Leeds Castle Tours — Frequently Asked Questions
Everything visitors ask before they book a day in Kent, grouped into the four things that actually decide it: the tour, the ticket, the practicalities and the castle itself. Every figure here is either the operator's own or Leeds Castle's own.
If you are still choosing between a coach from Victoria, a private car and the castle's own Leeds Castle tickets, the three at the top of the list are one per channel, and the decision guide lays all nine out in a single table.
Booking a tour
How much do Leeds Castle tours cost?
Guided coach days from London start at $130 per person, and the two-castle day with Hever runs to $172. The castle's own admission ticket is the cheapest way in at $59.86, and private cars are priced for the whole vehicle rather than per head. Each figure is the operator's own starting fare and moves with the date you choose.
Do the tours include entry to the castle?
Most of the coach days do: five of the captured departures name entry to Leeds Castle in the fare, so you walk in without buying anything. None of the three private cars includes it — you are hiring the vehicle and the driver, and admission is bought separately. Every card says which is which before you click through.
How long do you get at the castle on a day trip from London?
Ninety minutes is the standard allowance on the Canterbury and Dover coaches, which covers the castle building and a quick walk in the grounds. The two-castle day gives three hours, and the private cars give two. If you want the maze, the falconry and the gardens as well, the castle's own ticket and your own transport is the honest answer.
Where do the coaches leave from in London?
Victoria is the hub. Evan Evans boards at its kiosk opposite Gate 1 inside Victoria Coach Station at 8:30am, Premium Tours goes from Gate 19 at 8:15am, and Golden Tours meets at Bus Stop 1 on Bulleid Way at 8:15am. The private cars collect you from your own address or hotel instead.
Is a whole day at the castle worth it?
The estate runs to 500 acres and the castle building is roughly an hour of it, so the answer depends on whether the maze, the gardens, the Bird of Prey Centre and the playgrounds interest you. Reviewers who came on a ninety-minute coach stop and expected the whole estate are the ones who leave three stars. Give it four or five hours and almost nobody says it was too long.
Can you visit without a tour?
Yes, and for some visitors it is the better answer. Southeastern runs direct trains from London Victoria to Bearsted in 70 to 75 minutes, and it is a five-minute taxi or a 30 to 40 minute walk from there. Arrive by train, bus or bike and show a valid ticket for that date and the castle takes 20% off admission.
Do I need to book in advance?
For a coach day, yes — a Leeds Castle booking made a few days out costs the same and the popular summer dates fill. For the castle alone there is no timed entry, so a Leeds Castle reservation is not required once you hold a ticket, though the online price is lower than the gate price. Every tour listed refunds in full up to 24 hours before departure.
What happens if I need to cancel?
All nine of the captured tours carry free cancellation up to 24 hours before the start time, for a full refund. Admission tickets bought from the castle stay valid for twelve months from the date you selected, so an unused day is rescheduled rather than lost. If the castle closes for an event, the same twelve-month validity covers you.
Are the tours run in languages other than English?
Two operators sell the same coach with a guide in Mandarin, Japanese or Spanish as well as English — Evan Evans lists eight language grades and Golden Tours twelve. You pick the language when you choose the ticket grade, not on the day. Everything else on this list is English only.
Tickets and admission
What are Leeds Castle ticket prices in 2026?
An adult Explorer ticket is £34.50 online or £38.50 at the gate, and a child aged 3 to 15 is £24.50 or £28.00. The Ultimate Explorer is £45.50 online or £49.50 on site for an adult, and £33.00 or £36.00 for a child. Parking is included in every one of them.
Is it cheaper to buy online?
Yes, on every band. The saving is £4.00 on an adult Explorer, £4.00 on an adult Ultimate Explorer, and £10.00 on a two-adult family ticket. Tickets cannot be bought over the phone, so it is the website or the gate.
What is the difference between the Explorer and Ultimate Explorer tickets?
Both open the castle, the grounds, the maze and grotto, the gardens, the playgrounds and the Bird of Prey Centre. The Ultimate Explorer adds six trips on Elsie the Castle Train or the seasonal Black Swan Ferry, plus one round of adventure golf. At £11 more for an adult, it pays for itself if you would have bought those separately.
Is the castle ticket really valid for twelve months?
It is. The castle states that admission tickets are valid for multiple use for one year from the day you select when booking. That makes a second visit free, which is why the gardens in May and the Christmas lights in December can be the same ticket. Evening and special ticketed events are the exception and are sold separately.
Is there a family ticket?
Two of them. Family 1 covers one adult and up to three children at £87.00 online for Explorer or £114.50 for Ultimate Explorer; Family 2 covers two adults and up to three children at £115.00 or £153.50. Both are cheaper than the same heads bought individually.
What counts as a child?
Three to fifteen years old pays the child price and sixteen and over pays the adult price. Under-threes are not given a price band on the ticket page. If you are travelling with a toddler, ask at the ticket office rather than assuming.
Do carers have to pay?
No. A disabled ticket includes one free carer per disabled visitor, and the disabled adult rate is itself lower — £30.00 online for Explorer against £34.50. Additional carers need to be arranged with the castle in advance.
Is there a discount for arriving without a car?
There is, and it is worth planning around: show a bus or train ticket valid for the date of your visit, or arrive by bike, and the castle takes 20% off admission. On an adult Ultimate Explorer that is nearly £10 back. The 510 bus and both Southeastern stations qualify.
Is a guided day cheaper than buying the ticket yourself?
Not on the ticket alone, but often on the whole day. An adult Ultimate Explorer at £45.50 plus a return train from Victoria and a taxi at each end lands close to a $130 coach fare that already includes entry, a guide, Canterbury Cathedral and the White Cliffs. The trade is time at the castle: ninety minutes on the coach against as long as you like on your own.
Visiting practically
What time does the castle close?
It depends on the season, and the grounds and the building close at different times. From 1 April to 30 September the grounds run 10am to 6pm and the castle 10:30am to 5pm; from 1 October to 19 November it is 10am to 5pm and 10:30am to 3:30pm; from 20 November to 3 January both close at 3:30pm. Last entry is always earlier than closing.
When is last entry?
Between April and September, 4pm for the grounds and 4:30pm for the castle building. From October onwards it drops to 3pm for both. Arrive after that and the ticket is still valid for another day, because it runs for twelve months.
Are there days when it is shut?
The castle and grounds close on Christmas Day. The castle building also closes for the Fireworks Spectacular weekend on 7 and 8 November 2026 and for the July concert, while the grounds stay open. Check the date before you travel if the interior is the reason you are going.
Is parking included?
Yes — parking is covered by the cost of admission, so there is nothing extra to pay at the barrier. Use ME17 1RG in a sat nav rather than the postal ME17 1PL, which will send you somewhere else. The castle sits seven miles east of Maidstone at Junction 8 of the M20.
How long should I allow?
Two hours covers the castle building and the nearest gardens. Four hours adds the maze, the grotto and a falconry display, and a full day suits anyone bringing children to the playgrounds and the adventure golf. Because the ticket lasts a year, splitting it over two visits costs nothing extra.
How do I get there by train?
Southeastern runs direct services to Bearsted and Hollingbourne. London Victoria to Bearsted takes 70 to 75 minutes, and Ashford International 25 to 30. From either station it is a five-minute taxi or a 30 to 40 minute walk, and your train ticket earns 20% off admission.
Is there a bus to the castle?
The Stagecoach 510 serves it. On Saturdays the route comes into the castle grounds themselves; on other days it stops at the Mercure Maidstone Great Danes Hotel, about a twelve-minute walk away. Keep the ticket for the green travel discount.
Can I take a picnic?
Picnics are welcome across the grounds, and there is a sandy beach with an ice cream parlour to eat one beside. Barbecues are banned everywhere on the estate, disposable ones included. Cafés and a restaurant are on site if you would rather not carry lunch.
Can you take dogs to Leeds Castle?
Only assistance dogs. Wildfowl wander freely across the moat and the Great Water, so the castle admits no other dogs or animals at all. If you have read that dogs are welcome here, it is not true of this estate — visually and hearing impaired visitors may bring an assistance dog into the castle and the grounds, and nothing else is allowed in.
Can I bring a pushchair, a scooter or a bike?
Pushchairs are fine in the grounds but not inside the castle building or the Castle View Restaurant, and a buggy park is provided at the door. Scooters, bikes and wheel-based toys are not allowed in the grounds at all, though toddlers' Smart Trikes are. Drones need permission and are otherwise refused.
Is the castle wheelchair accessible?
Largely, with published detail. Wheelchairs are lent free of charge, ten of them kept on Castle Island, and a free accessible mobility bus runs from near the ticket office; the furthest you need to travel from the car park to reach it is about 100 metres. Electric mobility scooters cannot go inside the castle building, and a castle wheelchair is offered instead.
The castle itself
Is Leeds Castle in Leeds?
It is not. Visitors book flights to Yorkshire on the assumption that Leeds Castle is in Leeds, and the two are roughly 250 miles apart: the castle stands in Kent, seven miles east of Maidstone and about an hour from London. The name comes from the Kentish village of Leeds beside it, recorded in Domesday as Esledes. Use ME17 1RG in a sat nav and you will not go wrong.
Who built it, and when?
The first stone castle went up in 1119, built by Robert de Crevecoeur on two natural islands in the River Len. His family had held the estate since William II granted it to his grandfather Hamo in the 1090s, and kept it for 175 years. Domesday records the manor here in 1086 under Odo, Bishop of Bayeux.
Why is it called the queens' castle?
Because six medieval queens held it in turn as part of their dower. Eleanor of Castile built the revetment wall and the Gloriette in the 1280s, and Margaret of France, Isabella of France, Anne of Bohemia, Joan of Navarre and Catherine de Valois followed. Joan was later accused of witchcraft by her stepson Henry V and imprisoned in the castle until 1422.
Did Henry VIII stay here?
He did, with Katherine of Aragon, and he changed the place. Between 1517 and 1523 he turned a fortress into a royal palace, which is why a castle founded in 1119 reads as Tudor from the lawn. Jean Froissart had already called it ‘the beautiful Palace in Kent’ more than a century earlier.
What is actually inside the castle building?
Mostly the 1930s. Olive, Lady Baillie, the last private owner, had the interiors remade by Armand-Albert Rateau and then by Stephane Boudin of Maison Jansen, so the rooms you walk through are a country-house interior rather than a medieval one. The Gloriette, the older building on the smaller island, is the medieval survivor.
What is the maze like?
It holds 2,400 yew trees and was created in 1988 by the maze designer Adrian Fisher. It is laid out in a square, but seen from the viewing mound or the air the pattern is circular, and part of the plan mirrors a queen's crown. The way out is downwards, through an underground grotto.
Can you combine Leeds Castle and Canterbury in one day?
Almost every guided day from London does exactly that, and most add the White Cliffs of Dover as a third stop. Canterbury Cathedral entry is usually an option you select rather than something the base fare includes, so read the grade before you pay. The cathedral leg runs 45 minutes to two hours depending on the operator.
Ready to pick one?
Five of the guided tours cover castle admission in the fare, three do not, and one is the castle's own ticket. The differences are on the cards.
Longer answers live on visiting Leeds Castle, ticket prices and accessibility. Leeds Castle Tours keeps the tour fares in one place beside them.
Sources
Checked on 5 September 2026. Hours, prices and event dates are Leeds Castle's own and they change. The official pages are the place to confirm before you travel.