An exciting new university league table to get the pulse racing and/or feel cross about. This time we are looking at university buildings and centres which appear in the list of top visitor attractions in the UK. This source data is not necessarily comprehensive as it only includes attractions which are in membership of the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions but the top 400 or so does range from the British Museum’s millions of tourists at one end to Broseley Pipeworks in Ironbridge Gorge (Once the site of the most prolific clay tobacco pipe makers in Britain apparently) with under 900 visitors per annum at the other. 

VISITS MADE IN 2024 TO VISITOR ATTRACTIONS IN MEMBERSHIP WITH ALVA

Here is the top 10 then and, as will be noted, there are no university-based visitor attractions in there. And all of them are in or very near London. No surprises there perhaps.

Rank, Site, Total visits

1. The British Museum 6,479,952
2. Natural History Museum (South Kensington) 6,301,972
3. The Crown Estate, Windsor Great Park 5,670,430
4. Tate Modern 4,603,025
5. Southbank Centre 3,734,075
6. V&A South Kensington 3,525,700
7. The National Gallery 3,203,451
8. Somerset House 3,074,736
9. Tower of London 2,902,385
10. Science Museum 2,827,242

Moving on from the big hitters then we find that there are in fact only three universities which feature in this particular league table – Oxford, Cambridge and Manchester. Here are those attractions then:

Rank, Site, Total visits

33 Ashmolean Museum 942,692 (Oxford)

37 Bodleian Libraries 865,191 (Oxford)

40 Oxford University Museum of Natural History 834,604(Oxford) 

56 Manchester Museum 650,392 (Manchester)

80 Pitt Rivers Museum 509,703 (Oxford)

81 The Fitzwilliam Museum 506,428 (Cambridge) 

120 Cambridge University Botanic Garden 366,787 (Cambridge) 

165 The Whitworth 236,445 (Manchester)

169 Oxford Botanic Garden and Arboretum 227, 573 (Oxford)

196 History of Science Museum 179,346 (Oxford) 

213 University Museum of Zoology 157,020 (Cambridge) 

228 Jodrell Bank Centre for Engagement 125,088 (Manchester)

244 The Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology  106,932 (Cambridge)

251 Kettle’s Yard 103,935 (Cambridge) 

258 Sedgwick Museum of Earth Sciences 92,458 (Cambridge) 

316 The Polar Museum 37,193 (Cambridge) 

356 Whipple Museum of the History of Science  17, 803 (Cambridge)

364 Museum of Classical Archaeology. 12,497 (Cambridge)

Which is your favourite? And which are the other top university attractions (ideally not located in Oxford, Cambridge or Manchester)  which don’t appear on this list?