Churchill war rooms, london

A series of decorative tickets featuring the text 'my return ticket' with a mix of gold and silver designs.

VERDICT: WE GAVE 4 OUT OF 5 TICKETS AND HERE’S WHY!

This guide forms part of our complete UK Travel Guide, featuring scenic road trips, iconic destinations, practical travel advice and honest first-hand travel experiences from across the United Kingdom.

This article is part of our 3 Days in London: Ultimate Guide. We explored St Paul’s Cathedral, Churchill War Rooms, British Museum, Tower Bridge and Tower of London, experienced Frameless Immersive Art, visited Abbey Road Studios and stayed at the Park Plaza Hotel. Follow our personal experiences and practical visitor tips. Highly Recommended – 5 Ticket Rated. Read the complete three-day London guide here:

If you only have a short amount of time, make sure you check out our guide to 24 Hours in London.

Two Hours Underground Exploring Churchill’s Wartime Bunker and Britain’s Fight for Survival

During our three-day stay in London, we decided to visit the Churchill War Rooms, one of the historical attractions we were particularly interested in seeing. We were staying at the Park Plaza Westminster Bridge, so getting there was easy.

From the hotel, one of the simplest options is actually to walk across Westminster Bridge, passing the Houses of Parliament, and continue toward King Charles Street, near St James’s Park. The walk takes roughly 15–20 minutes. If using the Tube, Westminster Station is the closest convenient station, but from the Park Plaza, we found that walking makes much more sense.

This preserved bunker complex is where Winston Churchill and his wartime cabinet directed Britain’s strategy between 1939 and 1945. Walking through the narrow corridors, visitors see the Cabinet Room where critical decisions were made, the Map Room left exactly as it was when the lights were switched off in 1945, and the cramped living and working quarters used by staff who often spent days underground during bombing raids.

Heading Underground

As we approached the entrance to the Churchill War Rooms, we really weren’t sure what to expect. Unlike many of London’s major attractions, there isn’t a magnificent palace, cathedral or monument towering above you. The real experience is hidden beneath the streets of Westminster.

We headed down the steps and entered the underground complex, both excited to explore the secret headquarters that played such an important role during the Second World War. Almost immediately, the atmosphere changed.

This wasn’t a recreation of a wartime bunker. These were the actual rooms used by Churchill, his ministers, military commanders and staff as Britain fought for survival.

Britain’s Secret Underground Headquarters

The Cabinet War Rooms became operational in 1939, shortly before Britain declared war on Germany. The underground complex allowed the British government and military leadership to continue operating while London was being bombed during the Blitz.

Walking through the narrow corridors and rooms gave us a much better understanding of the conditions people worked under.

The experience is less about grand architecture and more about decision-making under extreme pressure. These rooms were filled with people working extraordinarily long hours while a war was unfolding above and around them.

That knowledge made exploring the bunker considerably more powerful.

The Cabinet Room

One of the most important areas is the Cabinet Room, where Churchill met with senior ministers and advisers.

Standing there, it wasn’t difficult to imagine the tension that must have filled the room as reports arrived from across Europe and decisions were made that could affect millions of lives.

Britain came dangerously close to defeat during the early years of the war. The exhibits explain how leadership, intelligence, military strategy and national morale all played crucial roles in determining what happened next.

For us, seeing the actual location where many of those discussions took place brought the history to life in a way that reading about it simply cannot.

Churchill’s Underground World

The War Rooms contain far more than meeting rooms.

We saw offices, communications areas and sleeping quarters used by the people who worked underground. Many of the rooms have been preserved to show how they appeared during the war.

There is also the famous Map Room, where military information was gathered and constantly updated as the conflict developed.

The details throughout the complex help you understand that this wasn’t somewhere Churchill occasionally visited. It was a functioning wartime headquarters filled with military officers, government officials, typists, secretaries, telephone operators and other staff.

They were helping to run Britain’s war effort from beneath central London.

The Churchill Museum

The experience also includes the modern and interactive Churchill Museum, dedicated to the life and leadership of Sir Winston Churchill.

This section adds important context to the underground rooms.

Through personal letters, recordings, photographs, documents and multimedia displays, we learned more about Churchill as both a wartime leader and an individual. The museum also explores the enormous challenges Britain faced during the war and the decisions Churchill and his government were forced to make.

Even if you already know something about Churchill and the Second World War, there is an enormous amount of information here. Just as we experienced at several of London’s historical attractions, we found ourselves learning details and stories we had never heard before.

Experiencing Wartime London

We spent approximately two hours inside the Churchill War Rooms, which we found was a good amount of time for our visit. What impressed us most was the atmosphere. As we moved through the underground corridors, it became easier to imagine what working here during wartime must have felt like. London was being attacked from the air, Britain faced the possibility of invasion, and many of the people working underground had little idea how the war would eventually end.

That makes the War Rooms an unusually immersive historical experience. Rather than simply looking at wartime objects displayed behind glass, we were standing inside the actual environment where people worked and major decisions were made.

Our Churchill War Rooms Experience

By the time we returned to street level, we felt that we understood this chapter of British history considerably better than when we had entered.

The Churchill War Rooms are atmospheric, factual and surprisingly emotional. There are no towering ceilings or spectacular architecture here. Instead, the power of the attraction comes from its authenticity and the knowledge of what happened within these underground rooms.

For visitors interested in Winston Churchill, wartime history, leadership or Britain’s role in the Second World War, we consider the Churchill War Rooms essential viewing.

Allow around 1.5 to 2 hours, although anyone with a strong interest in WWII history could easily spend longer. For us, those two hours underground became one of the most memorable historical experiences of our three days in London.

🔟 Top 10 Displays You Cannot Miss on the Tour

1. The Cabinet War Room

This is the heart of the bunker. It’s where Winston Churchill and his cabinet met to make life-or-death decisions during WWII. Seeing the original table, chairs, and microphones immediately grounds the visit in reality, this wasn’t theoretical planning, this was national survival.

2. The Map Room

Perhaps the most powerful space in the entire complex. The maps tracking Allied and enemy movements were left exactly as they were in 1945, when the lights were turned off for the last time. It’s one of the most authentic, untouched WWII rooms anywhere in Europe.

3. Churchill’s Bedroom

Surprisingly modest, this small room shows where Churchill sometimes slept and often worked. It humanizes him instantly and reinforces how close leadership lived to danger during the Blitz.

4. The Telephone Room (Churchill–Roosevelt Line)

This secure room housed the direct transatlantic phone line between Churchill and U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt. It symbolises the Anglo-American alliance and the importance of real-time communication in modern warfare.

5. The Switchboard & Communications Hub

Operated largely by women, this area handled thousands of confidential calls daily. It highlights the scale of coordination required and the often-overlooked role of civilian staff working under intense pressure.

6. The Dormitories

These cramped sleeping quarters show how staff lived underground for days at a time. Narrow bunks, little privacy, and constant noise underline the psychological toll of wartime service away from the front lines.

7. The Staff Canteen

Food shortages, rationing, and exhaustion were everyday realities. This space reminds visitors that war is fought as much by endurance as by strategy.

8. The Churchill Museum Timeline

This interactive section charts Churchill’s entire life, failures included. It gives essential context to his wartime leadership and avoids the trap of hero worship, showing how unlikely his rise to power really was.

9. Churchill’s Speeches & Audio Recordings

Hearing Churchill’s actual voice delivers goosebumps. These speeches weren’t rhetoric, they were tools to hold a nation together when invasion felt imminent.

10. The Exit Corridor (End of the War)

As you leave, the narrative shifts from crisis to victory. Knowing the rooms were sealed almost immediately after VE Day gives the tour a quiet, reflective ending – history paused in a concrete shelter.

🎯 Final Tip from the My Return Ticket Team

Do not rush this site. It’s not visually grand like palaces or castles, but it is emotionally intense. Read the panels, listen to the audio, and pause in the Map Room, it’s the closest most people will ever come to the nerve centre of WWII Britain.

Explore these places in England

Continue exploring London

Nearby London attractions

Planning Your Trip?

Before you go, don’t forget to book the essentials:

With every trip, we offer feedback to travel companies along with honest views for you, the reader. We rate adventures on a scale of one to five tickets, judged on quality, service, memorability, and price. A perfect ‘Ticket Rating’ of a five-ticket score means the experience was flawless and we’d eagerly return. Your desire to go back is the ultimate measure of a trip’s worth. Exclusive to My Return Ticket.

London

England

Download our FREE guide to Churchill War Rooms, London

My_Return_Ticket_Churchill_War_Rooms_Top_10_Displays Download

Churchill War Rooms ⎮ Britain’s Secret Underground World War II Headquarters