Ice Skating in London: Where to Skate This Winter (2026)

Dates: 11 November 2026 to 10 January 2027. Session: 45 minutes, skates included. Price: adult from £13, child from £11, plus a £1.50 fee per ticket. Nearest Tube: Temple (Circle and District lines), about five minutes' walk.

If you skate once in London this winter, make it here. The rink fills Somerset House's 18th-century neoclassical courtyard on the Strand, with a tall Christmas tree beside the ice, and it runs later into January than the other seasonal rinks. Sessions start on the hour through the day, and prices move with the session across an £11 to £28.50 range. Skate Lates are the DJ nights, with an Aperol bar.

It's good for beginners and families too. Skate aids are available for children 8 and under (first come, first served, no pre-booking), there's a Kids' Club for ages 6 to 10, and a weekend-morning Skate School for adults and teens. Watching is free, so a non-skater can wait rinkside. The trade-off: 45 minutes goes fast, and the per-ticket fee adds £6 to a family of four. Tickets went on sale on 25 September, so book early for December.

Dates: 19 November 2026 to 3 January 2027. Session: 45 minutes, skates included. Price: adult £12.65 off-peak to £19.25 peak, booked in advance, plus the event entry ticket. Nearest Tube: Hyde Park Corner (Piccadilly line), for the Blue Gate.

Winter Wonderland bills its rink as the UK's largest open-air one, and it's built around the park's Victorian bandstand. That's the argument for it. The argument against is that you pay twice: once for a timed entry slot into Winter Wonderland (£1 off-peak, £5.50 standard, £8.25 peak) and again for the rink. Spend £25 in one online booking and the entry is free, which a family skate ticket (£37.40 to £55) clears on its own.

Children from 3 can skate with an adult; penguin aids are only for children under 1m tall in their skates. Book by 23:59 the night before to get the advance prices; on the day it's more. The trade-off: no phones or cameras on the ice, a £2-per-item cloakroom, and a crowd that peaks on December weekends. Go on a weekday in November if you can.

Dates: 20 November 2026 to 3 January 2027. Session: up to 45 minutes, skates included. Price: adult £19.50 off-peak, £21.50 peak; family £59.50 to £65.50. Nearest station: Hampton Court, by National Rail from Waterloo, just over the bridge from the palace.

This is the rink with the backdrop: the ice sits in front of Henry VIII's palace. It's also one of the priciest rinks in London, and the skating ticket doesn't include the palace, so it earns the trip best if you're making a day of it or live in the southwest. Adult-only evening skates with a DJ and cocktail bar are on the events schedule too.

Weekday sessions before 3pm are the quietest. Wheelchair users skate for £15 with a carer free, and there are relaxed sessions with softer music. The trade-off: it's just outside London's southwest edge in East Molesey, Surrey, and a £65.50 peak family ticket is well above a family skate at any indoor rink.

Dates: 6 November 2026 to 3 January 2027. Session: 45 minutes, skates included. Price: adult £19.38 on a mid-November weekday evening, £22.80 on a December Saturday evening, fees included; child £11.98 to £14.82. Nearest Tube: Battersea Power Station (Northern line).

Glide isn't one rink but three linked ones and a 200-metre trail that runs along the riverside, under the chimneys and a 30-foot tree. If a round rink bores you after ten laps, this is the one to pick. It's open to 10pm at weekends, weekday mornings in November and early December have longer Extended Skate sessions, and there's a New Year's Eve skate from 11pm to 12:15am.

Children aged 3 and under can't skate; penguin aids cost £6 for children under 1m. Mon to Thu students get a ticket with a drink included until 10 December. The trade-off: once fees are in, it's among the priciest adult tickets in town, sold-out sessions have nothing on the door, and rain doesn't get you a refund.

Dates: 31 October 2026 to 3 January 2027. Session: 45 minutes, skates included. Price: 2026 prices not yet published; off-peak and peak tiers, and a four-person family ticket. Nearest Tube: Leicester Square (Northern and Piccadilly lines), a minute's walk.

The first outdoor rink of the season to open, and the most central. It's a circular rink in the middle of the square with a bar and a few Christmas stalls around it, which makes it the easy pick for a quick skate before a West End show rather than an outing in itself. There are double-bladed skates for the smallest feet and paid skate aids for young children; under-3s aren't allowed on the ice.

The trade-off: no cloakroom, just a boot room at your own risk. 2026 prices aren't out yet.

Open: all year. Session: at least an hour. Price: from £8 on Monday and Tuesday, £11.75 off-peak, £13.75 peak; skate hire £3. Nearest Tube: Queensway (Central line), or Bayswater (Circle and District), two minutes away.

Queens has been a rink since 1930 and calls itself the oldest surviving ice rink in London, and it's my pick for a year-round skate from a central hotel: it's right by Queensway station, just north of Kensington Gardens. Now branded Queens skate dine bowl, it has bowling and a diner alongside, and after 9pm the Late Skate sessions (from £10) turn it into an adults' night out. From 8pm it's 18+ only.

For families, the Monday and Tuesday sessions from £8 are the cheapest skate in this guide. Penguin aids for children up to 1.4m are £6 an hour. The trade-off: skate hire is extra, there's no wheelchair lift, and under-18s have to be in by 7pm.

Open: all year. Session: 90 minutes at weekends and in school holidays, 2 hours on term-time weekdays. Price: £11.75 off-peak, £12.75 peak; under 12 £10.50 to £11.50; skates included. Nearest Tube: Wood Green (Piccadilly line), then the W3 bus up the hill, or Alexandra Palace station (National Rail).

Per minute on the ice, this is the best value of the nine: twice the time of a Christmas rink at a lower price, with skates thrown in. It's a big indoor rink inside the Victorian palace on the hill in north London, and evening Ice Discos run from 3 October 2026 to 3 April 2027. It's my pick for a family with small children.

The skate aids are well thought out: a push-along seal for 5 and under, a penguin for ages 3 to 7 and a snowman for 8 and up, each £7.50 and sold on site only. The minimum age is 3. The trade-off: outside the discos, public skating is daytime only, and it's a long way north of the West End.

Open: all year. Session: 1 hour, including 10 minutes to get on and 10 to get off. Price: adult £13, junior £10; skate hire £3. Nearest station: Lea Bridge (National Rail), with free parking for up to four hours.

A new building, opened in 2023, with two Olympic-size sheets of ice under one roof. It's in the Lee Valley park in Leyton, east London, and it's worth the trip if you're staying in Stratford or Hackney or driving in. Holiday Skate sessions run in school breaks (adult £16, family £52.50), and Disco Ice runs on Saturday evenings, with skate hire included in the £17 adult ticket.

The minimum age is 3, children under 8 need someone 16 or over on the ice with them, and polar-bear skate aids (£5) are first come, first served. The trade-off: it's out of the centre, and with hire the real price is £16 for about 40 minutes of skating.

Open: all year. Session: 60 minutes. Price: weekday adult £11.30, child £10.65, under 5 £1.70; skate hire extra. Nearest station: Streatham (National Rail); there's no Tube.

Streatham has had an ice rink for more than 80 years, and the current one is a full Olympic-size rink inside a council leisure centre, with public sessions through the day, seven days a week. It's the south London option, and the £1.70 under-5 ticket makes it a very cheap way to get a toddler on the ice.

Penguin aids are for children under 1.2m and snowman aids for taller ones, both available for hire. Carers of registered disabled skaters skate free. The trade-off: it's a leisure-centre rink, not a day out, and skate hire is paid on site on top of the ticket.