It’s no secret that train travel is one of the worst ways of getting around the country. It might be better in a lot of nations, but the UK’s train network is absolutely appalling. We’ve got a lot of trains going to big cities (woo!), yet there are always multiple issues making your journey less comfortable and more frustrating than it should be.
You’ve got excessive prices to deal with, packed train carriages, long journeys and much more.
How can you improve your train journeys so they’re less annoying? Check out these top tips, and you’ll start hating this mode of transport a tiny bit less!
The worst train experience looks like this:
You arrive at the station, only to find your platform is packed with passengers waiting to board. The train rolls in, you’re stuffed inside, and they’ve turned off the seat reservations because it’s too busy. (Why do they do that, by the way? What’s the point in buying seats when they just turn it off?!). Cue the entire journey spent either standing up or crammed between someone who won’t stop manspreading. All the while, the first-class cabins are almost empty, with loads of free space!
As a result, your first tip is to try and get cheaper first-class tickets whenever possible. They’re weirdly not that bad for singles or daily returns, especially if you have a Railcard. You can also download the Seatfrog app. It lets you bid on first-class tickets at a cheaper price than usual, so you get to save chunks of cash. Honestly, it’s always worth looking here before planning a journey. You sometimes find first-class seats for as much as a normal seat. Being in the first-class trailer gives you peace of mind as the seats are more comfortable, you have way more space and it’s lovely and quiet.
If you want to go to or from a major UK city, you’re probably going to be on the train for at least an hour. This gets extremely uncomfortable, especially if you’re in the normal seats. Some trains are better than others – CrossCountry is notoriously uncomfortable – but you always end up with a stiff neck after the journey.
That’s why you should always bring a travel pillow with you on every train journey. It turns any seat into something far more comfortable, and you can close your eyes and try to sleep or doze in peace. It’s funny how people bring these pillows on planes, yet nobody uses them on trains! They’re worth the investment as they do make train journeys less frustratingly uncomfortable.
A “quick” UK train journey is still pretty slow – and that’s before we take all the delays into account. You could be stuck on a train for 3+ hours with very little to do. Time goes so slowly, and it leaves you incredibly frustrated.
Deal with this by downloading or playing games on your phone. It’s a simple way of helping the time melt away so you forget what’s going on. Lose yourself in mahjong, go through multiple sudoku puzzles or download a puzzle game like Candy Crush to keep you going for hours. It sounds like such a weak tip, yet you’ll be amazed at the difference this makes to every train journey.
It’s all about occupying your mind so it’s distracted from the frustrations. You won’t even notice that the train has to move slowly for 30 minutes because there’s a single snowflake on the tracks. It doesn’t bother you when you’re waiting outside a station for an extra 10 minutes as there are no platforms free. You’re lost in your games, so when the journey ends, it feels like it’s been going for a fraction of the real time.
No joke, this might be the number one train travel tip.
A good set of noise-cancelling headphones will change your life forever. No longer will you suffer from the rowdy “lads” making football chants for hours on end. That crying baby in the seat near you? Its wails are gone. Blown away into the background and falling on deaf ears.
You get to sit in peace and quiet for the entire journey. Play music through your headphones or listen to an audiobook/podcast and feel the hours melt away. Every trip is infinitely better, and this is a key way to make travelling less stressful in general. If you can lock yourself away in a little bubble and ignore everything else around you, public transport doesn’t feel so bad anymore!
Train timetables are usually classified in the following ways:
These terms refer to how busy the train lines will be during certain times. Peak times are usually in the morning or between 5-7 pm when everyone is travelling to/from work. It’s way busier, so the trains are packed, and tickets cost more money.
Try to travel during off-peak times as this saves a huge tonne of cash while ensuring you get emptier trains. Super off-peak is a fairly new term they just magically created a few years ago. This means that trains are even less busy and cheaper at certain times of the day. If you can get on some trains during these periods, you’ll have fewer people in your carriage, so the journey is way more comfortable. There should also be fewer delays as the lines aren’t as busy!
Everyone in the UK should know the main train companies. We’ve got a few to choose from, and some are region-specific (like Transport for Wales and West Midlands Railway). Most of the long journeys between big cities are handled by either Avanti West Coast, CrossCountry or Great Wester Railway.
This isn’t an ad for them (and they’re far from perfect), but picking a GWR train will make your journey better. They’re just far more spacious, and you have more legroom, so it’s more comfortable to sit in any seat. The other two feel a lot more cramped and don’t have as many carriages, so journeys become highly frustrating.
And on that note, you’ve reached the end of your tips to make train travel more comfortable. Travelling by train can be a real pain, but hopefully these ideas will make you hate it a tiny bit less than usual.
Full time I'm an ambitious Head of Marketing and Communications in the luxury industry. Part time, I'm an enthusiastic British Fashion, Beauty and Lifestyle blogger and YouTuber from Manchester, UK. This blog has been my outlet for the past 7+ years, and as a longstanding, Award-winning blogger I take the most enjoyment from creating content I truly love and believe in. All authentic. Always.