Getting in
Visiting Parliament for Free
In this guide
- Two free routes, and who each is for
- How does the free tour through your MP work?
- Can anyone watch a debate?
- Which chamber should you choose?
- What about Prime Minister's Questions?
- What the free routes give you, and what they do not
- Is Westminster Hall free to see?
- What can you see from outside for nothing?
- When are the free routes available?
- When is it worth paying anyway?
- What to write to your MP
- What is the queue for the gallery like?
- Committees, the other free room
- What to bring for a free visit
- What to expect once you are inside
- The free option you can take before you travel
- Free visits with children
- What the free routes do not give you
- The short version
Two free routes, and who each is for
The Houses of Parliament is one of very few major London attractions you can go inside without paying, and there are two separate ways to do it. One is for UK residents. One is for everybody.
Neither is a lesser version of the paid visit. The free tour is led by the same in-house guides who run the £34 one. The public gallery shows you something a tour cannot: the building doing its job.
How does the free tour through your MP work?
If you live in the UK, your own Member of Parliament can book you a free guided tour, up to three months in advance. You do not need to know them, to have met them, or to have voted for them. It is a constituency service and it takes one email.
Find your MP through Parliament's own website, write to their constituency office, say how many of you there are and which dates work, and wait. The tour runs about seventy-five minutes and covers the same route as the paid ones. Demand is high in the summer and around holidays, so ask early.
Can anyone watch a debate?
Yes. The public galleries in both Houses are free and open to everyone, UK resident or not, whenever that House is sitting — Monday to Thursday and on sitting Fridays. You queue, go through the same airport-style security as a paying visitor, and sit above the chamber.
There is no ticket, no booking and no charge. You can stay for five minutes or two hours. It is comfortably the least-known good thing in Westminster.
Which chamber should you choose?
The Lords, if you want to get in easily and see the room properly. It is far quieter, the queue is usually short, and it is the most decorated room in the building. The Commons is the famous one, and the gallery fills accordingly.
If you want a specific debate, both Houses publish what is coming up. If you simply want to sit in the building while it works, walk up and take whichever is open.
What about Prime Minister's Questions?
Wednesdays, and it is the exception to everything above. PMQs is the busiest half hour of the parliamentary week, and seats are allocated by ticket. Tickets go to UK residents who request them through their own MP or a member of the Lords; everyone else queues for whatever is left once ticket holders are seated.
Realistically, if you are visiting from abroad and PMQs is the point of the trip, plan for a long queue and a real chance of not getting in. If the room rather than the argument is what you want, come on a Tuesday and walk straight up.
What the free routes give you, and what they do not
| Free MP tour | Public gallery | Paid tour | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who | UK residents | Anyone | Anyone |
| Cost | Free | Free | £31–£34, or from $42 |
| Booking | Via your MP, up to 3 months ahead | None — you queue | Timed slot |
| Guide | In-house guide | None | Guide or handset |
| What you see | The full tour route | One chamber, in session | The full tour route |
| When | Saturdays and recess | Sitting days | Saturdays and recess |
| Certainty | High once confirmed | Space dependent | High |
The free routes cover the same building. What you give up is the commentary and the certainty of a booked slot.
Is Westminster Hall free to see?
On a sitting day, effectively yes. The public route up to the galleries passes through Westminster Hall, so anyone going to watch a debate walks the length of the oldest room in the building on the way. You will not linger, but you will have stood in it, under a roof built between 1393 and 1402.
It is also the one part of the interior you are allowed to photograph, along with St Stephen's Hall and New Palace Yard.
What can you see from outside for nothing?
- The Elizabeth Tower from Parliament Square or the eastern end of Westminster Bridge.
- The Great Bell on the hour — the quarters play first, then the strike.
- The Oliver Cromwell statue on Cromwell Green, outside the west front.
- The Victoria Tower, taller than the clock tower at 98.5 metres and almost never noticed.
- St Margaret's Church, free to enter, part of the same World Heritage Site.
Parliament also publishes free 360-degree virtual tours of the interior, which are worth twenty minutes before you travel.
When are the free routes available?
They are almost exact opposites, which is convenient. The free MP tour runs when the paid tours run: Saturdays all year, weekdays in recess. The public galleries are open when the House is sitting, which is precisely when the tours are not.
So whichever week you are in Westminster, one of the two is available. When Parliament sits sets out the 2026 calendar, including the six recess windows.
When is it worth paying anyway?
Three situations. If you are visiting from abroad, because the MP route is closed to you and the gallery does not show you the tour route. If you want commentary in a language other than English, because the paid handsets cover nine to twelve languages and the free tour is in English. And if you want certainty on a fixed date, because a booked slot is a booked slot.
There is also the combined-booking argument: some trips sell Westminster Abbey and the Palace together with the sequencing solved, which is worth real money on a single morning. all Houses of Parliament tours sets them out.
What to write to your MP
Keep it short. Find your own MP through Parliament's website — it has to be the one for the constituency you live in — and email their constituency office rather than their Westminster one.
Say who you are, that you are a constituent, how many people are in your party, and give two or three date ranges that work. Ask whether they can arrange a tour of Parliament. That is the whole message. Their office handles the booking with the visitor team and comes back with a slot.
Ask early: three months is the maximum lead time and the summer fills first. If your dates are tight, say so, and be ready to take a Saturday.
What is the queue for the gallery like?
Variable, and usually shorter than people expect for the Lords. You join it at the Cromwell Green entrance, pass through the same airport-style screening as a paying visitor, and are directed up to the gallery.
The Commons on a busy afternoon can take a while and Prime Minister's Questions is a different proposition entirely. The Lords is often close to walk-in. Either way, the queue is outdoors, so dress for it, and bring nothing larger than 60 by 40 centimetres because the bag rule applies to free visitors exactly as it does to ticketed ones.
There is no time limit once you are up there. You can watch for five minutes or stay for the afternoon.
Committees, the other free room
Debates are not the only thing you can watch for nothing. Select committee hearings in both Houses are open to the public too, and they are often the more interesting hour: smaller rooms, a handful of witnesses, and questioning that goes into detail a chamber debate never reaches.
Committee sittings are published in advance, so you can pick a subject rather than take whatever is running. They also tend to be far less busy than the chambers, which means walking in rather than queueing.
What to bring for a free visit
- Photo identification. The same requirement as a paid visit; a passport or national ID card.
- A small bag. Nothing over 60 by 40 centimetres, and there is no storage on site.
- Nothing sharp, no flags. Both are refused at the screening point.
- Patience for the queue. It is outdoors and it is the only unpredictable part.
- Time. There is no limit on how long you sit in the gallery.
You do not need a printed anything. For the free routes there is no ticket to show.
What to expect once you are inside
The same security as everyone: photo identification, airport-style screening, nothing larger than 60 by 40 centimetres, no sharp objects. You are given a visitor badge and you wear it throughout.
In the galleries, phones stay away and bags go under the seat. You can come and go quietly. In the chambers on a tour, nobody sits down — there is nowhere to sit — so wear shoes that will let you stand for two hours without noticing.
The free option you can take before you travel
Parliament publishes 360-degree virtual tours of the interior, free and without booking. They cover the rooms on the tour route, and twenty minutes with them before you travel makes the real visit measurably better: you arrive knowing which room is which and spend your time looking rather than orienting.
They are also the answer for anybody who cannot make the climb or the queue — the Elizabeth Tower in particular, which has 334 steps and an age limit, is more accessible virtually than it will ever be in person.
Free visits with children
The public gallery has no age limit and no charge, which makes it one of the cheapest good hours in central London with a child who has met any of this at school. The realistic constraint is attention rather than access: a chamber debate is slow, and twenty minutes is usually the useful maximum.
If you are a UK resident, the free MP tour is the better family option. It runs seventy-five minutes, follows the full route, and the guides are the same ones who lead the paid tours. Ask for a morning slot and take the earliest one offered.
Either way the security rules apply exactly as they do to a paid visit, including the bag size.
What the free routes do not give you
Two things, and they are worth naming plainly. The public gallery shows you one chamber in session and nothing else — not Westminster Hall at leisure, not Central Lobby, not the route between the two Houses. The free MP tour covers all of that, but only if you live in the UK and only on the days the paid tours run.
Neither free route offers commentary in a language other than English. Parliament's paid handset covers twelve languages plus British Sign Language, and the listed entry ticket covers nine, so for a visitor who wants the building explained in their own language the paid options are genuinely the only ones.
And neither gives you a guaranteed slot on a fixed date. If you are in London for three days with one free morning, a booked ticket removes a risk the queue cannot.
The short version
Live in the UK? Email your MP three months out and take the free tour. Visiting from abroad, or in Westminster on a sitting day? Walk up to the public gallery, queue, and watch the country being governed for nothing. Want the tour route on a fixed date with commentary in your own language? Pay, and pick from the options on London Parliament Tours.
The practical detail for all three is the same, and it is on visitor information.
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