RHS Garden Wisley is the Royal Horticultural Society's flagship garden, near Woking in Surrey, and you can reach it from Waterloo in about an hour without a car: 24 minutes on the train, then an hourly bus. Arriving without a car also cuts the ticket price by 30%, to £14.40 for an adult (September 2026). It opens every day except Christmas Day.
Surrey has more good gardens within an hour of London than any other county, and most visitors see none of them because they assume a car is necessary. For Wisley it is not. For several of the others it more or less is, and this page is honest about which is which.
Our guide to Kew Gardens covers the botanic garden inside London, which is a different kind of place: a scientific collection in Victorian glasshouses. Wisley is a working demonstration garden aimed at people who garden themselves, and the difference shows in the planting.
RHS Wisley: tickets and times
- Adult, booked online
- From £15.20, depending on the date
- Adult, arriving car-free
- £14.40, with proof of your bus, train or cycle journey
- Adult, on the day
- £20.50 all year
- Children
- £6 for ages 5 to 16, free under 5
- RHS members
- Free, no booking needed
- Opening
- Monday to Friday 10am to 6pm, Saturday and Sunday 9am to 6pm, last entry 5pm
- Address
- Wisley Lane, Woking, Surrey GU23 6QB
- From London
- Waterloo to Woking in 24 minutes, then bus 462 or 463
The ticket tiers, and how to land on the cheapest one
The RHS prices Wisley by date, and the difference between the bands is about £5 a head. Booking online always beats the gate.
| Ticket | Adult price | When it applies |
|---|---|---|
| Saver | £15.20 | Weekends and weekdays, 9 November to 31 December |
| Off-peak | £17.20 | Weekdays, 1 April to 17 July and 7 September to 23 October, with some excluded dates |
| Standard | £19.00 | Weekends 1 April to 8 November, and weekdays from 20 July to 4 September |
| On the day | £20.50 | All year, bought at the gate |
| Car-free | £14.40 | All year, on proof of arriving by bus, train, bike or on foot |
The car-free ticket undercuts every other adult price, including the cheapest advance one. You buy it on arrival at the welcome desk rather than online, and you need to show your train or bus ticket, so keep it. Visitors receiving Universal Credit, Pension Credit or Employment and Support Allowance pay £1, and up to five people in their party pay the same, on production of proof.
A family of four arriving by train pays less than a family arriving by car. Two car-free adults and two children aged 5 to 16 come to £40.80 at the gate. Two off-peak adult tickets booked online plus two children come to £46.40, before petrol. The 30% car-free discount is the best deal the RHS offers anyone who is not a member.
Getting there without a car, step by step
South Western Railway runs frequent fast trains from Waterloo to Woking, which the RHS describes as taking as little as 25 minutes; when we checked the timetable for a weekday in October 2026, the quickest were 24 minutes and an off-peak day return was £19.40. From Woking station, buses 462 and 463 run to Wisley every hour, seven days a week, all year except 25 and 26 December. They continue to Guildford bus station.
The 714 runs hourly from Kingston, via Esher and Cobham, six days a week from Monday to Saturday. That is the useful option if you are staying in south-west London rather than the centre.
Three other stations are near but not walkable: West Byfleet is four miles away, East Horsley four miles, and Guildford nine. All three need a taxi, and the RHS advises pre-booking one rather than expecting to find a cab. An off-peak day return from Waterloo to West Byfleet was £17.20 when we checked, marginally cheaper than Woking, but the taxi wipes out the saving.
A note on the bus stop: the garden has a new stop, and the 462, 463 and 714 no longer use the place where the old shuttle called. Follow the current signs rather than a memory of a previous visit.
What is in the garden
Wisley covers a large site with distinct areas: mixed borders, a rock garden, fruit fields, trial beds where the RHS assesses new plant varieties, a Glasshouse, the Old Laboratory, and RHS Hilltop, which is the society's science building and is open to visitors.
Each has its own hours inside the general 10am to 6pm. The Glasshouse runs 10am to 3.45pm with last entry at 3.30pm, the Old Laboratory 10am to 5pm, and Hilltop 10am to 5.45pm with last entry at 4.45pm. All three are included in garden admission. Hilltop Live, a programme of free talks and demonstrations, starts at 11.30am daily with no booking needed.
The tropical section of the Glasshouse is closed until 13 November 2026. The RHS took it out of service on 14 September 2026 for essential maintenance. The rest of the Glasshouse is open. If the tropical house is the reason you are coming, check the garden's own page before you book a train.
Dogs are not admitted apart from guide, assistance and service dogs, including assistance dogs in training. Personal drones are prohibited. There are five places to eat on site, from the Terrace Restaurant, which serves afternoon tea between 3pm and 4pm, to cafés and a food hall, all serving hot food between 11.30am and 3pm.
The other Surrey gardens, and how hard each one is to reach
| Garden | What it is | Without a car |
|---|---|---|
| Painshill Park, Cobham | An 18th-century landscape garden of follies: a Ruined Abbey, Gothic Temple, Turkish Tent, Serpentine Lake and a Crystal Grotto | Cobham and Stoke d'Abernon station is two miles away; bus 715 or 408 to Between Streets |
| The Savill Garden, Windsor Great Park | Thirty-five acres of ornamental garden and woodland created by Eric Savill from 1932 for King George V, open to paying visitors since 1953 | Egham or Windsor, then a taxi. Allow two to three hours on site |
| Claremont Landscape Garden, Esher | One of the earliest English landscape gardens, with a turf amphitheatre and a lake | Esher station, then a walk or short taxi ride |
| Polesden Lacey, near Dorking | Edwardian house and gardens on the North Downs | Box Hill and Westhumble station, then a taxi or a long walk |
| Winkworth Arboretum, near Godalming | A hillside of trees planted for autumn colour above a lake | Godalming station, then a taxi |
Painshill opens 10am to 6pm with last entry at 5pm, all year round. The Crystal Grotto, which is the single most photographed thing on the site, is closed on Mondays for maintenance except on bank holidays, so a Monday visit misses it. The garden does not publish its admission prices on the pages we could reach, so check before you travel.
Claremont, Polesden Lacey and Winkworth are National Trust properties. The Trust's website blocked our research requests when we checked in September 2026, so we have not verified their current admission prices or opening days. Look them up on nationaltrust.org.uk, and note that Trust properties often close on particular weekdays out of season.
The Savill Garden charges admission with a cheaper advance price than the on-the-day one, and it sells combined tickets that include a cream tea. It also offers free parking with a paid entry, and suggests two to three hours for a visit. Prices change between the summer and winter seasons, so check the current table before booking.
Can you do two gardens in a day?
Not easily by public transport, and this is where honesty helps. Wisley, Painshill and Claremont are all within about five miles of each other around Cobham and Esher, which sounds like a good day out with a car and is a frustrating one without. There is no bus that links them directly, and the taxi fares between them add up quickly.
By train, treat each as its own day. Wisley fills five or six hours comfortably; Painshill takes two to three; the Savill Garden two to three. If you want two in one day and have a car, Wisley in the morning and Painshill in the afternoon works, because they are ten minutes apart by road and Painshill's last entry is 5pm.
If you are hiring a vehicle purely for this, read our notes on whether a car is worth it in London first, and remember that the M25 between junctions 9 and 10 is one of the least reliable stretches of motorway in England on a summer weekend.
When to go
Wisley is designed to be worth visiting all year, which is unusual, and the RHS prices it accordingly: the cheapest Saver band runs from 9 November to 31 December, when most gardens are at their least interesting. What you get then is structure, bark, winter stems and the Glasshouse rather than flowers.
Late May and June are the peak for borders and roses. July and August bring the fruit fields and the trials. October gives the best autumn colour, which is also when Winkworth Arboretum is worth the taxi. Our guide to the weather month by month is a fair guide to what you will be walking around in.
If flower shows rather than gardens are the draw, the Chelsea Flower Show in late May and the Hampton Court Garden Festival in early July are both ticketed RHS events in London itself and sell out well in advance.
Fares, railcards and the cost of the day
An off-peak day return from Waterloo to Woking was £19.40 in September 2026, and a railcard takes a third off most off-peak fares. Our guide to which railcards visitors can buy explains the rules for overseas travellers, and how British rail tickets work sets out the difference between Advance, Off-Peak and Anytime fares.
Two adults and two children travelling off-peak from Waterloo, with the car-free discount at the gate, come to roughly £100 for the day including fares and admission. That is more than a London museum and less than most paid attractions in the centre.
Other gardens on the same theme
Within London, Chelsea Physic Garden is the closest thing to Wisley in spirit and closes every Saturday. The Isabella Plantation in Richmond Park is free and peaks for three weeks in spring. Going east instead of south-west, our page on Sissinghurst and the gardens of Kent covers the other great cluster within an hour.
For something that combines a garden with a building, Hampton Court by boat sets out the slow way to reach the palace gardens, and the walking country beyond Wisley is covered in Box Hill and the Surrey Hills. The Windsor page is the one to read if the Savill Garden is your target, because they share a transport problem. The full list is on our days out from London page.
Frequently asked questions
How do you get to RHS Wisley from London without a car?
Take a South Western Railway train from Waterloo to Woking, which takes about 24 to 25 minutes, then bus 462 or 463, which run hourly every day of the year except 25 and 26 December. From Kingston, the 714 runs hourly from Monday to Saturday. Keep your ticket for the car-free discount.
How much does RHS Wisley cost?
Adult tickets booked online start at £15.20 and rise to £19.00 depending on the date, with a flat £20.50 on the gate. Arriving by bus, train, bike or on foot gets you in for £14.40. Children aged 5 to 16 pay £6, under-5s are free, and RHS members go free.
How long do you need at RHS Wisley?
Five to six hours does the garden properly, including the Glasshouse, Hilltop and lunch. Three hours is enough for a first look at the main borders and the Glasshouse. The garden opens at 10am on weekdays and 9am at weekends, with last entry at 5pm.
Which Surrey gardens can you reach by train?
Wisley is the only one with a regular bus connection from a station. Painshill is two miles from Cobham and Stoke d'Abernon and is served by buses 715 and 408. Claremont is within reach of Esher on foot. Polesden Lacey, Winkworth and the Savill Garden all need a taxi from the nearest station.
Is anything closed at RHS Wisley in 2026?
The tropical section of the Glasshouse closed on 14 September 2026 for essential maintenance and is due to reopen on 13 November 2026. The rest of the Glasshouse, the Old Laboratory and RHS Hilltop remain open with garden admission, each on its own slightly different hours.
Sources
- RHS Garden Wisley - Plan your visit, prices and opening times (checked September 2026)
- RHS Garden Wisley - How to get here (checked September 2026)
- Painshill Park - Opening times (checked September 2026)
- Painshill Park - Getting here (checked September 2026)
- The Crown Estate - The Savill Garden, Windsor Great Park (checked September 2026)
- National Rail Enquiries - London Waterloo to Woking, times and fares (checked September 2026)