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Museums in London

85 places from the A Reason to Stop library. Pick one to see what makes it worth a stop, then take the whole list with you in the free app.

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  • Apsley HouseThe Duke of Wellington's London home at Hyde Park Corner, run by English Heritage as a museum with grand state rooms, a Canova statue of Napoleon and paintings by Velazquez, Rubens and Goya.
  • APT GalleryAn artist-run contemporary art gallery and studio complex on the banks of Deptford Creek, founded in 1995 by the charity Art in Perpetuity Trust and now housing 42 studios alongside its exhibition space.
  • Bank of England MuseumA free museum beside the Bank of England on Bartholomew Lane, telling the Bank's story through banknotes, coins and bullion, with a reconstruction of Soane's Stock Office and a real gold bar visitors can lift.
  • Benjamin Franklin HouseThe only surviving former home of Benjamin Franklin anywhere in the world, a Georgian house on Craven Street near Trafalgar Square where he lodged for nearly sixteen years between 1757 and 1775.
  • Bentley Priory MuseumA museum in the Grade II* listed mansion that served as RAF Fighter Command headquarters in the Battle of Britain, with Dowding's office and the Operations Room.
  • Bethlem Museum of the MindA free museum in the grounds of the Bethlem Royal Hospital in Beckenham, telling the story of an institution founded in 1247 and showing art by former patients including Richard Dadd and Louis Wain.
  • British Library (Treasures Gallery)The UK's national library, whose free Treasures Gallery displays historic manuscripts and books, including Magna Carta, the Lindisfarne Gospels and the Gutenberg Bible.
  • British MuseumA vast free museum of human history and culture, housed in a Bloomsbury building with a glass-roofed Great Court at its centre.
  • Bruce Castle MuseumA free museum in a Grade I listed manor house in Tottenham, with exhibitions on local history and postal reform, set in Bruce Castle Park.
  • Burgh House and Hampstead MuseumA Grade I listed Queen Anne house of 1704 in Hampstead's New End Square, home to a free local-history museum, a basement cafe and the world's largest collection of work by Helen Allingham.
  • Camden Art CentreA free contemporary art centre in a Victorian former library on Arkwright Road, with changing exhibitions by under-shown artists, a garden and a good cafe.
  • The Cartoon MuseumA small museum near Oxford Street dedicated to British cartoon art, caricature and comics, from newspaper satire to graphic novels.
  • Charles Dickens MuseumCharles Dickens's only surviving London home, at 48 Doughty Street, where he lived from 1837–1839 and wrote Oliver Twist and Nicholas Nickleby, opened as a museum in 1925.
  • Churchill War RoomsThe underground bunker beneath Whitehall from which Winston Churchill and his war cabinet directed Britain's campaign during the Second World War.
  • The Cinema MuseumA volunteer-run cinema museum in the former Lambeth Workhouse in Kennington, with posters, projectors, ushers' uniforms and cinema seats, visited on guided tours that include short films.
  • The Clink Prison MuseumA museum on Bankside built on the actual site of The Clink, an ecclesiastical prison dating to 1144 that gave the English language its slang word for jail.
  • The Courtauld GalleryAn art gallery inside Somerset House holding one of the UK's finest Impressionist and Post-Impressionist collections, from Manet and Van Gogh to the most significant group of Cézannes in Britain.
  • Crystal Palace MuseumA small volunteer-run museum in the park's surviving Victorian engineering-school building, telling the story of the giant glass Crystal Palace that stood here until it burned down in 1936.
  • Dennis Severs' HouseA Spitalfields townhouse staged as if its 18th-century occupants just stepped out, walked through in silence with candlelight and creaking floors.
  • Design MuseumA free museum of product, industrial, graphic and architectural design, housed since 2016 in the restored former Commonwealth Institute building in Kensington.
  • Down House (Home of Charles Darwin)Charles Darwin's family home for four decades in the village of Downe, in the London Borough of Bromley, with his study, gardens and the Sandwalk where he paced out his thoughts.
  • Dulwich Picture GallerySir John Soane's 1817 gallery on the edge of Dulwich Village, often described as England's oldest public art gallery, with an outstanding Old Master collection and a sculpture garden.
  • Emery Walker's HouseA modest terrace house whose interiors were kept almost unchanged since Emery Walker, friend of William Morris, lived there, making it one of the last intact Arts and Crafts interiors. Visits are by guided tour only.
  • The Fan MuseumA small museum in a pair of Grade II* listed 1721 townhouses on Crooms Hill devoted entirely to hand fans, with an orangery with murals and a Japanese-style garden behind.
  • Fashion and Textile MuseumA fashion and design museum in a former Bermondsey cash-and-carry warehouse, founded by designer Dame Zandra Rhodes and converted by Mexican architect Ricardo Legorreta into a building painted hot pink, orange, yellow and blue.
  • Fenton House and GardenA 1690s merchant's house in Hampstead with a collection of early keyboard instruments, porcelain and needlework, and a walled garden with an old apple orchard.
  • Florence Nightingale MuseumA museum at St Thomas' Hospital holding the world's largest collection of material on Florence Nightingale's life and work, opened in 1989.
  • The Foundling MuseumA museum near Coram's Fields telling the story of the Foundling Hospital, Britain's first children's charity and first public art gallery, founded in 1739 by philanthropist Thomas Coram.
  • Freud MuseumSigmund Freud's final home in Hampstead, where he lived after fleeing Nazi-annexed Austria in 1938, preserved as it was when his daughter Anna Freud died there in 1982.
  • Garden MuseumBritain's only museum of the art, history and design of gardens, in the medieval and Victorian church of St Mary-at-Lambeth beside Lambeth Palace, with the Tradescant tomb, a garden and a cafe.
  • Goldsmiths CCAA free contemporary art gallery on the Goldsmiths, University of London campus in New Cross, built inside a converted 1898 Victorian bath house by Turner Prize-winning architects Assemble.
  • Guards MuseumA military museum inside Wellington Barracks near Buckingham Palace, telling the story of the five Foot Guards regiments (Grenadier, Coldstream, Scots, Irish and Welsh Guards) from the 17th century to today.
  • Gunnersbury Park MuseumA free local-history museum in the Large Mansion of the former Rothschild estate at Gunnersbury Park, with archaeology, costume and fine art displays, in a large park in west London.
  • Headstone Manor and MuseumA moated medieval manor house with a 16th-century Great Barn, walled garden and free local-history museum in Harrow.
  • Hogarth's HouseWilliam Hogarth's country retreat from 1749 to 1764, on Hogarth Lane by the Great West Road in Chiswick, now a free museum of his prints with a small mulberry garden.
  • Horniman Museum and GardensA free South London museum of anthropology, natural history and musical instruments set within 16 acres of gardens, opened in 1901 as a gift to the public by tea trader Frederick John Horniman.
  • Hunterian MuseumThe Royal College of Surgeons' museum at Lincoln's Inn Fields, tracing the history of surgery through 18th-century anatomist John Hunter's own specimen collection, reopened in 2023 after a five-year, £4.6 million redevelopment.
  • IWM London (Imperial War Museum)The Imperial War Museums' London branch, in the former Bethlem Royal Hospital under its copper-clad dome, documenting modern war and wartime experience since 1914, with free general admission.
  • Jewish Museum LondonA small, free exhibition space run by Jewish Museum London inside JW3 community centre, an interim home while the museum works toward reopening permanently after its Camden building closed for good in July 2023.
  • KenwoodA neoclassical mansion on the northern edge of Hampstead Heath, free to enter, holding an Old Master collection with a Rembrandt self-portrait and a Vermeer, plus a glowing Adam-designed library.
  • Leighton HouseThe former home and studio of Victorian painter Frederic Leighton in Holland Park, built around an elaborate tiled Arab Hall inspired by his travels through the Middle East.
  • Linley Sambourne HouseThe preserved Kensington home of Punch cartoonist Linley Sambourne, its dense Victorian interiors filled with William Morris wallpapers, stained glass and Chinese porcelain.
  • London Canal MuseumA King's Cross museum on the history of London's canals, housed in a former Victorian ice warehouse built by ice-cream pioneer Carlo Gatti, with two real 30-metre ice wells underneath it.
  • London Museum of Water and SteamA Victorian waterworks in Brentford with historic Cornish beam engines and a 200ft standpipe tower of 1867, telling the story of London's drinking water.
  • London Transport MuseumA museum tracing 200 years of London's public transport, from horse-drawn buses to Tube trains, in a former Victorian flower market building.
  • Lord's Cricket Ground Tour and MCC MuseumA guided tour of the home of cricket that takes in the Victorian Pavilion, the Long Room, the players' dressing rooms, the media centre and the MCC Museum, which houses the Ashes urn.
  • Markfield Beam Engine and MuseumA Victorian sewage pumping station in Markfield Park whose 1886 beam engine still runs on steam days.
  • Museum of BrandsA nostalgic walk through two centuries of consumer culture, from Victorian packaging to the digital age, laid out as a Time Tunnel in Notting Hill.
  • Museum of CroydonA free museum in the Croydon Clocktower that mixes local history with the Riesco collection of Chinese ceramics and changing exhibitions, in the same building as the David Lean Cinema.
  • Museum of FreemasonryFree museum on the first floor of Freemasons' Hall, the Art Deco headquarters of English freemasonry, showing regalia, jewels, ceramics and rare manuscripts. A rare chance to see behind the mystique.
  • Museum of London DocklandsA museum inside a genuine early-19th-century Georgian sugar warehouse at West India Quay, covering London's history as a port city, including its role in the transatlantic slave trade.
  • Museum of the HomeA museum in Hoxton exploring the history of domestic life in Britain, housed in genuine 1714 almshouses originally built by the Ironmongers' Company.
  • The Musical MuseumA Brentford museum of self-playing instruments, with a Wurlitzer theatre organ, player pianos and orchestrions, brought to life on guided tours with live demonstrations.
  • National Army MuseumA free museum beside the Royal Hospital in Chelsea covering British Army history from the Civil War to today, across five galleries, with hands-on displays and a cafe.
  • National GalleryA free national collection of Western European painting spanning the 13th to 19th centuries, overlooking Trafalgar Square.
  • National Maritime MuseumA free museum of Britain's seafaring history in Greenwich, holding the world's largest collection of maritime art, maps, and ship models.
  • National Portrait GalleryA free collection of portraits of notable British figures from the Tudors to the present day, just behind the National Gallery.
  • Natural History MuseumA free museum of the natural world in a terracotta Romanesque building in South Kensington, known for its dinosaur skeletons and blue whale.
  • The Old Operating Theatre MuseumEurope's oldest surviving operating theatre, hidden in the garret of a church tower where surgeons once worked without anaesthetic.
  • Orleans House GalleryA free gallery in Twickenham built around the Grade I listed Baroque Octagon Room, with changing exhibitions, the Richmond borough art collection, woodland gardens and a cafe.
  • Petrie Museum of Egyptian ArchaeologyA UCL museum holding over 80,000 objects of Egyptian and Sudanese archaeology, one of the largest and most important collections of its kind outside Egypt itself.
  • The Photographers' GalleryThe UK's first public gallery dedicated entirely to photography, founded in Covent Garden in 1971 and now based in a converted Soho textile warehouse.
  • The Postal Museum and Mail RailA museum of postal history in Clerkenwell, paired with a ride on Mail Rail, the narrow-gauge railway that once carried post through tunnels beneath London.
  • RAF Museum LondonA free aviation museum on the site of the old Hendon aerodrome, with six hangars of RAF and aviation history from the first world war onward and a family activity where you can sit in a Spitfire.
  • Ragged School MuseumA canalside museum in Dr Barnardo's former free school in Mile End, where you can sit in a recreated Victorian classroom and learn East End childhood history.
  • Royal Academy of ArtsAn art institution founded in 1768 at Burlington House on Piccadilly, run by and for working artists rather than a state collection, and still home to the Summer Exhibition.
  • Science MuseumA free museum of science and technology in South Kensington, covering everything from steam engines to space exploration.
  • Shakespeare's GlobeA reconstruction of the open-air Elizabethan playhouse where Shakespeare's company performed, standing near the site of the original theatre on Bankside.
  • Sherlock Holmes MuseumA Victorian townhouse museum recreating the fictional consulting detective's rooms at 221B Baker Street, staffed by costumed guides.
  • Sir John Soane's MuseumThe architect's own house, left exactly as it was in 1837. Crammed floor to ceiling with antiquities, paintings, and architectural curiosities.
  • South London GalleryA free contemporary art gallery on Peckham Road, founded in 1891 to bring art to south London and now spanning its original Victorian building plus a converted former fire station.
  • Tate BritainA free gallery of British art from 1500 to the present, on the Thames at Millbank, with the country's largest collection of J.M.W. Turner's work.
  • Tate ModernA free gallery of international modern and contemporary art, housed in a former power station on the south bank of the Thames.
  • V&A East MuseumA free V&A museum on Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, opened in April 2026, with two permanent Why We Make galleries and an opening exhibition on Black British music.
  • V&A East StorehouseA free working museum store in the Here East building at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, holding over 250,000 objects across three floors, with a Conservation Overlook where you can watch conservators at work.
  • V&A MuseumA free museum of art, design, and fashion across more than 140 galleries in South Kensington, the world's largest of its kind.
  • Valence House MuseumA partly moated manor house in Dagenham, now a free local museum with displays on the area's past, a tearoom and walled gardens. It is the only survivor of Dagenham's five manor houses.
  • The Wallace CollectionA free national museum in a Marylebone townhouse holding the Hertford-Wallace family's collection of Old Master paintings, arms and armour, and French furniture and porcelain.
  • Wellcome CollectionA free museum exploring medicine, the body, and human belief through the eclectic collection of a Victorian pharmaceutical magnate.
  • Whitechapel GalleryA public contemporary art gallery on Whitechapel High Street, opened in 1901 as one of London's first free exhibition spaces built specifically for the East End's working-class communities.
  • The Wiener Holocaust LibraryA free exhibition space and research library on Russell Square documenting Nazi persecution and the Holocaust, which describes itself as the world's oldest institution devoted to its study.
  • William Morris GalleryA free Georgian house in Lloyd Park, Walthamstow, where the Morris family lived from 1848 to 1856, now holding the most comprehensive collection of William Morris's work and Arts and Crafts design.
  • Wimbledon Windmill MuseumA windmill built in 1817 on Wimbledon Common, now a small free museum of milling and local history, beside the Mill House where Baden-Powell wrote parts of Scouting for Boys.
  • World Rugby Museum at Twickenham StadiumA museum in the South Stand of Twickenham holding over 37,000 pieces of rugby memorabilia, including an 1871 England jersey and cap and the Calcutta Cup, with stadium tours available.
  • Young V&AThe V&A's free children's museum in Bethnal Green, housed in a relocated 1850s iron-framed building, with playful galleries about imagination, play and design that adults enjoy too.

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