United Kingdom: know before you go

Visitors to the United Kingdom now need an Electronic Travel Authorisation, or ETA, before they can board a flight, train or ferry. It is a digital permission linked to your passport, applied for through the UK ETA app or on gov.uk. The fee is £20, decisions usually arrive within a day, and the Home Office asks you to allow up to three working days. An approved ETA lasts two years or until your passport expires, and covers repeated visits of up to six months each. Everyone travelling needs one, including babies and children, and you must travel on the passport you applied with. Travellers from countries that are not on the ETA list need a standard visitor visa instead. Irish citizens need neither, and border officers decide at arrival how long you may stay.

Heathrow is the UK's busiest airport by a wide margin and the main long-haul gateway; Gatwick, Manchester and Edinburgh are the other big points of entry. All of them sit on rail and coach links into their cities, and booking your onward train before you land saves money on peak weekends. The second front door is rail: Eurostar runs from London St Pancras through the Channel Tunnel to Paris in about 2 hours 15 minutes and to Brussels in about 2 hours. Ferries also bring cars and foot passengers from France, Ireland and the Netherlands.

Trains link the big cities, and the fare structure rewards planning. Flexible tickets cost more and let you take any train; Advance singles tie you to a specific departure and cost the least, typically going on sale 12 weeks before travel. National Railcards, which cover different ages and groups, take a third off standard fares. Coaches are the budget option, with National Express serving hundreds of destinations. Two additions extend the network: the Caledonian Sleeper runs overnight from London Euston into Scotland, and the BritRail Great Britain pass gives unlimited National Rail travel from 2 days to 1 month, though it excludes Eurostar and the London Underground.

Outside the big cities, a car is often the practical way to reach the countryside, the Highlands and the coast. The UK drives on the left, and limits are lower than in much of Europe: 70 mph on motorways, 60 mph on single carriageway roads, 30 mph where street lighting marks a built-up area. Hire cars are available at airports, stations and city centres. Ferries reach the islands, with Caledonian MacBrayne running a west coast network to Skye, Mull, Islay, Lewis, Harris and beyond, bookable online with vehicle spaces. In towns, buses, licensed taxis and ride-hailing apps cover the gaps, and contactless cards work on most city buses and many rural services.

The United Kingdom uses the pound sterling and never adopted the euro. Bank of England notes circulate in England and Wales, while Scotland and Northern Ireland issue their own through local banks; those notes are valid money but can raise eyebrows far from home, so spend them where you got them. Cards and phones are the default at tills, and contactless works on buses and trains; a little cash still helps at market stalls and rural pubs. VAT is 20% and generally included in the price you see. There is no national tourist tax, but local levies exist: Edinburgh adds 5% to paid overnight accommodation from 24 July 2026, capped at five nights. Tipping is optional, so check whether a service charge is already on the bill.

The UK is a low-crime country by international standards, and the practical risks are mundane: pickpockets in busy tourist areas and on crowded transport, and weather that turns fast in the hills. Dial 999 for police, fire or ambulance; 112 reaches the same service. NHS 111 covers urgent medical problems that are not emergencies. Traffic drives on the left, so look right first at pedestrian crossings, and take extra care on rural roads after dark. On the coast, tide times matter more than they look. In the Scottish Highlands and the Welsh and Cumbrian mountains, conditions can change within an hour; leave word of your route and carry waterproofs.

NHS emergency care is available to everyone, but it is not free for most visitors. If you are not ordinarily resident in the UK, hospitals can charge for non-urgent and planned treatment, so travel insurance covering medical costs and repatriation is worth arranging before you fly. Pharmacies, marked with a green cross, handle minor ailments and sell over-the-counter medicines; NHS 111 will point you to the right service out of hours. Tap water is safe to drink across the UK. Carry prescription medicines in their original packaging with a copy of the prescription, and check any controlled-drug rules before travelling.

Mobile coverage is good in cities, along motorways and on most main rail lines, and patchy in the Highlands, mid-Wales and remote national parks. The UK's 2G and 3G networks are being switched off as 4G and 5G take over, so check that your phone and roaming plan work on 4G before you rely on them. Prepaid SIMs from the major networks are cheap and sold in shops and supermarkets, a useful option if your home operator charges for UK roaming. Public Wi-Fi is common in cafes, libraries, museums and railway stations. Download offline maps before heading to the islands or the hills.

British etiquette runs on small courtesies, and the big one is the queue: join the back at bus stops, ticket counters and food stalls. In pubs, order and pay at the bar; staff will often ask what you want before you have found a seat, and waiting at a table can mean a long wait. Please, thank you and sorry carry more weight than visitors expect, and cheers does duty as both a toast and a thank-you. Sunday stays slower in smaller towns, with shorter shop hours, while the big cities barely pause. You must be 18 to buy alcohol, and ID is commonly checked under Challenge 21 or Challenge 25 policies; Scottish shops sell alcohol only between 10am and 10pm.

English is spoken everywhere in the UK, and visitors manage fine with it alone. Wales is officially bilingual: road signs, railway station names and public documents appear in Welsh and English, and Welsh is a living daily language, especially in the north and west. In Scotland, Scottish Gaelic persists most strongly in the Highlands and islands, with bilingual ferry signs and place names in the north and west. Northern Ireland gave Irish official status in 2022, and bilingual signage appears in some areas. Accents shift quickly over short distances; if you do not catch something, ask, and people will repeat it.

Accessible travel in the UK is better than the Victorian architecture suggests, but it pays to check the details before you book. Rail passengers can use Passenger Assist, a free service that arranges staff help with boarding, changes and getting off; book it through the operator or a station. Many stations are step-free, plenty are not, and the access notes for your exact station are the ones that matter. Long-distance trains carry wheelchair spaces and accessible toilets, and major attractions publish access information of their own. Station staff have a duty to help, and buses in UK cities are low-floor, with space for wheelchairs and buggies.

Bank holidays close banks, many offices and some attractions, and they shift transport timetables. England and Wales get eight a year, Scotland nine and Northern Ireland ten. The shared core is New Year's Day, Good Friday, the early May and spring bank holidays, the summer bank holiday, Christmas Day and Boxing Day. Scotland adds 2 January and St Andrew's Day and takes its summer holiday on the first Monday in August; Northern Ireland adds St Patrick's Day in March and the Battle of the Boyne on 12 July. When a holiday falls on a weekend, a substitute weekday is declared: in 2026, Boxing Day moves to Monday 28 December. Big-city shops mostly stay open, and attractions often run holiday timetables.

Three things are worth sorting before a UK trip. The first is the ETA: you cannot board without an approved one, and although most decisions come within a day, allow up to three working days. The second is long-distance rail: Advance fares open around 12 weeks ahead, and the cheapest seats sell out first, so book London to Edinburgh, Glasgow or Inverness as soon as your dates are fixed. The third is accommodation: Edinburgh in August, Christmas and New Year anywhere, and coastal towns in school holidays fill months ahead. BritRail passes can be bought up to 11 months in advance, and seat reservations on busy routes are free at National Rail stations once you arrive.