verify a registered vehicle.

Taxis in London range from expensive to very expensive, you have been warned! Black cabs are particularly expensive, especially if picked up from an airport; as such we would recommend booking a minicab. There are many companies in London, so we recommend minicabit to find a selection, with real-time quotes, and Uber, if you have the app installed and are registered with a credit card.

If you still want a Black Cab, you can either hail one from the street when they have their yellow light on at the front, or you can find one using the GETT or FreeNow apps.

Car Rental

If you are staying in central London or anywhere near an underground station, we would not recommend hiring a car in London, as there is a daily (Monday – Friday) congestion charge to enter central London by car and car parking can be on the very expensive side. You will find it cheaper and easier to travel by public transport, taxi or minicab.

However, if you are planning a journey outside of London to see the rest of England, a hire car maybe your best option; for this we recommend RentalCars.com (from the same people who bought you Booking.com) and will compare several car rental companies for you almost anywhere in the world, including London.

Bike Rental in London

In the past couple of years, London is encouraging people to use their legs and ride a bike to get around London while enjoying the view, with the demand and usage further increasing since the coronavirus.

London has introduced many cycle paths, these cover large parts of London and are usually marked with a bicycle symbol on the ground, and recently London has created Cycle Superhighways, these are segregated lanes on main roads solely for the use of bicycles and are generally painted blue.

You can rent bicycles in many parts of London from automated machines; these are easy to spot and used to be called “Boris Bikes” (named after Boris Johnson who introduced them when he was the mayor of London between 2008-2016) but are now officially called Santander Cycles as they are sponsored by Santander Bank.
Full details of the easy 3 step process to rent a bike can found on the TfL website.

Bike tour can be found in Golden Tours website:

Secret London Bike

Grand London Bike Tour

Cable Car

You read that correctly, London now has its very own cable car, called Emirates Air Line, which crosses the River Thames between Greenwich Peninsula and the Royal Docks. Cabins arrive every 10 seconds and take around 10 minutes each way. This is a great way to see an alternative view of London while crossing the river and only a 5-minute walk from The 02 venue.

River Bus

London has an active River Bus service that can be used for commuting as well as seeing London from a different perspective. All River Bus Services are wheelchair accessible (maximum of four wheelchairs and three folding chairs on the larger boats) and you can use your Oyster card or contactless debit/credit card to pay for the journey, although make sure your Oyster card has enough money before beginning your journey as you will not be able to top up at the pier. You will be able to buy a single or return ticket at the ticket offices but this will be more expensive than if you paid in advance online.

The River Bus is run by MBNA Thames Clippers and not by TfL with services starting at around 06:30 through to 23:00 weekdays and 08:30 to 23:00 weekends, but please check the timetable for exact departure and arrival times.

Prices are per zone, similar in structure to underground pricing, with zones broken up as Central, East, West, Central and East, Central and West, or All Zones.

A map of all the River Bus stops can be found in tfl website.

Planning your journey

The good old technique of looking at maps at bus stops, underground stations and at TfL’s (Transport for London) website works wonders, although these days there are many up to date tools and apps available to make this easier, showing real-time information, mapping, direct you from A to B and the ability to geolocate yourself.

The easiest way to plan your journey, if you have access to the internet is using the TfL journey planner here, or by using an app like Citymapper, while Google Maps and Apple Maps also offer real-time public transport journey planners via their respective apps (Android or iOS). We recommend you lift your head from your smartphone every so often as London has a lot to offer, and if you look up once in a while you will see some great architecture and you may be surprised, such as Shakespeare’s head peeking out of a window in Carnaby Street.

Oyster Card – What is it?

We have talked about the Oyster card, and you have probably seen people touching the little blue plastic credit card like thing on the yellow readers on busses and trains in London, but what is it?

It is a smart card, the same size as a credit card, and used to pay for public transport in London. It is accepted on busses, tube, overground, DLR, some national rail stations, some Thames River crossings, and the Emirates Air Line.

You can purchase up an Oyster card at all underground and train stations, as well as in some shops (where you see the Oyster card symbol). There is currently a £7 deposit on all-new cards that can be refundable after one year.

To use the Oyster card, simply press it against the yellow readers at the point of departure and arrival when using trains, or when you get on the bus; no need to touch when getting off a bus. To top up your oyster or see your balance, you can go to any ticket machine at any stop, press the card against the yellow reader and the balance will be displayed. You can also top up your oyster at any ticket machine, or shops where you see the Oyster symbol.

The Oyster card can be used as a PAYG (Pay-As-You-Go) or as a Travelcard (fixed price for a fixed period of time, 1 week, 1 month, 1 year).

PAYG – Here you pay for what you use, your Oyster has to be topped up before it can be used, and you will see how much each journey costs you when you tap at the end of your journey on the trains, and the beginning of your journey on Buses.  Oyster journeys are currently capped, on a daily basis, and the full-fare guide can be found in TFL website.

Travelcard – Here you pre-pay for a set period of time, this is done in the same way as PAYG via one of the ticket machines or shops displaying the logo. more information about travelcards can be found in TFL website.

Price comparison between PAYG, daily cap, and Travelcard base on the zones in your journey can be found in TFL website.

Journey Prices in London

On the Underground, the price depends on the start and endpoint of your journey and which zone you are traveling to and from as well as the time of travel.

London is segregated into travel zones, most visitors will find themselves in Zone 1 and Zone 2 as this is central London, click here or here to see a map of all the zones.

Rush Hour or Peak travel times are Monday to Friday between 07:30 and 09:30 in the morning and again between 16:00 and 19:00 in the evenings. Travel during these times is more expensive and you should expect it to be far more crowded at these times.

Sample Prices for the London transportation – updated 2023

London buses have a flat rate for any journey, any time of day or night, currently at £1.75 per person (adult) per journey regardless of where in London you are traveling to or from and there is a daily cap of £5.25 if only using the bus that day.

If using the tube to travel between Zone 1 and Zone 2, there is a single fare of the price of £3.40 during rush hour and £2.80 at all other times. Travel within Zone 1 is £2.80 during rush hour and £2.70 at all other times.

When using an Oyster card, your daily journeys will be capped at £8.10 regardless of the time of travel and if using the tube and bus together between Zones 1 & 2, and £9.60 between Zones 1 & 3.

The weekly travel card for Zones 1 and 2 costs £40.70, a monthly travel card is £156.30 Please pay attention and do the maths to see if these are relevant for you or if a PAYG Oyster with daily capping would work out cheaper for you depending on the number of journeys you plan to make during your time in London.

Full details of all fares can found in TFL website.

London Addresses

Most addresses in London and the rest of the UK follow the same pattern;

House/Flat Number, Building Name, Building Number on the Street, Street Name, City Name, Post Code, e.g.:

1 Palm Court, 128 Oxford Street, London, W1D 1LT

This will bring you to flat 1 in a building named Palm Court, located at number 128 on Oxford Street, in London, with a postcode of W1D 1LT. Some shops, restaurants, and other places of interest may only include the street number, name, and postcode.

Why is the post code important?

The postcode in London is an easy way to identify which part of the city the address is in, and can be a great way to identify the perfect location for your hotel in London.

The postcode is built of 2 parts. The first part identifies which part of the city you are in and constitutes 1 or 2 letters followed by 1 or 2 numbers followed by an optional letter;

The first 1 or 2 letters denote the area North (N), East (E), South (S), West (W), North West (NW), North East (NE) South East (SE), South West (SW), or East City (EC), West City (WC), these last two relate to the city of London area.

Following these are numbers, which relate to a sub area within that direction.

The second part of the post code usually made up of 1 letter and 2 numbers provides a more exact location, as used by sat nav and delivery of post. This last part can also identify which side of the street the address is on, but it is not easy to decipher without the aid of specialist software, like a sat nav.

Using Post Codes

It is best to give any taxi drivers, or when searching on online maps, the full postcode as this will be the most accurate way of finding your intended destination.

London Pass

If you are looking for a one-stop card to offer both public transport and discounts or free entrance at London’s top tourist attractions, and you are planning on staying in London for at least a few days, you should consider the London Pass. You can combine the London pass and your oyster in one convenient card.

SPECIAL OFFER: “Ask a Local” users have a special offer of a 5% reduction in the price of London pass. To benefit from this offer simply enter the code LP5ASKA at the checkout of the London Pass page.

Further offers in London can be found on the London Deals Page.