London's museums, sorted by what you actually like

The Wallace Collection on Manchester Square and Handel and Hendrix on Brook Street are the two museums closest to most central London apartments. The city's best are mostly free, several of the finest are small houses a few streets from where you're staying, and two hours in the right one beats a lost afternoon in the wrong one.

Measured from central London apartments, the Wallace Collection and Handel and Hendrix each fall within about a kilometre of more of them than any other museum, with the Faraday Museum at the Royal Institution and the Science Museum close behind. For most visitors, that puts a serious collection within walking distance.

South Kensington, with or without children

The Natural History Museum and the Science Museum are free, next door to each other, and each is a full day with children. The Natural History Museum is open daily from 10am to 5.50pm and suggests a free timed ticket at busy times so you skip the queue, while the Science Museum, open 10am to 6pm, asks everyone to pre-book a free ticket. Wonderlab, its hands-on gallery with more than 50 exhibits, is the bit children remember. Weekends and school holidays are crowded from the moment the doors open, so arrive at 10am or come after 3pm, when the school groups leave.

The V&A, a few steps away, is the world's leading museum of art and design and is also free, covering fashion, jewellery, furniture, ceramics and sculpture. Further west at 224 to 238 Kensington High Street, the Design Museum has a free permanent display, Designer Maker User, plus ticketed temporary shows.

Houses, palaces and Old Masters

The Wallace Collection is free, and its 18th-century French painting is among the best in the world: Fragonard's The Swing, Frans Hals's The Laughing Cavalier, and rooms of armour, porcelain and furniture besides. It's rarely crowded on a weekday morning. Apsley House at Hyde Park Corner, known as Number One London, was the Duke of Wellington's home and still holds his collection, including paintings by Velázquez and a colossal statue of Napoleon; it's ticketed and open Wednesday to Sunday, 11am to 5pm. The National Gallery and National Portrait Gallery on Trafalgar Square are both free, and the Portrait Gallery stays open until 9pm on Fridays.

Handel and Hendrix, at 25 Brook Street in Mayfair, is two homes separated by a wall and 200 years: the house where George Frideric Handel lived and wrote, and the flat Jimi Hendrix rented next door. It's open Wednesday to Sunday, 10am to 5pm with last entry at 4pm, tickets are booked online, and it's small enough that ninety minutes is plenty. For science, the Faraday Museum at the Royal Institution on Albemarle Street tells the story of Michael Faraday's work on electricity and magnetism in the building where he did it, a short visit that pairs nicely with a walk round Mayfair.

The King's Gallery at Buckingham Palace puts on changing exhibitions from the Royal Collection. The current one, Queen Elizabeth II: Her Life in Style, runs until 18 April 2027 and is the largest exhibition of the late Queen's fashion yet. Adult tickets are £22 and can be turned into a year's pass for unlimited return visits, and the gallery opens Thursday to Monday.

Contemporary art

Moco Museum, at 1 to 4 Marble Arch, shows more than 100 works by Banksy, Warhol, Basquiat, Haring, Kusama and others; it's ticketed and booked online, and you should allow 90 minutes to two hours. In Kensington Gardens, the two Serpentine galleries are free and put on some of the strongest contemporary shows in London. For commercial galleries, walk to Lisson Gallery in Marylebone, which has two spaces on Bell Street and Lisson Street, both free and open Tuesday to Saturday, 11am to 6pm. The Saatchi Gallery on the King's Road and Tate Modern on Bankside cover the bigger names.

Several of the house museums here shut on Mondays and Tuesdays, so do the national museums at the start of the week and save the houses for Wednesday onwards.