What to See at Hampton Court Palace
Two palaces share one roofline here — Henry VIII’s Tudor courts at the front, William III’s Baroque apartments behind. This guide walks the route in the order the building reveals itself.
The Great Gatehouse and Base Court
You enter the way a Tudor visitor did: through the Great Gatehouse’s twin turrets into Base Court, the largest of the courts, ringed by lodgings for the household. Look up — the barley-twist brick chimneys, each patterned differently, are the palace’s signature against the sky.
Clock Court and the astronomical clock
The second court carries the palace’s most-photographed detail: the astronomical clock made for Henry VIII in 1540, mounted on Anne Boleyn’s Gateway. It shows the hour, the month, the moon’s phase and the time of high water at London Bridge — tide tables mattered when your guests arrived by barge.
The Great Hall
Henry VIII’s Great Hall is the last medieval great hall built for the English Crown, its hammerbeam roof carved and gilded overhead, Flemish tapestries on the walls. The court ate here in shifts; the king did not — he dined in state elsewhere while several hundred household members worked through their rations below.
The Tudor kitchens
The largest surviving Tudor kitchens anywhere, built to feed some 600 people twice a day. Fires still burn in the roasting hearths on many weekends, with historical cooks working period recipes. Give this section more time than you think it needs — travellers repeatedly name it the surprise highlight.
The Chapel Royal
Still a working chapel after nearly five centuries, viewed from The Royal Pew above. The blue-and-gold fan-vaulted ceiling is one of the finest Tudor interiors in existence. Services can close it at short notice — part of what it means that the palace is alive rather than preserved.
The Haunted Gallery and the processional route
The gallery linking the royal apartments to the chapel is where Catherine Howard is said to have run screaming to plead with Henry in 1541 — and where her apparition has been reported since. The stories, the 2003 CCTV figure and what a psychology study made of it all are on the ghost tours at Hampton Court Palace page.
Wren’s Baroque palace: the State Apartments
Pass through the colonnade and the building changes century: Portland stone, tall sash windows, painted staircases. The King’s Apartments — restored after the 1986 fire — process from guard chamber to bedchamber exactly as etiquette once demanded; the Queen’s State Apartments answer them on the east front. The Cumberland Art Gallery and the Georgian Story rooms continue the collection; note the Mantegna Gallery stays closed until Spring 2027, with two of the Triumphs of Caesar canvases shown in the Georgian Story meanwhile.
Hidden highlights
Three things most visitors walk past: the wine fountain in Base Court, a working replica of the one painted in the Field of the Cloth of Gold; the real tennis court, the indoor royal tennis court still in use — you may catch a game in progress; and the graffiti centuries of residents carved into the stonework, which the sharpest private guides delight in pointing out.
See it with someone who knows every room
An architectural historian and former palace warders lead private tours - the building explains itself twice as well.
The gardens deserve their own visit — start with the Hampton Court Palace gardens and Maze guide — and the history page explains how one palace ended up in two styles. When you’re ready, Hampton Court Palace Tours compares every way to see it.