If you’re travelling to London from elsewhere, you’ll certainly be looking for something exciting to do with your time in the Big Smoke. Selfridges, the iconic Oxford Street department store, even offers its own experience gifts like an afternoon (beau)tea experience and floristry workshops.
Our London experience guide has something for everyone, with the best experiences to gift for couples, foodies, boozy mates, and the adventurous types.
We’ve even got the niche, but highly important, category covered: what to suggest when a parent comes to visit. They’re probably not going to want to visit your local pub, and dishing up a microwave meal while you catch up on soaps together might not cut it, either. We know they’re here to see you, but come on, let’s make a bit of effort!
The RadioTimes.com team knows a thing or two about what to do in London. We've researched the best London walking tours, the best London art exhibitions and the best West End shows, as well as how to get cheap theatre tickets. We like to try out the things we recommend, too, and you can read our 2:22 A Ghost Story review and BBC Earth Experience review.
A lot of the activities come from reputable experience day companies, too, like Buyagift and Virgin Experience Days, who work hard to secure you the best deal. So without further ado, let’s see what exciting things you can get up to in London this year.
For more exciting things to do in the capital city, be sure to check out our Going Out section for guides like the best UK driving experiences and explainers like what is Frameless?
Best London experience gifts 2023 at a glance:
- Tour of Wembley Stadium, four for £65
- The Slide at the ArcelorMittal Orbit, two for £33.50
- Candlelight: A Tribute to Coldplay at Southwark Cathedral, from £20
- Painting Class at The Clapham North, from £20
- Hidden Vintage Cinema Experience with Cocktail, two for £40
- Sister Act, from £24
- ZSL London Zoo, from £26.50
- Comedy Night with Three Dish Dinner at Inamo, two for £59.95
- The Big London Bake, from £32
- Historic Photography Tour of London for Two, for £99 £69
- Candlelight: A Tribute to Taylor Swift at Southwark Cathedral, from £35
- Original Chocolate Making Workshop, two for £100 £70
- Graveney Gin Tasting in Tooting Market, two for £70
- Kew Gardens with Thames River Cruise, two for £74
- Up at The O2 Climb, two for £84
- Become a Zombie for a Day at The London Tombs, two for £99.99
- Gin Masterclass at Gordon Ramsay's Bread Street Kitchen, two for £100
- Thames Rockets Break the Barrier River Cruise, two for £110
- Cookery Class at The Jamie Oliver Cookery School, two for £128
- Vegan Pasta Workshop Supper Club, for £75
- London Eye and Lunch Cruise, for £124
Best London experience gifts to buy in 2023
There are hundreds (if not thousands) of attractions to visit in London, and more classes, shows, and immersive experiences are popping up every day. To help you filter through the barrage of information, we've pulled together our recommendations of the best London experiences you can gift someone, then broken them down into categories. Here are our favourites for 2023.
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Best London experience gifts for foodies
The Big London Bake
Fans of The Great British Bake Off are going to want a piece of this experience. Grab a mate — or a couple of them — and head over to The Big London Bake, where you’ll have 90 minutes to whip up a creation that would impress Prue Leith and Paul Hollywood. There’s no judging here, though, so cake it ‘til you make it, and snap up a ticket before they sell like hotcakes.
Buy The Big London Bake tickets from £32 at DesignMyNight
Cookery Class for Two at The Jamie Oliver Cookery School
In this cookery class, you’ll have the choice of which cuisine you’d like to become a culinary master at North Indian Thali, Vietnamese street food, pasta, or easy dinnertime meals. A professional chef will talk you through your chosen meal, and yes, you can absolutely eat it at the end.
A cookery class would be the perfect birthday gift for a loved one, and for more inspiration, take a look at our best experience birthday gifts guide.
Vegan Pasta Workshop Supper Club
Learn plenty of tips and tricks as you whip up a vegan pasta delight, plus get a vegan recipe booklet to take home in this workshop. There are different flavours on various days, so you can choose whether to make mushroom, butternut squash, spinach and ricotta, or pear and gorgonzola pasta — all of which sound delicious.
Buy Vegan Pasta Workshop Supper Club tickets for £75 at Fever
Original Chocolate Making Workshop for Two
Discover the rich history of chocolate and make your own sweet treats in this chocolate-making class. You’ll taste cocoa in its purest form, and try a variation of chocolate, then you’ll try your hand at making chocolate yourself! Create and decorate a giant chocolate button, and add toppings to gooey fudge. You should have some chocolates to take home with you if you can resist eating them before…
Best London experience gifts for your parents
Kew Gardens with Thames River Cruise for Two
This experience includes a one-and-a-half-hour sightseeing cruise along the River Thames which will drop you off a 10-minute walk away from Kew Gardens, then you’ll also get entry for two into the beautiful botanical gardens. One of the RadioTimes.com team treated their mum to this last summer, and let's just say they were favourite child for a while...
Buy Kew Gardens with Thames River Cruise for Two tickets for £74 at Virgin Experience Days
Candlelight: A Tribute to Coldplay at Southwark Cathedral
This candlelight concert truly is a once-in-a-lifetime experience. An outstanding pianist will cover Coldplay’s greatest hits, including ‘Yellow’, ‘Fix You’, ‘The Scientist’, ‘Clocks’, and more, in the beautiful setting of Southwark Cathedral.
Buy Candlelight: A Tribute to Coldplay at Southwark Cathedral tickets from £20 at Fever
Are you a fan of live music? Here's how to get cheap concert tickets to see your favourite artists for less.
ZSL London Zoo
If you’re in London for a limited time, a day out at the zoo is a brilliant way to spend it. Plan your day and choose which animals you’d like to see: will you start with the meerkats and otters, before heading to the Reptile House and finishing at Penguin Beach? Or maybe you’ll visit creepy crawlies at Butterfly Paradise and Tiny Giants, then walk to bigger animals like gorillas and tigers.
Buy ZSL London Zoo tickets from £26.50 at ZSL London Zoo
Tour of Wembley Stadium
With the success of the Lionesses this year, combined with the World Cup frenzy that's currently taking place, we recommend taking a tour of the UK's best-known football ground. It's the ideal gift for a football fan in your family; the Wembley Stadium tour allows you to see the changing rooms, take a picture in the Press Conference Room and walk through the players' tunnel.
Buy Tour of Wembley Stadium tickets for two adults and two children for £65 at Buyagift
Are you a sports fan? Check out the best BT Sport offers and Sky Sports offers for this month.
Historic Photography Tour of London for Two
If your parents are anything like ours, they love taking photos when they're out and about – and they can never resist a 'family selfie' either. This next experience lets them hone in on their photography skills, as a professional photographer tour guide will teach them all the tips and tricks of photography.
London is packed with impressive cathedrals, structures and churches, not to mention stunning side streets, too, and you'll be taking photos of all of them in this History Photography Tour.
Buy Historic Photography Tour of London for Two for £99 £69 (save £30 or 30%) at Activity Superstore
For more photography experiences, we've compiled a guide to the best photography courses.
London Eye and Lunch Cruise
There are a few landmarks which are synonymous with London: Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, Tower Bridge, the Tower of London and, of course, the London Eye. Experience London from new heights (135 metres up, to be exact), then enjoy a two course lunch, plus tea and coffee, on a blissful river cruise.
This experience is for Saturdays and Sundays throughout the year.
Buy London Eye and Lunch Cruise for £124 at Activity Superstore
A West End show like Sister Act
Sister Act is returning to London's West End with two stellar guest stars: Beverley Knight and Alexandra Burke, who will be taking it in turns playing the lead role of Deloris van Cartier. You're probably familiar with the Sister Act plot: Deloris (Whoopi Goldberg in the movie) goes into witness protection as a nun at a convent after she witnesses a murder, but she has more than a little trouble adjusting to her new lifestyle...
Buy Sister Act tickets from £24 at Ticketmaster
Best London experience gifts for couples
Comedy Night with Three Dish Dinner for Two at inamo
Switch-up the usual dinner time routine: asking your significant other what to cook for tea, opening the fridge to an uninspiring selection of food, then ordering a takeaway from your local. In this experience for two, you’ll begin the night on a high with a delicious three dish meal of Pan-Asian cuisine, like sushi, sashimi, tapas, dumplings and more, at inamo in Covent Garden, before enjoying a comedy evening at inamo’s in-house Comedy Club.
Are you a fan of comedy? Then take a look at Just For Laughs London and the best comedy shows in London.
Hidden Vintage Cinema Experience with Cocktail for Two
Who doesn’t love a trip to the cinema? How about a trip to a vintage cinema with a cult classic showing, and a movie-themed complimentary cocktail afterwards? Sounds perfect.
Buy Hidden Vintage Cinema Experience with Cocktail for Two tickets for £40 at Virgin Experience Days
Painting Class at The Clapham North
This painting class in south west London is a great way to finish off a day exploring the city. Depending on which day you pick, you can either paint Three Sunflowers In a Vase or The Starry Night by Van Gogh, or paintings by Steinlen, Kandinsky, Hopper and Monet. No matter which painting you choose, you’ll enjoy your time in a relaxed environment and have a piece of art to take home with you at the end of the day.
Buy Painting Class at The Clapham North tickets from £20 at Fever
Candlelight: A Tribute to Taylor Swift at Southwark Cathedral
For three days only, there's the chance to see a tribute to Taylor Swift at Southwark Cathedral - but as was to be expected, tickets for the various 7pm and 9pm performances are already selling out.
In a room bathed with candlelight, you'll listen to an extraordinary group of string musicians perform Taylor Swift songs. This is a great experience if you and your significant other are Swifties, but it's also a wonderful evening out with friends.
Buy Candlelight: A Tribute to Taylor Swift at Southwark Cathedral tickets for £35 at Fever
Best London experience gifts for adventurers
Become a Zombie for a Day at The London Tombs
In this one-of-a-kind experience, you and a friend will be transformed into terrifying zombies and given a lesson in the art of scaring people, as well as how to apply your own FX make-up. You'll take these skills (and your creepy exterior) to scare visitors at The London Tombs.
Scaring people is thirsty work, so you and your zombie cohort will be treated to pub grub at The Bermondsey Bierkeller as part of the experience, too.
Buy Become a Zombie for a Day at The London Tombs for £99.99 at Virgin Experience Days
Take a look at the best UK zombie experiences, if you dare...
Up at The O2 Climb for Two
View London from dizzying new heights with this experience. You and a fellow adventurer will climb 365m to the top of The O2, take the opportunity to snap some incredible photos with the whole of London stretched out behind you, before heading back down to earth.
Buy Up at The O2 Climb for Two tickets for £84 at Virgin Experience Days
Thames Rockets Break the Barrier River Cruise for Two
We all have that mate who’s a huge thrill-seeker; so if you’re planning a day out for them, you know afternoon tea isn’t going to cut it. Treat your daredevil friend to a speedboat ride across the River Thames. Take twists and turns along the river at high-speed and catch glimpses of landmarks like The O2, all while listening to tunes across the ages. Just remember to hold on tight!
Buy Thames Rockets Break the Barrier River Cruise for Two tickets for £99 at Buyagift
If that wasn’t adventurous enough for you, check out the best UK driving experiences and best London escape rooms.
The Slide at the ArcelorMittal Orbit for Two
Take in 360-degree views of London from the largest sculpture in the UK before whizzing down the slide - which is the longest in the world measuring a gigantic 178 metres. Loccated in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, you'll be able to see up to 20 miles across London.
The Slide at the ArcelorMittal Orbit for Two tickets for £33.50 at Red Letter Days
Best boozy London experience gifts
Graveney Gin Tasting in Tooting Market for Two
The iconic Tooting Market hosts this fun-filled experience: gin tasting for two. Learn about the history of gin, taste three variations of Graveney Gin’s spirits, and enjoy some nibbles.
Buy Graveney Gin Tasting in Tooting Market for Two tickets for £70 at Virgin Experience Days
If you're a fan of a cocktail, check out our guide to how to get Sex and the City the experience tickets, which is in London for one week only in June, and where the Cosmopolitans are sure to be flowing.
Gin Masterclass for Two at Gordon Ramsay's Bread Street Kitchen
If gin and tonic is your tipple of choice, then this masterclass is a perfect way to spend an afternoon. You and your plus one will hop behind the bar like the mixologists you were born to be, and choose ingredients to craft two botanical gin cocktails. You’ll end the masterclass with your cocktails, of course, and a delicious sharing platter.
Buy Gin Masterclass for Two at Gordon Ramsay's Bread Street Kitchen tickets for £100 at Buyagift
Cocktail Masterclass for Two at Gordon Ramsay's Bread Street Kitchen
In the next life, we’d like to be mixologists: conjuring up new and exciting cocktails, then trying out our creations (obviously) is our idea of heaven, but we definitely need to work on our arm strength first. You’ll be treated to a one-on-one cocktail-making class to whip-up classic and contemporary drinks.
Buy Cocktail Masterclass for Two at Gordon Ramsay's Bread Street Kitchen tickets for £80 at Buyagift
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