Every city reads better from the top deck. Ride the right bus.
Whether a 24-hour hop-on hop-off pass beats the 72, how long one loop really takes before you get off anywhere, which languages the audio guide speaks, and what a coach day out to the canyon costs.
Four bus tours worth building a day around.
The rides most travellers get on first. What a seat costs, and why each one earns the morning.
01The London loopLondon Big Bus Hop-On Hop-Off Tour with Optional River CruiseTwo routes, a river cruise thrown in, and a stop within walking distance of almost everything on a first visit.
02Manhattan, roof downBig Bus NYC: Hop-On Hop-Off Sightseeing Tour by Open-top BusDowntown, uptown and Brooklyn on one ticket. Sit upstairs at the front and let the bridges do the work.
03Rome without the walkBig Bus Hop-on, Hop-off Open-Top Sightseeing TourNine hours of cobbles is a lot in August. The bus takes the hills between the Colosseum and the Vatican.
04The aurora busNorthern Lights Bus Tour with Hot CocoaA driver who has been reading cloud maps all afternoon, and hot chocolate at the far end of the fjord.
A 24-hour bus pass or the 72? Count the stops before you pay.
One full loop of a big city runs ninety minutes to three hours before you get off anywhere, so a 24-hour ticket really means one sightseeing day. Two days of proper stopping and the 48 costs less than the taxis it replaces. The 72 only pays for itself when the route reaches something out on the edge of town.
The American bus day: city loop, roof down, after dark, or out to the canyon.
More sightseeing buses run in the United States than anywhere else on the site. Four kinds of day, what a seat costs on each, and the cities they run through.
The hop-on hop-off buses that earn their pass.
One ticket, a fixed loop, a stop near most of what you came for. Buses every ten minutes on the good routes and every forty on the rest, which is the whole difference.
Six cities where the sightseeing bus is the sensible way round.
A loop of London, a roof over Manhattan, Paris between its monuments, the Strip after dark, the Edinburgh old town by open top and the road out of Reykjavik. The best-rated bus tour in each.
Open-top and double-decker: the seat everyone photographs from.
The upper deck puts you above the traffic and level with the first-floor balconies. Take a layer whatever the forecast says, sit at the front, and check the roof actually opens before you pay the premium for it.
The bus tours more travellers ride than any other.
Every bus tour we have reviewed →The rides at the top of the site, and what earns each of them the seat.
1
Mt Fuji and Hakone 1-Day Bus Tour Return by Bullet Train
This 11-hour tour pairs Mt. Fuji’s 5th Station with a buffet lunch, Hakone Ropeway, Lake Ashi cruise, and a Shinkansen ride back to Tokyo. An English-speaking guide such as Sora, Hiro, Momo, or Levin leads the day, with multilingual audio support. Expect a full schedule and weather-dependent stops.
From · $163
Read our review →
2
Warner Bros. Studio Harry Potter Tour & Branded Bus
from $151
3
Tootbus Hop-on Hop-off (Optional River Cruise)
from $43
4
Zaanse Schans, Edam, Volendam & Marken Bus Tour
from $32
5
1-Day Tokyo Bus Tour
from $129
6
Northern Lights Bus Tour with Hot Cocoa
from $74
7
London Big Bus Hop-On Hop-Off Tour with Optional River Cruise
from $39
8
City Sightseeing Hop-On Hop-Off Bus Tour
from $39
The night bus: Vegas neon, Paris lit up, London under Christmas lights.
Cities change at eight. The night runs are shorter, usually two hours, they skip the museums nobody can get into anyway and they point the open deck at the lit-up things. Book the later departure in summer or you will beat the dark.
Every night bus tour →
What a bus tour actually costs, from a seven-dollar loop up.
Every ride on the site grouped by fare. Most city loops come in under the price of the two taxis they replace.
City loops, 24-hour passes, open-top decks and the short guided runs between the big sights.
Full coach days out, aurora chases, dinner-and-lights runs and combined bus-and-boat tickets.
- 11-Day Tokyo Bus Tourfrom $129
- 2Northern Lights Bus Tour with Hot Cocoafrom $74
- 3Warner Bros. Studio Harry Potter Tour with Transfersfrom $117
Private coaches, multi-day runs and the small minibuses that go where a double-decker cannot turn.
Three buses where the bus is the day out, not the transport.
Scones served upstairs while the driver takes the long way round, an actor with a microphone and a graveyard, and a sound system with a bar crawl bolted to it.
The Afternoon Tea Bus
A restored Routemaster with tables bolted to the upper deck, a two-hour loop past the palace and the river, and a tiered stand of sandwiches and scones arriving between stops. London runs the most of them and Dublin has its own vintage version. About thirty seats per sitting and two sittings a day, which is why weekend tables go weeks ahead.
- 1Afternoon Tea Bus Tour in Dublin★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 2,791 reviews
- 2Afternoon Tea Bus Tour – 1960s Routemaster Bus★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 2,032 reviews
- 3Afternoon Tea Bus with a Glass of Prosecco★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 1,853 reviews
The Ghost Bus
A black double-decker, an actor working the aisle with a microphone, and a route that strings together the plague pits, the gallows and the closes nobody built over. Edinburgh, York and New Orleans do it best. It is played for laughs more than terror, the windows are curtained, and it is the one bus tour that is better in the rain.
- 1Comedy Horror Ghost Bus Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 3,932 reviews
- 2Comedy Horror Show: York Ghost Bus Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 3,032 reviews
- 3Ghost Bus Tour of Edinburgh★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 2,761 reviews
The Party Bus
A coach stripped of its seats, fitted with poles, a sound system and a cooler, doing a circuit of three or four bars with the queueing already handled. Nashville runs honky-tonk loops, Las Vegas runs club crawls and the Caribbean islands run them along the coast road. Over-21 almost everywhere, and the ride is the point rather than the destinations.
- 1Istanbul Party Pub Crawl with Party Bus in Sultanahmet and Taksim★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,882 reviews
- 2Nashville’s Wildest Honky Tonk Public Party Bus (21+)★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,305 reviews
- 3Aruba Nightlife and Barhopping on Chogogo Party Bus★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 1,201 reviews
Four bus tickets that will not wait for you.
Most sightseeing buses will still sell you a seat at the kerb ten minutes before it leaves. These four run on studio slots, weather windows and a single vehicle with thirty seats in it.
- 01Warner Bros. Studio Harry Potter Tour & Branded BusThe studio sells timed entry slots weeks in advance, and the branded coach only runs to the slot you already hold.
- 02Northern Lights Bus Tour with Hot CocoaThe season runs roughly September to April and one clear forecast empties every minibus in town by lunchtime.
- 03Afternoon Tea Bus Tour in DublinOne vintage bus, about thirty seats, one or two sittings a day. Saturday tables go first and go early.
- 04Grand Canyon West Bus Tour with Hoover Dam and Optional SkywalkA canyon day is a thirteen-hour coach out of Las Vegas, and through the season the buses leave full.
Chasing the northern lights by minibus, out of Tromso and Reykjavik.
The point of the bus is the driver. Someone who has spent the afternoon reading cloud maps and will drive two hours down a fjord or inland off the ring road to get out from under the weather. Small vehicles chase further than big coaches. Dress for standing still in the cold, not for walking.
- 1Northern Lights Bus Tour with Hot Cocoafrom $74
- 2Northern Lights Chase Minibus Tourfrom $172
- 3Chase Aurora in Minibus and Free Aurora Portraitfrom $141
By city — where the buses run
By kind of bus — loop, open top, night run or coach day
Seven more cities running a sightseeing bus worth the fare.
Prague
Vienna
Lisbon
Istanbul
Dubai
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