Jake was fantastic. Very knowledgeable and friendly. Encouraged questions and was happy to sculpt the tour to our interests. Highly recommend him as a guide.
About Activity
What's Included
Includes
- Tour Guide Exclusively For You (Does NOT apply if you choose "SAVE! BOOK SEMI-PRIVATE" option)
- Wheelchair Friendly (Does NOT apply if you choose "SAVE! BOOK SEMI-PRIVATE" option)
- Guided Combo Museum Tour
- Duration 5.5 Hours (Including A Break)
Excludes
- Tour price does NOT include hotel pickup or drop-off (we recommend UBER or Taxi)
- Tour price does NOT include gratuities (optional)
- Temporary exhibitions NOT included
Departure & Return
Departure Point
- Meet by the red telephone booth closest to the main gate of British Museum. Meet your guide outside the gates of the museum by the red telephone booth situated to the left of the main gates of the museum on the sidewalk of Great Russell Street across from Starbucks.
Itinerary
Meet your private guide outside the British Museum at 10am, then step inside to begin your 5-hour tour. At The British Museum discover valuable treasures such as the Mummy of Katebet, the Oxus Treasure, the Parthenon sculptures, and the Rosetta Stone. During your tour, explore 6,000 years of human history and learn of primitive tribes and mighty empires through the ages.
After lunch (own expense), head onward to the National Gallery Admire works such as Johannes Vermeer’s A Young Woman Standing at a Virginal, Jan van Eyck’s Arnolfini Portrait, or Van Gogh’s Sunflowers, and hear essential details on the meanings behind the works. Explore the galleries and hallways — home to masterpieces by Botticelli, Monet, Rembrandt, and Vermeer — and gain insight into art history dating back to the 14th century. When your guided visit comes to an end, continue exploring at your leisure or step outside to conclude your tour.
Language Offered
Additional Info
Cancellation Policy
Reviews
James was great! Good emery and enthusiasm
James Howard, our British Museum tour guide, was excellent! Our group included eight professionals who have taken organized tours in many countries over many years. James was one of the best guides we've ever had. He was very knowledgeable, friendly, and fun to be with. He was so good that we asked him to guide us on "the City of London" walking tour two days later. We highly recommend him!
Outstanding tour guide—Matilda was exceptional. We had a group of 8 and the tour was wonderfully paced and packed with a wealth of knowledge. Very helpful to have a guide for such a huge collection. Very engaging!
Great day with Jake! My 13 yo daughter and I had been to British Museum twice before, but not the National Gallery. Jake brought new insights to us at the British Museum and gave us a great tour through the history of Western art in the National Gallery. Highly recommended!
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Excellent British Museum & National Gallery Tour! We had a wonderful experience on the British Museum & National Gallery guided tour. Jake was an excellent guide—very professional, knowledgeable, and engaging. He shared so many interesting stories and historical details that made everything much more meaningful. We learned a lot about British and world history while enjoying some incredible artifacts and artwork. Jake’s knowledge and storytelling really brought everything to life. We absolutely loved the tour and would highly recommend it to anyone visiting London. Thank you, Jake, for a fantastic experience!
James was our tour guide and he was one of the best tour guides we have ever had. He knew his subject extremely well and did a fantastic job of being able to tell the back story of each object or painting and how that object or painting fit into the historical timeline and why it was relevant. He did not do a shotgun approach of trying to see everything but rather he methodically selected specific items and paintings that were especially significant. James is one of the best!
Guy was a wonderful tour guide. He made history entertaining while educating us. We couldn’t have asked for a better guide.
Becky was an excellent guide. She was knowledgeable, enthusiastic and accomodating. We did the small group tour of the British museum and the exhibits she highlighted were interesting and meaningful. I highly recommend this tour.
Matilda was an excellent guide! Pleasant, knowledgable, and enthusiastic about the each exhibit we visited. She knows her stuff! Highly recommend.
Matilda was very knowledgeable and very personable
u have to have a guide its just too much to see and the guide has the expertise to explain what u r lookibg at
James was a phenomenal tour guide, super knowledgeable and enthusiastic.
Our British Museum semi-private highlights tour with Colin was excellent. He wax fun and knowledgeable and did a great job providing context and history about the museum and the exhibits he showed us. The group size was very small (8 people). Definitely worthwhile— the museum is vast and we wouldn’t have known what to focus on if we’d gone on our own.
Joey was exceptional. Very knowledgeable and helped us navigate the museum!
Matilda really knows history. Along with giving very interesting information on the many displays in the British Museum, she was able to answer questions posed to her. Thus, positively expanding the overall experience.
James did an outstanding job guiding us through the expansive British Museum. We would have never been able to get the level of detail by reading the display write ups. James navigated us to our sections of interest first. We appreciated his level of detail.
Stephanie was a great guide! She made everyone feel welcome. The British Museum is huge and can be a bit intimidating at first. Steph was able to make it less difficult by giving us the highlights and explaining some of her favorite items. We learned a lot from her.
Great job Nathan! Engaged, funny & knowledgeable. Highly recommended 👍🏻
Matilda was a fabulous guide - so informative!
Awesome tour of the British Museum. Matilda our tour guide was amazing! She was so knowledgeable and made it fun for the adults and teens in our group All four of us were so happy with the experience.
We (three adult family members from the US) thoroughly enjoyed our semi-private tour of the British Museum with Sheldon. He was lively and personal and presented his information with a great deal of engagement. Sheldon not only knew the background story of each object we focused on, he also put the story of each object in historical and social context. Highly recommend! (Also—visiting the enormous collections in the Museum with the help of a guide was well worth the expense.)
We had a detailed, informative and very pleasant tour with Becky. She had a ton of interesting information, an excellent sense of humor, and made sure we were all together as we moved through the large and crowded spaces. We thoroughly enjoyed her tour!
Matilda was wonderful !!! 5 stars ... super knowledgeable and she called us by our names during the tour which shows she really cares about the people in her group 😊😊. She genuinely cares about her craft which is refreshing 👍👍🙏🙏
Thoroughly enjoyed our tour of the British Museum. The collections are mind-boggling in their vastness. We greatly appreciated the knowledge of our guide, Colin, who did an amazing job of covering the museum’s “&stars” and explaining their unique histories in the time allotted. Kudos to Colin!
Collin helped us navigate the massive museum and find the most popular sites in a VERY manageable way! He also gave us some unique experiences!
Ivo was a great guide for the British Museum- we would have been lost without him. He wove together key pieces to tell a story that we’ll remember and inspired us to come back to see more!
The British Museum tour was excellent! My spouse and I thoroughly enjoyed the event. It was both informative and entertaining. Our tour guide, Nathan, was fantastic. He did an excellent job and was the primary reason why I rate the tour so highly.
Our guide, Ivo, was fabulous. He was intelligent, engaging and steeped in the history of the artifacts we viewed. His choice of artifacts was quite well informed, and illustrated some of the history of the British Museum itself. He was also warm and charming with a great sense of humor. Wonderful guide, knock-out museum!
Darcy did a great job of explaining things and moving us from one highlight to another, staying ahead of the moving crowds
This was a tour of the science museum . Sasha was an excellent guide providing lots of interesting info but in a very understandable way. Would highly recommend Sasha as his educational background leant to a very interesting and fun tour. Some people started joining our group for part of the tour because he was so great.
Guy gave a wonderful tour! Entertaining and informative. Wish we had a few more hours walking with him!
Becky was an outstanding guide at the British Museum. She is incredibly knowledgeable and did a fantastic job bringing the history to life for our family. My teenagers were genuinely engaged the entire time, which is not always easy to do in a museum setting. Her presentation style made complex history feel interesting, accessible, and memorable. She explained the stories behind the artifacts in a way that made everything feel meaningful rather than overwhelming. This was one of the highlights of our time in London, and I would absolutely recommend Becky to anyone visiting the British Museum, especially families with kids. She made the experience educational, engaging, and truly enjoyable.
Our guide Guy was excellent. He brought the history to life with stories and helped to frame historic timing and relevance
We really enjoyed our tour today with Becky at the British Museum. Her knowledge coupled with a keen curation of items/choices really made for a great tour. My daughter and I appreciated learning about just how vast the British collection of artifacts is - such world history. Thank you!!
Absolutely the best art tour I've ever had. I will leave it at this - he shared that the onset of photography was a motivator of the Impressionist movement. You need to listen to the full discussion - but it informed my view of both for life. Stunning presentation!!! Thank you!!!!
Great experience. Becky is knowledgeable and smart as heck. She was a pleasure to speak with covering a variety of topics.
Stéph Kuypers Is such a great guide. I travel all over the world and had nearly one hundred tours. She is THE BEST. My son and I really enjoy our tour with her in British Museum and national gallery. Actullay it is like a history and art class.
MATILDA was our tour guide today. A 2.5 hour tour of British Museum . It was a great tour and she made it very interesting. I would highly recommend Matilda for future tours.
Jake explained the highlights of the British museum in a very engaging and passionate way! We thoroughly enjoyed learning about the Rosetta Stone, Ancient Greece, Easter Island, and Egyptian mummies.
Matilda was an AMAZING tour guide. She started by asking what we wanted to see or was interested in and then personalized the tour based on that. She was entertaining, intelligent and well spoken about all the pieces we viewed during the tour. Would highly recommend Matilda as a tour guide for anyone who wants a specialized great tour of the British museum. Her depth and breath of knowledge was second to none.
We were so pleased with the guided tour of both the British Museum and the National Gallery. Matilda H, our guide, was friendly, engaging, along with being a wealth of knowledge. She provided highly informed commentary and made the tour an exceptional experience. She took time for questions and invited our thoughts and opinions. I could not recommend this more highly!
Jamie was a fantastic guide on our small group tour. Very interesting tour and could have stayed much longer, and Definitely enjoyed this. Will definitely have to come back and explore more
very good and clear explanation of the most important aspects of the Museum. I am pretty sure we would have never known about these details if we had gone on our own.
The tour provided a different view on the background of the items shown in both musea. The guide was very knowledgeable and made the tour fun. He was open for discussion on different views on history, which made the tour inspiring. A real treat.
We did both the British museum and National gallery in one day, lot of walking, there is an hour in-between the two tours, Wesley our tour guide, he was amazing, very knowledgeable, highly recommended tour.
What a wonderful tour! Alex was very informative and interesting. Loved being there when it opened. Lots of fun
Fantastic tour, it was clear that our tour guide Jamie has a passion for history ans art and thanks to him we take with us many stories and details from what we saw.
We had a wonderful tour of the British Museum and the National Gallery by Mathilda. She was very well informed, personable and spoke with passion and interest. Both venues have so much to see but Mathilda gave us a good overview and then focused with great knowledge on many key parts of both. We recommend the tour and Mathilda as a guide! Erik and Hope
Excellent overall. Guide was very knowledgeable and made the experience very enjoyable. Would recommend this tour to friends.
Monday through Friday 9 am to 7 pm EST
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