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Royal palaces you can visit this summer
Last summer, Balmoral in Aberdeenshire offered public guided tours for the first time.
This year King Charles also let visitors inside parts of Buckingham Palace that were previously out of bounds.
The only catch is that those small group tours cost £110pp for Balmoral and £90pp for Buckingham Palace. Despite this, they sell out quickly. When we checked on 20 May, there was only one date left for Balmoral - 19 July. However, times do sometimes become available, so it's worth checking back. The Buckingham Palace tickets had all sold out for summer 2025.
Some palaces, such as Clarence House – where the Queen Mother lived for 50 years – are still not open, while others, such as St James’s Palace, can only be visited by paying for an expensive guided tour.
However, most royal palaces do now welcome visitors to some of their spectacular rooms. There are still guided tours to Holyrood in Edinburgh and evening group tours (for 15 people or more) of Windsor Castle.
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Palaces | Standard adult visitor ticket | Standard ticket access areas | Guided tours / access to other areas. |
£18.50 | Grounds and ballroom | ||
£32.00 | Selected state rooms | ||
£20.20 | Grounds, state rooms and other rooms | n/a | |
£21.00 | Gardens and state rooms | ||
£20.00 | State rooms and jewel room | n/a | |
£25 | Gardens and eight ground floor rooms | n/a | |
n/a | n/a |
The best historic sites in the UK
When we asked almost 3,000 people to tell us about their favourite historic destinations, the answers weren’t necessarily what you’d expect.
The five most popular sites included two attractions from the twentieth century, while none of the three were in London - and the only royal ‘palace’ was a ship.
The UK’s 63 top rated historic attractions for you to visit this summer.
