Things to Do in Oxford: A Complete Guide
Oxford has a habit of stopping people mid sentence, usually the moment they turn a corner and find themselves facing another few hundred years of golden stone architecture. It’s a working city with a Saturday market and ordinary traffic jams, but the university woven through its centre makes it feel like nowhere else in England. If you’re mapping out things to do in Oxford, expect the list to be dominated by colleges, libraries and the odd bit of wizarding trivia. It makes an easy add-on to a longer UK trip too, especially if you are already planning a visit and want ideas for things to do in London to bookend the journey.
The colleges: Christ Church and the Radcliffe Camera
Christ Church is probably Oxford’s most visited college, and for good reason. Its dining hall, with long tables beneath portraits of former students, was a direct inspiration for the Great Hall in the Harry Potter films, and the college’s Tom Quad is the largest quadrangle in Oxford. Christ Church Cathedral sits within the college grounds too, doubling as both a college chapel and the cathedral for the Diocese of Oxford, which is a fairly unusual arrangement.
The Radcliffe Camera is the building most people photograph without knowing its name, a circular domed library that sits in Radcliffe Square surrounded by the spires of All Souls and St Mary’s Church. You can’t just wander in as it’s a working library for Bodleian readers, but climbing the tower of the University Church of St Mary the Virgin next door gives you the best view of the Camera and the rest of Oxford’s skyline from above.
The Bodleian Library and Oxford’s Harry Potter trail
The Bodleian Library is one of the oldest libraries in Europe and it still receives a copy of every book published in the UK. Guided tours take you through the Divinity School, a stunning example of medieval Gothic architecture with an intricately carved ceiling, which doubled as the Hogwarts infirmary and also hosted several ballroom scenes in the films. The Duke Humfrey’s Library upstairs, the oldest reading room in the Bodleian, was used for the Hogwarts library scenes and still has the look of somewhere Madam Pince might appear from behind a shelf.
Beyond the Divinity School, film fans often walk New College’s cloisters, another filming location, and browse the Harry Potter themed shops that have sprung up around the city selling wands and house scarves. Oxford’s connection isn’t limited to the films either, since C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien both taught here and drew inspiration from the city and its surrounding countryside for Narnia and Middle Earth.
Museums, markets and punting on the Cherwell
The Ashmolean Museum is Britain’s oldest public museum and it’s free to enter, with collections ranging from Egyptian mummies to Pre Raphaelite paintings and an impressive display of Islamic art. It’s a good rainy day option and rarely feels as crowded as the colleges do in peak season.
The Covered Market, tucked just off Cornmarket Street, has been trading since the 1770s and remains a proper working market rather than a tourist trap, selling everything from fresh fish and cheese to handmade chocolates and vintage clothes. Grab lunch from one of the small cafes squeezed between the stalls.
Oxford also has its own punting tradition on the River Cherwell, a gentler and narrower waterway than Cambridge’s Cam, running past the University Parks and down towards the Botanic Garden. The Cherwell Boathouse and Magdalen Bridge are the two main hire points, and punting here tends to be less crowded than the Cambridge equivalent, especially on weekday afternoons.
More things to do in Oxford
Oxford’s green spaces are worth building into your visit too. University Parks offers a quiet riverside walk away from the crowds, and the Oxford Botanic Garden, Britain’s oldest, sits right by Magdalen Bridge with glasshouses and a small but lovely collection of plants from around the world. The Pitt Rivers Museum, attached to the Natural History Museum, is a genuinely strange and wonderful place, packed floor to ceiling with anthropological curiosities collected over more than a century.
In the evenings, Oxford’s pub scene leans heavily on its literary history. The Eagle and Child was the regular haunt of C.S. Lewis, Tolkien and the rest of the Inklings writing group, who met there for decades to read their work aloud to each other, and it’s still open for a pint today alongside plenty of other traditional pubs tucked into the city’s side streets.
Getting around Oxford
Oxford’s centre is compact and best explored on foot, with most colleges, the Bodleian and the Covered Market within ten minutes of each other. Bicycles are everywhere, reflecting the city’s large student population, and hiring one is a good way to reach slightly further flung spots like the Botanic Garden or Port Meadow.
The train station connects to London Paddington in about an hour, making Oxford an easy day trip, and the Oxford Tube coach service runs around the clock from central London as an alternative. Term time brings restricted visiting hours to many colleges, so check ahead if a specific college is high on your list, and consider a spring or early autumn visit to avoid both exam period closures and peak summer crowds. If you fancy comparing notes with a trip closer to home, our guide to UK staycation ideas is worth a look too.
