8 must-visit places for Harry Potter fans across the UK

Calling all wannabe wizards and witches from the muggle world — these are the Harry Potter places you need to add to your travel bucket list. Visit spellbinding Harry Potter-themed spots like the Warner Bros. Studio near London where the movies were filmed and places that existed long before J.K. Rowling was even born, like the Edinburgh street that inspired Diagon Alley and the Glenfinnan Viaduct. Imagining sipping butterbeer, strolling down ancient cobbled streets, and hopping aboard magical train rides? It’s all in this roundup of the best Harry Potter places to visit across the UK.

1. Step onto the set of Harry Potter

Harry Potter destination: Warner Bros. Studio Tour, London

If you want to stand in the same studio Harry, Hermione, and Ron filmed some of your favorite scenes, you have to visit the Warner Bros. Studio in London. During the tour of the Warner Bros. Studio, you’ll walk through some of the most iconic places in the Harry Potter franchise, like the Great Hall and Diagon Alley. You’ll also get to wield a wand and whizz around on a broomstick. Sure, the latter is with the help of a green screen, but us muggles need a bit of assistance. Real props and sets from the actual films are scattered all over the studio, and the seekers among you should keep an eye out for 15 hidden snitches.

2. Take a ride on the Hogwarts Express

Harry Potter destination: Glenfinnan Viaduct, Highlands, Scotland

There was no green screen magic in the Harry Potter movies when the Hogwarts Express glided over a viaduct that cut through lush countryside. It’s one of the iconic shots in the franchise, and you can travel the exact route taken by young witches and wizards by heading to Scotland. The ride on the Jacobite Steam Train, to give the train ride its muggle name, lasts a camera-filling two hours, departing from Fort William. If you’d rather see the train cross the Glenfinnan Viaduct than be on it, you can take a day trip from Edinburgh that will bring you straight to this must-see Harry Potter location.

3. Push your trolley into Platform 9¾

Harry Potter destination: King’s Cross Station, London

You probably won’t crash your trolley quite as spectacularly as Harry and Ron did at Platform 9¾, but you can still give it a go at King’s Cross Station in London where you’ll find one of best things to do in London for Harry Potter fans. Although removed from the platform for safety reasons, you can still find a sign and a trolley ready for you to snap the ultimate souvenir photo. Sadly, you won’t be able to recreate the moment the famous duo flies away from the station in a Ford Anglia as this would break the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy. Rules are rules.

4. Go shopping in Diagon Alley

Harry Potter destination: Leadenhall Market, London

Diagon Alley is where the who’s who of the wizarding world mingle — and who can blame them with such a great selection of bars and shops? The closest we muggles can get to the likes of The Leaky Cauldron, Ollivanders, and Flourish & Blotts is by wandering around London’s Leadenhall Market and Borough Market. Every Harry Potter fan needs to experience the magic of these two locations, which doubled for Diagon Alley.

5. Stroll through real-life Hogwarts

Harry Potter destination: Oxford University

It’s every Potterhead’s fantasy to study at Hogwarts, and students at Oxford University are pretty much doing just that. Many of the university’s age-old buildings were used as filming locations in Harry Potter films. Luckily, a walking tour means you don’t have to be an Oxford student to stroll through the opulent halls, gardens, libraries and other places that Harry Potter frequented. That said, having a real Oxford student show you around is key to finding all the most magical spots.

6. Walk over the Millennium Bridge

Harry Potter destination: Millennium Bridge and St. Paul’s Cathedral

Are you brave enough to walk over a bridge that’s been snapped in half by Death Eaters? Best take your wand, just in case. There are so many Harry Potter film locations hidden in London, and the Millennium Bridge hides in plain sight to the thousands of commuters and tourists that cross it every day. Not only is it one of the most Instagrammable spots in London, it’s bookended by two must-visit London landmarks and another Harry Potter location: St. Paul’s Cathedral, home to the spiral Geometric Staircase leading to Professor Trelawney’s Divination classroom in “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban,” and the Tate Modern, London’s leading modern art gallery.

7. See the places that inspired J.K. Rowling

Harry Potter destination: Edinburgh

It takes talent, imagination, and inspiring scenery to create an amazing novel, and that is exactly what J.K. Rowling found in Edinburgh when she wrote the Harry Potter books. The Scottish capital is packed with places that feel instantly familiar to Harry Potter lovers. The 1,000-year-old Edinburgh Castle sitting high on Castle Rock just like Hogwarts or the colorful Victoria Street that was the inspiration for Diagon Alley — J.K. Rowling looked down on it as she wrote. A Harry Potter tour isn’t just a fun thing to do in Edinburgh with kids, it’s a must for any Potterhead to see and hear all the details of these fascinating Harry Potter places in its author’s adopted hometown. Who knows, it might even inspire you to write your own bestseller.

8. Test your parseltongue skills

Harry Potter destination: London Zoo

Try to keep your Parseltongue abilities in check when you enter the Reptile House at London Zoo — the actual place Harry Potter one upped Dudley and made the glass vanish so a python could head back to Brazil in “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” — and hope no snakes make a break for it with the aid of a wizard.