Sauna in London: where to share the heat in 2026

A city with two generations of sauna

London has 23 communal bathing spaces on the Bathhouse map. They come from two eras. One is the public baths with hot rooms on the Turkish bath model; two of them, from 1929, were refurbished and reopened in 2025. The other is the saunas opened in recent years: not-for-profit associations, neighborhood clubs, outdoor sauna villages and wood-fired boats in the docks.

The London chapter of Britain’s Best Saunas (Lucie Grace, Hoxton Mini Press, 2026) brings the two generations together; the book comes up in the piece on the social side of the bathhouse. This guide works from the map’s records, which describe what each operator publishes on its own site. It is not a ranking. Prices and hours were read on the sites between August and October 2026 and they change; check before booking.

Several formats at once

Format	What it is	Spaces on the map
Public Turkish bath	Hot rooms in sequence, steam, cold pool, entry by time slot	Porchester Spa, York Hall, Ironmonger Row
Russian banya	Humid steam room, cold pool, parenie with a venik, a table in the lounge	Banya No.1 (Hoxton and Chiswick), The Bath House
Community sauna	Not-for-profit or church, low price, social rate	Community Sauna Baths (five sites), Finnish Church
Sauna club	Booked session, social or silent sauna, cold plunge	Sauna Social Club, Lowlu, Pulse Club, Arc, The Cabin, Innervisions Alchemy
Sauna on the water	Sauna in the docks, with cold water next to it	Skuna, Sweheat

1. The public Turkish baths

Three public bath buildings offer the Turkish bath’s sequence of hot rooms: tepidarium, caldarium and laconicum, each hotter than the last, with steam and a cold pool.

Porchester Spa, in the Porchester Centre on Queensway (Bayswater), occupies an art deco building from 1929. It reopened in February 2025 after a £3 million refurbishment reported by the press: three Turkish hot rooms, two steam rooms, a sauna, a cold plunge and two pools. Days are separate: women on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, men on Mondays and Wednesdays, mixed on Sundays. Entry cost £31 per visit, according to press coverage of the reopening, with a minimum age of 18.

Be Well the Spa, at York Hall in Bethnal Green, also dates from 1929. Tower Hamlets Council announced its reopening on April 3, 2025: three hot rooms, two aromatic steam rooms, a traditional sauna, an infrared sauna, an ice fountain, a cold plunge and a hammam, with access from £32.50 for non-members.

York Hall in Bethnal Green: the 1929 baths that Tower Hamlets Council reopened in 2025. Photo: Paul the Archivist, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

In Islington, Ironmonger Row Baths house the thermal spa of GLL (the Better brand), set, according to the operator, in one of London’s oldest Turkish baths. The thermal session costs £47 for 120 minutes and must be booked, members included. The dry sauna reaches 90 °C; there are Turkish bath rooms, aromatic steam, a hammam, an ice fountain and a plunge pool. Swimwear is required, the minimum age is 16 and phones stay outside. In the week of October 19, 2026, Tuesday from 10 a.m. to noon was women only.

Ironmonger Row Baths in Islington, seen from the garden at St Luke’s. Photo: Jim Osley, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

AIRE Ancient Baths, in a listed building off the Strand, works differently: it sells a booked 90-minute bathing ritual, the same as the chain’s other houses, with a hammam, steam and a cold pool. The price does not appear in the map’s sources.

2. The Russian banyas

Banya No.1 has been in Hoxton since 2012. The public banya is shared: a humid steam room, a cedar cold pool, bucket showers and parenie rooms, the ritual with bundles of leaves (venik). Most of the week is mixed, with swimwear required; there are women-only hours on Monday morning and men-only hours on Tuesday evening and Friday afternoon. A 90-minute session cost £40 off-peak and £50 at peak, with a 50% deposit when booking online.

Banya No.1 Chiswick, on Chiswick High Road, publishes its steam room at about 70 °C with high humidity, a plunge pool, an ice bath and a lounge where each group gets a booth with a table. The 90-minute session starts at £40.

The Bath House, in Belgravia, opened in 2020 at 1 Grosvenor Gardens. A session lasts 2 hours (3 with treatments): steam at about 70 °C, a cold pool at 6 to 8 °C, buckets of ice water and a table in the lounge, with slippers, towel and sheet included. Tuesday is men’s day, Thursday is women’s day and the rest are mixed. The session without treatments cost £75.

3. The community saunas

Community Sauna Baths is a not-for-profit with five sites on the map. The first is in the old public baths on Eastway, Hackney Wick, a 1930s building (the photo at the top of this piece): six communal saunas, a private one for up to 20 people, cold plunges, a garden and a café. Sessions referred by the NHS, Britain’s public health service, are free. Others cost from £9.50 to £16.50, depending on the time.

The other sites:

• Ruskin Park (Camberwell), opened in April 2025 with Lambeth Council: four saunas, one of them accessible, and four cold pools between 5 and 10 °C.
• Stratford, in a community garden: three saunas, three cold tubs from 3 to 15 °C, a wheelchair-accessible sauna and changing room, and hours reserved for the NHS every day from 7 to 11 a.m.
• Walthamstow, opened in September 2025 near Blackhorse Road, according to local press: three saunas and outdoor cold pools.
• Peckham, in the Glengall Wharf garden: two wood-fired saunas, no electricity and no cold tub, Friday to Sunday, in 75-minute sessions for £8.

Ruskin Park, Stratford and Walthamstow publish a social rate from £5 for people on low incomes, students and NHS workers, and the network sells monthly memberships.

The Finnish Church sauna, at 33 Albion Street in Rotherhithe, opens Wednesday to Sunday. Public sessions are separate for men and for women, with 8 places per slot, from £12. The church asks bathers to wash with soap before going in and to sit on a small towel, and warns that too much steam sets off the fire alarm.

The Finnish Church in Rotherhithe, whose sauna is open to the public Wednesday to Sunday. Photo: Robin Stott, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

4. The sauna clubs

Most of the new offer is clubs that sell booked sessions with a Finnish sauna, a cold plunge and a rest area. What changes between them is the size of the room and the type of session.

• Sauna Social Club (Peckham), under a railway arch: two Finnish saunas, four ice baths and essential, social, silent and aufguss sessions. The 50-minute session cost £14.99.
• Lowlu, with three sites. Kentish Town is an outdoor village with five saunas and six plunges. Wandsworth separates a social sauna and a silent one. Ilford, inside a padel club, has women-only sessions. Sessions from £9 to £16.50, depending on site and time.
• Pulse Club (Fulham): 75-minute sessions, social or silent, from £17 to £22.
• Arc (Canary Wharf): a communal sauna for 60 people, eight ice baths, guided classes, free flow and sauna parties. The three-class intro pack cost £49.
• The Cabin Sauna (Clapham Common), an outdoor wooden sauna near the park’s paddling pool: a 55-minute session, open or guided, for £19.99.
• Innervisions Alchemy (Ilderton Wharf, Bermondsey): a wood-fired sauna and outdoor cold plunges, with community sessions and membership.

5. Sauna on the water

In the eastern docks, two saunas sit at the water’s edge.

Skuna keeps two wood-fired sauna boats at West India Quay, Canary Wharf: the larger for up to 16 people and the smaller for up to 7. The cold pools on the deck are between 3 and 6 °C, and the sauna between 70 and 90 °C. A shared 75-minute session starts at £15, and the £49 monthly membership gives unlimited shared sessions.

Sweheat is on Western Beach at Royal Victoria Dock, a 7-minute walk from Royal Victoria station. Public sessions are mixed, 60 minutes for £15 or 90 minutes for £20, with a cold plunge. There are events with set places, such as aufguss and Lithuanian rituals with bundles of leaves.

Before you go

• Booking: almost all of them sell booked sessions on the website or through an app. Walk-ins only where the operator says it takes them and there is space.
• Gender sessions: Porchester, the Finnish Church, the banyas and Ironmonger Row have men-only or women-only hours. Check the session first.
• Dress: Ironmonger Row, Lowlu, Pulse Club, Skuna and the mixed sessions at the banyas require swimwear. At Banya No.1 it is optional in single-gender sessions.
• Towel: Lowlu asks for two, one for the sauna bench and one for after the plunge; the Finnish Church asks for a small one to sit on.

Summary by format

Space	Format	Published access
Porchester Spa	Public Turkish bath from 1929	Entry per visit, gender days and mixed Sunday
Be Well the Spa, York Hall	Public Turkish bath from 1929	Booked session or membership
Ironmonger Row Baths	Thermal spa in a historic Turkish bath	120-minute booked session
AIRE Ancient Baths	The AIRE chain’s bathing ritual	90-minute booked session
Banya No.1 (Hoxton and Chiswick)	Russian banya	Booked session, mixed or by gender
The Bath House	Russian banya	2-hour session with a table in the lounge
Community Sauna Baths	Not-for-profit community sauna	Booked session, social rate, free for NHS referrals
Finnish Church	Finnish sauna	Gender sessions, 8 places per slot
Sauna Social Club, Lowlu, Pulse Club, Arc, The Cabin, Innervisions Alchemy	Sauna club	Booked session, pack or membership
Skuna, Sweheat	Sauna on the water	Booked shared session

Address, hours and the full listing for each space are on the London map. On the sauna as a meeting place away from home and work, read the social side of the bathhouse; for the differences between a Finnish sauna, a banya and a hammam, see the types of sauna.