TKTS London: It Is Now the Official London Theatre Ticket Booth

If you’re looking for TKTS in Leicester Square, you’re looking for the Official London Theatre Ticket Booth. The name changed, the booth didn’t: it’s the same Clocktower building on the south side of the square, run by the Society of London Theatre, which describes itself as a not-for-profit. It calls itself “formerly TKTS London”, and it’s still the place people mean when they say they’re going to get half-price tickets.

The change matters because the old web address is a dead end. When we looked on 10 October, tkts.co.uk was returning an SSL certificate error, and the old /tkts/ page on Official London Theatre simply redirects to its Today’s Tickets listing. If you’re after the booth’s deals online, that’s the address to use.

A short history of the name

The booth opened in 1980 as the Half Price Ticket Booth, a small wooden hut painted green and yellow on the west side of Leicester Square, the first of its kind in the square and the one that spawned the imitations. After the square was redone and reopened by the Queen in 1992, it moved into the Clocktower building, and in 2001 it was renamed TKTS, borrowing the name of its Broadway counterpart in New York. It now trades as the Official London Theatre Ticket Booth, partnered with tkts.

Finding the right booth

It’s on the south side of Leicester Square, next to the park, opposite the Radisson Blu Edwardian Hampshire hotel. That last detail is worth knowing, because there are plenty of other ticket shops around the square and only this one is run by the Society of London Theatre. The booth says so plainly on its own site, so you know you’re in the right place.

From Leicester Square station, leave onto Charing Cross Road, walk west along Cranbourn Street into the square, turn left and head south. From Piccadilly Circus, go east along Coventry Street, cross Wardour Street, and turn right once you’re in the square. From Charing Cross, take the Strand to Trafalgar Square, then St Martin’s Place and Charing Cross Road past the National Portrait Gallery, and turn left down Irving Street into the square.

Hours

The booth is open Monday to Saturday from 10.30am to 6pm and on Sundays from 11am to 4pm. One online listing shows 10am to 7pm daily, but the operator’s own page gives the shorter hours, and that’s the one to trust. Shows, extra tickets and prices can change through the day, so it’s worth checking again before you queue.

There’s a Christmas timetable on the booth’s page, but it looks like last year’s. It lists 28 December and 4 January as the shorter 11am to 4pm days, which were the Sundays last winter, whereas this year the Sundays fall on 27 December and 3 January. So expect the dates to change, and don’t plan Christmas week around that table. It does show the pattern, which is closed on 25 December and a 3pm finish on Christmas Eve.

Is it really cheaper, and is it cheaper online?

The booth sells discounted and full-price tickets, and doesn’t have concession rates for students, children or seniors. What it does have is on-the-day stock that theatres haven’t sold. Its Today’s Tickets page, on the evening we checked (Saturday 10 October), showed how uneven the discounts are. Smaller shows had the big reductions: From the Heart at the Garrick from £15 (up to 60 per cent off), Million Dollar Quartet from £15 (up to 57 per cent), Franz & Marie from £23.50 (up to 50 per cent) and Avenue Q from £28 (up to 42 per cent). The big hits barely moved: Beetlejuice was from £40 (up to 49 per cent), The Devil Wears Prada from £32.50 (up to 37 per cent) and The Book of Mormon from £63 (up to 26 per cent), while Hamilton, Cabaret and The Lion King showed from £93, £85.93 and £73 with no discount marked.

So it’s most useful for the shows with unsold seats, and less so for the ones everyone wants.

The online side is the useful part. The operator says its on-the-day prices online are exactly the same as at the booth, new on-the-day tickets appear at 12.01am every day, and you can pay with Theatre Tokens either way. In the booth you leave with a physical ticket and advice from the staff. Booking fees cover the cost of running the booth, with any profit going back into theatre initiatives.

If something goes wrong

If you bought in person and lost your ticket, go back to the booth during opening hours. If you bought online, email ticketing@officiallondontheatre.com with your booking reference; the ticketing is handled by See Tickets. Outside the booth’s hours, the operator suggests going to the theatre itself, which will try to resolve it. You can also buy advance tickets at the booth, although it’s mainly built for the same day.

For a show-by-show guide to every other way of paying less, see our cheap theatre tickets guide, which covers lotteries, ballots and day seats.

Where to go next

Cheap theatre tickets covers every scheme beyond the booth, and the best West End shows covers what is worth seeing.

Operation Mincemeat and Cabaret both run their own lotteries, and Covent Garden is a short walk from the booth.