London in August: Weather, Events and the Best Tours
Written and checked by the Best London Tours editorial team. .
August is the warmest month in London, averaging 22.3C by day, and the only month in this guide with fewer than eleven wet days. It is also one of just three months when the Buckingham Palace State Rooms are open to visitors. Sunset on the 15th is 20:23, so an evening tour is still a daylight tour.
Quick pick: the best London tours in August
| # | Tour | Best for | Duration | From | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Buckingham Palace | The one thing you cannot do most of the year | 2.5 hours | £33 | 4.6 (7,797) |
| 2 | Thames River Cruise | Using the 20:23 sunset properly | 1-2 hours | £17 | 4.5 (24,711) |
| 3 | Hop-On Hop-Off Bus | A first orientation day in dry weather | Full day | £25 | 4.3 (8,092) |
| 4 | Tower of London | Arriving at opening, before the coaches | 2-3 hours | £37 | 4.6 (31,489) |
| 5 | London Zoo | A school-holiday day that is almost entirely outdoors | 3-4 hours | £31 | 4.4 (2,526) |
| 6 | Harry Potter Studio Tour | The wet day in the middle of a dry month | 7-9 hours | £85 | 4.6 (10,822) |
| 7 | London Bike Tour | Covering the parks and the river in one go | 3 hours | £42 | 4.8 (151) |
| 8 | Photography Tour | Golden hour on the river | 1 hour | £39 | 5 (18) |
| 9 | Borough Market Food Tour | Eating outdoors without a plan B | 3 hours | £92 | 4.8 (593) |
| 10 | London Eye | The clearest long-distance views of the year | 30 minutes | £25 | 4.6 (39,011) |
Prices, ratings and review counts verified against live GetYourGuide listings on 28 July 2026. Duration varies by the option you choose at checkout.
Is August a good time to visit London?
Yes, and it is the easiest month of the ten to plan. Highs average 22.3C, wet days drop to ten, the lowest count of any month, and you get 14 hours 37 minutes of daylight in mid-August. The trade is price and volume: this is peak season and the last weekend belongs to Notting Hill Carnival.
August is the month when London behaves least like its reputation. The 22.3C average high is mild rather than hot, the ten-year mean shows only ten days with a millimetre of rain or more, and the sun does not set until 20:23 in the middle of the month. You can genuinely fill a day from 09:00 to 21:00 without needing a wet-weather plan for every hour of it.
The reason to come now rather than in September is the Buckingham Palace State Rooms. They open for a short summer season each year, and the 2026 season runs 9 July to 27 September. For ten months of the year the only way into the Palace is a small number of ticketed guided tours on selected dates. If seeing the State Rooms is on your list, August and the first three weeks of September are your window in this guide.
What August costs you is space and money. Hotel rates in zone 1 sit at their annual peak, the South Bank is shoulder to shoulder from mid-morning, and the timed-entry attractions sell their good slots weeks out. If you want the same daylight with fewer people, May gives you an extra hour of it and considerably lower rates.
London weather in August
Expect 22.3C average highs and 13.7C lows, around 57mm of rain across ten wet days, and sunrise at 05:45 with sunset at 20:23 on the 15th. London sheds 1 hour 47 minutes of daylight between 1 and 31 August, the second-fastest loss of any month in the year.
| Measure | August | Annual context |
|---|---|---|
| Average high | 22.3C | Ranges from 7.7C in January to 22.6C in July |
| Average low | 13.7C | Ranges from 1.7C in January to 13.9C in July |
| Rainfall | 57mm | Driest is April at 40mm, wettest is October at 77mm |
| Wet days (1mm or more) | 10 days | Fewest in April at 10, most in March at 13 |
| Daylight, mid-month | 14h 37m | From 7h 52m in mid-December to 16h 36m in mid-June |
| Sunrise and sunset, 15th | 05:45 to 20:23 | From 15:51 in mid-December to 21:19 in mid-June |
| Change across the month | loses 1h 47m | Clocks go back on 25 October 2026 and forward on 28 March 2027 |
Temperature, rainfall and wet days are the 2015 to 2024 means from ERA5 reanalysis for central London, 2015 to 2024, via the Open-Meteo historical archive. Daylight, sunrise and sunset are for the 15th, from timeanddate.com sunrise and sunset tables for London.
The single most misread thing about a London August is heat. The ten-year mean high is 22.3C, which is a pleasant walking temperature, not a Mediterranean one. Individual days above 30C do happen and the Underground becomes genuinely unpleasant when they do, because the deep tube lines have no air conditioning on most of the network. Plan the deep lines for the morning and use buses or walk in the afternoon on a hot day.
Rain in August is convective rather than frontal: short heavy bursts rather than the all-day grey that arrives in October. Ten wet days across the month means roughly one day in three sees a millimetre or more, and most of those days are still perfectly usable. A packable shell beats an umbrella because London summer rain usually arrives with wind.
The daylight curve matters more than most guides admit. On 1 August you get 15 hours 24 minutes of daylight; by the 31st that is down to 13 hours 38 minutes. A river cruise booked for 19:30 in the first week is a golden-hour cruise. The same booking on 30 August is a dusk cruise. Check the date, not just the month.
Crowds, prices and what to book ahead
August is peak season and prices show it. Book the Buckingham Palace State Rooms, the Warner Bros Studio Tour and the Tower of London before you fly, all three run on timed entry and all three sell out. The last weekend, 30 and 31 August, is Notting Hill Carnival and west London effectively closes.
Three products in our list are genuinely book-ahead in August rather than nice-to-book-ahead. The Buckingham Palace State Rooms sell in timed slots against a fixed seasonal capacity. The Warner Bros Studio Tour at Leavesden sells out days in advance across the school holidays and does not admit walk-ups. The Tower of London absorbs the biggest single crowd in the city on a wet August afternoon, and the Crown Jewels queue is where that shows.
The Carnival weekend deserves its own paragraph. Notting Hill Carnival runs on Sunday 30 and Monday 31 August, the 31st being the summer bank holiday. Ladbroke Grove, Westbourne Park and Notting Hill Gate operate on heavily restricted patterns, some stations exit-only or closed altogether, and bus routes across W10 and W11 are diverted for two days. If you are staying in Notting Hill and not going to Carnival, plan to be somewhere else those two days.
On price, August is not the month to look for value in London. What does hold its value is the free national museums, which stay free in every month, and the walking product: our ghost, Blitz and Jack the Ripper walks are all under £30 and are not capacity-constrained the way the ticketed attractions are.
The best tours in London in August
The August ten is re-ordered around three facts: the Buckingham Palace State Rooms are open, sunset is at 20:23, and this is the driest month by wet-day count. Open-air, on-water and evening experiences move up; the indoor wet-weather attractions move down and return in October.
1. Buckingham Palace
4.6 out of 5 from 7,797 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £33 • 2.5 hours
Ranked first on seasonal logic rather than review volume, and it is the clearest re-rank on this page. The State Rooms open only for a short summer season, 9 July to 27 September in 2026. Every other tour in this list is available in ten or twelve months of the year. This one is not.
Best for in August: The one thing you cannot do most of the year
2. Thames River Cruise
4.5 out of 5 from 24,711 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £17 • 1-2 hours
The third most reviewed product on the site and the best-value hour in an August evening. An open-deck run between Westminster and Greenwich at 19:00 is still full daylight in mid-August. The same cruise in December is a dark-water cruise with the deck closed.
Best for in August: Using the 20:23 sunset properly
3. Hop-On Hop-Off Bus
4.3 out of 5 from 8,092 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £25 • Full day
This is the month the open top deck is actually the point. At 22.3C and ten wet days, the upper deck is usable most of the time, which is not true from October onwards. Note the Carnival weekend: routes through west London are disrupted on 30 and 31 August.
Best for in August: A first orientation day in dry weather
4. Tower of London
4.6 out of 5 from 31,489 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £37 • 2-3 hours
The second most reviewed thing on the site and still on its longer summer hours in August, which means a late-afternoon arrival works. The Crown Jewels queue is the pinch point and it is at its worst between 11:00 and 14:00, so take the first hour of the day or the last two.
Best for in August: Arriving at opening, before the coaches
5. London Zoo
4.4 out of 5 from 2,526 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £31 • 3-4 hours
Ranked up from mid-table on reviews for one seasonal reason: the Zoo is largely an outdoor site in Regents Park, and August is the month with the fewest wet days in the year. In November the same ticket buys you a cold walk between indoor houses.
Best for in August: A school-holiday day that is almost entirely outdoors
6. Harry Potter Studio Tour
4.6 out of 5 from 10,822 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £85 • 7-9 hours
A full indoor day at Leavesden, which is exactly what you want on one of August's ten wet days. It sells out across the school holidays, so this is the one booking in the list to make before you leave home rather than on the morning.
Best for in August: The wet day in the middle of a dry month
7. London Bike Tour
4.8 out of 5 from 151 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £42 • 3 hours
Moved up sharply for August from a base position in the mid-twenties on reviews. Cycling London is a weather-dependent activity and this is the warmest, driest-feeling month of the year for it. It drops out of the list entirely between November and February.
Best for in August: Covering the parks and the river in one go
8. Photography Tour
5 out of 5 from 18 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £39 • 1 hour
The lowest review count in this month's ten, ranked in purely on light. Sunset at 20:23 with a long slow dusk after it gives you the best photographic window of any month in this guide. In December the equivalent hour is 15:51 and it is usually grey.
Best for in August: Golden hour on the river
9. Borough Market Food Tour
4.8 out of 5 from 593 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £92 • 3 hours
Borough is partly covered and partly open, which makes it a summer-weighted experience. British produce is at its peak in August and the market's outdoor sections are genuinely pleasant rather than something to be endured.
Best for in August: Eating outdoors without a plan B
10. London Eye
4.6 out of 5 from 39,011 verified GetYourGuide reviews • from £25 • 30 minutes
The most-reviewed product on the site sits ninth this month rather than first, and the reason is scheduling rather than quality: a 30-minute rotation is the least efficient use of a 14-hour daylight day. Book it for 20:00 and you get the city lighting up as you go round.
Best for in August: The clearest long-distance views of the year
Madame Tussauds and the London Dungeon both drop out of the August ten despite holding more than 27,000 reviews between them. Both are indoor, queue-based, all-weather attractions, and August is the month with the fewest wet days in the London year. They are the right answer in October and the wrong one now. The Churchill War Rooms and the Natural History Museum tour drop out for the same reason.
Events and festivals in August 2026
August has one event large enough to change your plans: Notting Hill Carnival on Sunday 30 and Monday 31 August, when parts of W10 and W11 shut to traffic and several Underground stations run restricted. The 31st is also the summer bank holiday, so the whole weekend runs on a Sunday timetable.
| Event | Dates | Where | Free? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Buckingham Palace State Rooms open | Throughout, season runs 9 July to 27 September | Buckingham Palace, SW1 | Ticketed |
| Notting Hill Carnival | Sunday 30 and Monday 31 August | Notting Hill, Ladbroke Grove, W10 and W11 | Free to attend |
| Summer bank holiday | Monday 31 August | England and Wales | Public holiday |
| Changing the Guard | Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays | Buckingham Palace forecourt | Free to watch |
| School summer holidays | All month in England | Citywide, family attractions busiest | Not applicable |
Notting Hill Carnival is the largest street festival in Europe and it is genuinely worth building a day around, but go in with a plan. Sunday is family day and is the calmer of the two. Monday is the main parade and is the busier. Both days start early and finish in the early evening, and there is no realistic way to drive, park or take a taxi anywhere near the route.
Changing the Guard is the fact most competitor pages get wrong. It does not run daily. The ceremony at Buckingham Palace takes place on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and the schedule is published a month at a time by the Household Division and can change or be cancelled at short notice in bad weather. Check the day you are going rather than turning up on a Tuesday expecting a parade.
August is also the last full month of the Buckingham Palace summer season. The State Rooms close on 27 September, and for the rest of the year the Palace opens only on selected dates for a limited number of guided tours. If your trip runs into October, this page is the wrong month for that plan.
What is closed in August
Almost nothing is closed in August, which is the exact reason to come. The one thing to work around is the Carnival footprint on 30 and 31 August, when several west London Underground stations run exit-only or closed and buses across W10 and W11 divert. Changing the Guard runs three days a week, not seven.
| Site or service | Closed | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Notting Hill Gate, Ladbroke Grove and Westbourne Park stations | 30 and 31 August, restricted | Carnival operating pattern. Expect exit-only working, one-way systems and short-notice closures across both days. |
| Bus routes across W10 and W11 | 30 and 31 August, diverted | Roads inside the Carnival footprint close to traffic. There is no vehicle access to the route on either day. |
| Changing the Guard | Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays | The ceremony runs Monday, Wednesday and Friday, not daily. Bad weather can cancel it on a scheduled day. |
| Houses of Parliament | Sitting days only, summer recess applies | Parliament is in recess through August. Public tours run in the recess but the debating chambers are not sitting. |
| Warner Bros Studio Tour | Not closed, but sold out | Not a closure. Timed slots across the school holidays regularly sell out days ahead, and there is no walk-up ticket. |
Buckingham Palace opening season: Royal Collection Trust, visiting Buckingham Palace. Changing the Guard days are published a month at a time on the Household Division Changing the Guard listing, and the ceremony can be cancelled at short notice in bad weather.
This is the least constrained month in the whole ten-month set, and it is worth saying so plainly. Every major London attraction in our list is open, the Tower is on its longer summer hours, and the Buckingham Palace State Rooms are open, which is true of only eleven weeks in the year.
The Carnival restrictions are real but geographically tiny. They affect roughly two square kilometres of west London for two days. Everything from Paddington eastwards runs normally, and the river, the South Bank and the City are unaffected. If your hotel is not in W10 or W11, you may not notice it at all.
One thing we deliberately do not publish here is the Hyde Park Winter Wonderland schedule. The 2026 to 2027 dates were not confirmed by an official source when this page was written, and the third-party listings we found disagreed with each other. We would rather leave a gap than print a date you might plan a trip around.
What to wear and pack for London in August
Pack for 22.3C days, 13.7C nights and one wet day in three. The two items that actually matter in a London August are a light waterproof shell, because summer rain arrives with wind and umbrellas fail, and shoes you can walk ten miles in, because the tube gets unpleasant on the hot days.
The mistake visitors make is packing for a Mediterranean summer. A 22.3C average high with a 13.7C average low means the evening after a warm day genuinely cools down, and a Thames cruise at 20:00 on an August evening is noticeably colder than the same spot at 15:00. A light layer you can carry is more useful than another t-shirt.
St Paul's Cathedral and Westminster Abbey are working churches and ask visitors to dress respectfully, which in practice means covering shoulders inside. It is a much lighter requirement than in southern Europe, but it is worth knowing before you queue.
- A packable waterproof shell rather than an umbrella, for the ten wet days
- One warm layer for evenings, which fall to about 13.7C
- Shoes rated for ten miles a day on hard pavement
- A refillable bottle, tap water is free and drinkable everywhere
- A contactless card or phone, which is the cheapest way to pay for the tube and buses
How we chose these tours
For August the re-rank runs on daylight and dryness. Buckingham Palace goes to the top because its season is only eleven weeks long. The bike, photography and market tours move up because ten wet days is the lowest count of the year. Four indoor attractions move out and return when the weather turns.
- Popularity first. The base order is the verified review count on the live GetYourGuide listing, which is the only booking signal we can check independently.
- Then seasonal fit. A tour moves up or down for a specific, stated reason tied to August: temperature, wet days, sunset time, school holidays or a closure. Every move is explained in the entry itself rather than left implied.
- Closed means out. If an attraction is shut for the month, it does not appear in the ten at any rank, however popular it is. We name it in the closures table instead so you can plan around it.
- Nothing is invented. Prices, star ratings and review counts come from the live product page, checked on 28 July 2026. We do not publish an opening time, closure or event date we could not confirm, and we say so where we could not.
- We earn a commission. Booking links go to GetYourGuide and pay us if you book. That does not change the ranking: the review counts are public and you can check every one of them against the listing.
FAQs about London in August
How hot does London actually get in August?
The ten-year mean high for August is 22.3C and the mean low is 13.7C, measured over 2015 to 2024 for central London. That makes it the warmest month by daytime average, marginally behind July at 22.6C. Individual days above 30C occur most summers, and on those days the deep Underground lines are the most uncomfortable place in the city because most have no air conditioning.
Can you go inside Buckingham Palace in August?
Yes. The State Rooms open for a summer season each year and the 2026 season runs 9 July to 27 September, so the whole of August is inside it. Entry is by timed ticket. For the rest of the year the Palace opens only on selected dates for a limited number of guided tours, so August and September are the realistic window.
Does Changing the Guard happen every day in August?
No, and this is the single most repeated error about London. The ceremony at Buckingham Palace takes place on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, not daily. The schedule is published about a month ahead by the Household Division and the ceremony can be cancelled at short notice in bad weather, so check the specific date you plan to attend.
Is Notting Hill Carnival worth planning around?
Yes, in both directions. It runs on Sunday 30 and Monday 31 August 2026 and is the largest street festival in Europe, so it is worth attending. It also closes roads across W10 and W11 for two days and puts Notting Hill Gate, Ladbroke Grove and Westbourne Park stations on restricted operation, so if you are not going, plan to be elsewhere in the city those two days.
When does it get dark in London in August?
Sunset is 20:23 on 15 August, with useful light for around 40 minutes after that. The month moves fast: sunset is 20:48 on 1 August and 19:49 on the 31st, and London loses 1 hour 47 minutes of daylight across the month. An evening tour booked for the first week is a daylight tour; the same slot at the end of the month is not.
Is August a bad month to visit London because of crowds?
It is the busiest and most expensive month of the ten covered here, but London absorbs volume better than most European capitals because the attractions are spread across a large city rather than concentrated in one old centre. The practical fix is timing rather than avoidance: book timed entries for the first slot of the day and keep the middle of the afternoon for walking.