Why we build these
Answers you can't get from a guidebook
Most London travel advice stops at “get an Oyster card”. That leaves the questions people actually have unanswered: will four days of sightseeing cost me £35 or £90? Does the weekly cap help if I arrive on a Thursday? Is it really faster to take the Tube one stop?
Those are arithmetic problems, not opinions, so we built calculators rather than writing another list of tips. Each one runs entirely on your own device, needs no account, sends nothing to a server, and keeps working when you're underground with no signal.
Free means free. No trial, no email wall, no “unlock the full result”. The tools are the whole point.
2 tools, both free
The tools
Built for visitors, kept up to date with the March fare revisions, and honest about what they can't tell you.
Tube fare calculator
What your travel will cost
Tell it your zones, your dates and roughly how many journeys a day, and it works out what you'll actually be charged — including the daily and weekly caps that quietly stop you paying once you've spent enough.
A day in Zones 1–2, off-peak
- Day-by-day breakdown of what you'll be charged
- The Monday-to-Sunday weekly cap that catches out midweek arrivals
- Tells you plainly whether to tap or buy a 7 Day Travelcard
- Buses, Hopper transfers and Heathrow included
- Zone finder for your hotel, and a printable summary
Adult fares as at 1 March 2026. Caps frozen until at least March 2027.
Walk it instead
When the Tube is slower
A single stop takes about ninety seconds on the train — and seven more minutes of stairs, waiting and climbing back to the street. This puts the walk against a realistic door-to-door Tube time for any two central stations.
Leicester Square to Covent Garden
- 118 stations across Zones 1 and 2, plus 23 landmarks
- Shows exactly where the Tube's time actually goes
- Cross-river journeys routed via the nearest bridge
- Three walking paces, and an interchange allowance
- Ranks London's most pointless one-stop journeys
Estimates from TfL station coordinates, not routed directions.
Straight to the answer
Which one do I need?
The questions people arrive with, and where each is answered.
How much should I budget for travel?
Tube fare calculator — per person and for your whole party
Should I buy a Travelcard or just tap my card?
Tube fare calculator — it compares both for your dates
What is the daily cap, and when do I hit it?
How capping works — plus the journey count to reach it
Which zone is my hotel in?
Zone finder — type a station and it sets your zones
Is it quicker to walk this one?
Walk it instead — walk against a real door-to-door Tube time
How far apart are these two stations, really?
Walk it instead — distance, minutes and rough step count
Which Tube journeys are a waste of money?
Most pointless journeys — ranked, with the numbers
What about tipping, safety, or getting from the airport?
First-time visitor guide — the non-arithmetic questions
How they're built
What you can expect from them
Four rules we hold ourselves to on every tool.
Nothing leaves your device
Every calculation runs in your browser. There is no account, no login, and your inputs are never sent to us or anyone else.
- No sign-up and no email required
- Anything remembered is stored in your own browser
- No analytics on what you type into a tool
They work with no signal
Once you've opened a tool, your phone keeps a copy. It still works on a platform, in a tunnel, or abroad with roaming off.
- No data connection needed to calculate
- Add the site to your home screen before you fly
- Fares refresh automatically next time you're online
Kept current, and dated
TfL normally revises fares each March, and we update to match. Every tool shows when its figures were last checked, so you're never guessing how old a number is.
- Fares reviewed at every TfL revision
- Bus and tram changes tracked separately
- Bank holidays and weekends handled automatically
Honest about the limits
A calculator that pretends to certainty it doesn't have is worse than no calculator. Each tool explains its method and says where it might be wrong.
- Working shown, not hidden behind a result
- Estimates labelled as estimates
- Pointed at TfL's own tools where they're better
Good to know
Questions about the tools
The practical answers.
Are these really free?
Yes. There's no charge, no trial, no account and no sign-up. We build them because they bring people back to the site, and the site is funded by commission when visitors book tours and tickets through our partners. You're never asked to pay for a tool or to hand over an email address to use one.
Do they work without an internet connection?
Yes, once you've visited them. Both tools run entirely in your browser with no server calls, and the site saves a copy to your device the first time you open it, so they keep working on the Underground or abroad with roaming switched off. Add the site to your home screen before you travel and they're one tap away.
Do you track what I put into them?
No. The tools don't create accounts, don't send your inputs anywhere and don't need cookies to work. Everything is calculated on your own device, and anything remembered between visits — the number of days in your trip, say — is stored only in your own browser. Clear your browser data and it's gone.
How often are they updated?
Transport for London normally revises fares in early March, and we update the fare calculator to match. Bus and tram fares sometimes change on their own separate timetable, and the calculator applies whichever prices cover your travel dates. Each tool shows the date its figures were last checked.
Can I rely on them for an important journey?
Use them for planning and budgeting, not as the last word. Fares depend on the exact stations and route you use, and walking times are calculated estimates rather than routed directions. For a specific journey on a specific day, TfL's own fare finder and journey planner are definitive, and we link to them from both tools.
Can you build a tool for something else?
Quite possibly — suggestions are welcome and they're where most of these came from. If there's a London question you keep having to work out by hand, tell us about it. Airport transfer comparisons and an attraction pass calculator are the two we're most often asked for.
What should we build next?
These tools exist because visitors kept asking the same questions. If you're working something out on paper before your trip, there's a good chance we can turn it into a calculator.
Travel sorted — now book the good bits
Skip-the-line tickets for the Tower of London and the London Eye, guided walks, river cruises and day trips to Windsor, Oxford and Stonehenge.
Keep the tools one tap away
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