London in the School Holidays

Published 20 September 2026 · By the Guide to London editorial team · Editor: Terje Moy

English schools take six holidays a year, and during each of them London's family attractions get busier, more expensive and harder to book. The dates are not national law: each council and each school sets its own, so they vary by a few days across the city. But the pattern is consistent enough to plan around, and the two weeks either side of a half-term are often half the price of the week itself.

This page gives the 2026/27 dates as one London borough publishes them, explains which attractions the holidays actually affect, and shows how a small shift in your dates changes what you pay. For what is open on public holidays and Sundays, see our separate guide to bank holidays and opening hours, which covers a different question.

Travelling with children in a holiday week is not automatically bad news. Museums run free family programmes, some attractions open longer, and there is more going on. The problem is volume, and volume is manageable if you know when it arrives.

Why the dates vary, and how much

There is no single national timetable. Each local council sets term dates for the schools it maintains, and academies and independent schools set their own, which is why the government's own advice is simply to check with the relevant council. Independent schools typically break up a week or so earlier and go back later, particularly in summer.

In practice, the variation across London is small: a day or two at each end, and the occasional borough taking two weeks in October rather than one. Bexley, for example, notes that some of its schools take the fortnight from 19 to 30 October 2026 instead of the single week.

The useful consequence for a visitor is that there is no clean edge. The Saturday before a half-term is already busy because independent schools have broken up, and the Monday after is quieter than the Friday before. If you are trying to dodge the crowds by a single day, you will probably fail.

What actually gets busier

Not everything in London fills up in half-term. The effect is concentrated on a specific list.

• The South Kensington museums. The Natural History Museum warns that queues are likely during school holidays and at weekends, and the Science Museum next door is no different.
• Paid family attractions. The zoo, the aquarium, the dungeon, the wheel, the studio tour. These use demand-based pricing, so half-term costs more as well as taking longer.
• Anything with a queue that cannot be lengthened. Rides, boats, viewing platforms and playgrounds.
• Trains out of London on the first Saturday. Day trips are much harder on the opening weekend of a holiday.

What does not change much: the big free galleries away from the family circuit, theatre other than family shows and pantomime, restaurants, parks on a weekday, and the Underground, which is actually quieter in the morning peak because the school run has stopped.

What half-term does to prices

Several London attractions now charge by date, and the difference is large enough to change a family budget. ZSL London Zoo is the clearest example: booked online before 10am on the day of the visit and including the optional donation, an adult ticket is £30.50 off-peak on a weekday, £35.00 standard, £37.00 at a standard weekend and £38.00 at peak (September 2026). School holidays are peak.

Other places do the same thing differently. Hampton Court Palace charges £29.00 on weekdays and £32.00 at weekends and on bank holidays until 27 November 2026. Kew Gardens drops to an off-peak adult price of £17 online from 1 November, having charged £25 in the autumn peak, and runs £10 Tuesdays from 8 September to 29 December 2026.

Multiply those gaps by two adults and two children and a single day out can differ by £30 or more depending on when you go. Our guide to what a London trip costs works through a full family budget, and children's fares on London transport explains where you do not pay at all.

What opens specially, and what closes

School holidays bring extra programming rather than extra opening. The free national museums run family trails, drop-in workshops and activity days aimed at children, usually free with entry and often without booking, and they publish the programme a few weeks ahead on their own what's-on pages.

A few things work the other way. Some smaller museums and historic houses reduce opening in winter, several attractions close between Christmas and New Year, and the royal palaces close on fixed days of the week regardless of the season. The Science Museum now asks for a free ticket to be booked in advance, which is easy but is exactly the sort of step people forget in a holiday week when walk-up spaces run out.

Our separate guides to the Natural History Museum and to the Science Museum have the current opening arrangements and the one-off closure dates for autumn 2026, which are worth checking before you build a day around either.

Holiday by holiday: what each one is like

October half term is the best of them for a visitor. The weather is usually still workable, the museums run Halloween programming, and the attractions are busy without being at summer levels. October averages about 16°C by day and is one of the wetter months, so plan indoor alternatives.

Christmas is the most crowded fortnight of the year in central London and the most expensive for hotels. It is also the most fun: the lights, the markets, the ice rinks, and pantomime, which is a British institution worth seeing once. Winter Wonderland in Hyde Park opens on 19 November 2026 and closes on 3 January 2027, with timed tickets required.

February half term is cold, dark and cheap. If you are coming for indoor attractions and theatre rather than parks, it is the best value week of the year for a family, and hotel prices are at their lowest.

Easter is a fortnight and includes two bank holidays, so the crowds come in waves. The parks are at their best, the days are long enough, and this is the point in the year when outdoor attractions reopen for the season.

The May half term is short, usually sunny and dominated by the spring bank holiday Monday at the start of it. Summer is six weeks, peaks in the first half of August, and is covered in our month guide to August in London.

How to plan around a half-term

Three approaches work, in order of effectiveness.

1. Move your trip by a week. The week before October half-term or the week after February half-term gives you the same city at a fraction of the crowding and cost.
2. Keep the dates and change the order of your days. Do the busy paid attractions on the Monday and Tuesday, when families are still arriving and recovering from travel, and save free museums for Thursday and Friday.
3. Book the time slot, not just the ticket. Where an attraction sells timed entry, the first slot of the day is the difference between a 20-minute queue and none.

Our guides to the best time to visit London and when to book a London hotel cover the wider timing question, and if you are locked into a holiday week, our guides to London with children, London with teenagers and rainy day activities for children are the practical follow-ups.

Where to go when everywhere is full

Every half-term produces the same scene: a queue outside a museum and a family deciding what to do instead. The answer is almost always to go one step further out.

Kew Gardens absorbs crowds in a way that a museum hall cannot, and its cheap Tuesdays fall inside several holiday weeks. City farms and the better playgrounds are free, local and almost never full. The Warner Bros. Studio Tour must be pre-booked in any case, so if you have a ticket the crowd does not affect you, and if you do not, it is not an option.

And the older London attractions that children ignore are empty in half-term: small museums, historic houses, cathedrals and the quieter galleries. A ten-year-old who has had enough of queueing will often be happier in a strange little museum than in the one you travelled across the city for.

Frequently asked questions

When are the school holidays in London?

English schools take a week at the end of October, about two weeks at Christmas, a week in mid-February, two weeks around Easter, a week at the end of May and six weeks in summer. Councils and individual schools set their own dates, so they differ by a day or two across London and independent schools break up earlier.

Is London much busier in half-term?

Family attractions are, especially the South Kensington museums, the zoo and anything with a fixed-capacity queue. The Natural History Museum itself warns of likely queues during school holidays and at weekends. Theatres, restaurants and the general Underground network are barely affected, and the morning peak is actually quieter.

Which school holiday is cheapest for a family trip to London?

February half term. Hotel rates and flight prices are near their annual low, the free museums run their usual family programmes, and indoor attractions are the main plan anyway in winter. The trade-off is cold, wet weather and short daylight hours.

Do attractions cost more in the school holidays?

Often, yes. Several use demand-based pricing: ZSL London Zoo ranges from £30.50 for an off-peak weekday adult ticket to £38.00 at peak (online, with donation, September 2026), and school holidays are peak. Hampton Court and Kew also charge different prices by day and season.

Do I need to book attractions in advance during half-term?

For anything with timed entry or pre-booked tickets, yes, and as early as you can. The Science Museum wants a free ticket booked ahead, and the Warner Bros. Studio Tour sells nothing at the door. Free museums without booking still reward arriving at opening time.

Sources

• GOV.UK - School term and holiday dates (checked September 2026)
• London Borough of Bexley - School term dates 2026 to 2027 (checked September 2026)
• Natural History Museum - Plan your visit (checked September 2026)
• ZSL London Zoo - Tickets and price bands (checked September 2026)
• Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew - Tickets (checked September 2026)
• Historic Royal Palaces - Hampton Court Palace tickets and prices (checked September 2026)
• Science Museum - Visit (checked September 2026)
• Hyde Park Winter Wonderland - Official site (checked September 2026)