Tower of London Tour and the Crown Jewels

Most people start by asking whether to book a guided tour. What matters more is what order to do things in, because the ticket already includes the two things most people would pay a guide for: the Crown Jewels and a tour with a Yeoman Warder, the uniformed guards everyone calls Beefeaters.

A sensible order

1. Crown Jewels first. The Jewel House sits in the Waterloo Block, and its queue grows through the morning. Go straight there when you enter. Inside, a slow moving walkway carries you past the crowns, orbs and sceptres used at coronations, and you can go round again. Photography is not allowed in this part.
2. Then a Yeoman Warder tour. They leave regularly from near the entrance through the day and last about an hour. The Warders are former soldiers with long service careers, now full-time storytellers, and the tour is the funniest hour of history in London, full of executions, escapes and the ravens. It usually ends at the Chapel Royal of St Peter ad Vincula, where Anne Boleyn is buried.
3. The White Tower. The Norman keep at the centre holds the royal armouries, including Henry VIII's armour, and the plain chapel of St John upstairs, one of the oldest church interiors in the city.
4. The walls and the river side. The wall walk, the medieval palace rooms and Traitors' Gate, where prisoners arrived by boat from the Thames.

Who it suits

Almost everyone, including children old enough to enjoy the gore. Our things to do guide puts it near the top of the city's list for good reason: it is the one place where the whole story of English royalty is on one site.

Who it doesn't

Visitors who dislike crowds, especially on a summer afternoon when the courtyards fill with school groups. And anyone hoping for quiet reflection at the execution site: Tower Green is small and busy. If you only care about the jewels, you can be in and out in ninety minutes, but that misses most of the fortress.

A paid private guide makes sense in one case: if you want context the Warders skip, such as the medieval palace or the Tower's role as a mint and a zoo. For a first visit, the free tour is enough.

Buy a timed ticket from Historic Royal Palaces, the charity that runs the Tower. It includes the Crown Jewels, the White Tower and the Yeoman Warder tours. Booking online does not give you a cheaper entry, but it does fix your time slot, which matters in summer and school holidays. Our travel guide lists the other places in London to book before you arrive.

Resellers bundle the Tower with a boat trip, a London pass or a guided walk. Before paying, check three things:

• whether the "guided tour" is extra to the Yeoman Warder tour you already get for free
• whether early entry is real, and how much earlier than general opening it is
• if the ticket gives a fixed entry time, or a voucher you must exchange at a desk on the day

Warder tours are not booked separately: you join one at the meeting point as it starts, and they can be called off in bad weather. Step-free access is limited in the older towers, so check the access page on the official site before you go.

• Arrive at opening. The first hour is the quietest in the Jewel House all day.
• Travel light. There are bag checks, suitcases are a problem, and the spiral stairs in the towers are narrow.
• Wear flat shoes. Cobbles, slopes and hundreds of steps on the wall walk.
• Look for the ravens near the White Tower lawn, but keep your distance and your snack in your bag.
• Pair it with the river. Tower Bridge is next door, and walking west along the South Bank afterwards is exactly how our 3-day itinerary builds its second day.
• Skip the audio guide on a first visit. The Warder tour tells the stories better, and you will want your hands free on the stairs.
• Save the wall walk for last. By mid-afternoon the courtyards are at their busiest, and the walls are where the crowd thins out. From the walls you look across the Thames and straight at the glass towers of the City.