Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Review: How easy is taking the Elizabeth Line from Heathrow to central London?

Links on Head for Points may support the site by paying a commission.  See here for all partner links.

On Sunday, Transport for London finally started running direct Elizabeth Line services from Heathrow and Reading all the way to Abbey Wood and Shenfield.

This means the ‘swap from the underground Elizabeth Line platform to the above ground Elizabeth Line platform’ is a thing of the past – and should make getting to and from Heathrow a lot easier for many people.

As it happens, I was on my way back from Tampa after the Virgin Atlantic A330neo inaugural on Sunday night and needed to get home on Monday morning, so I thought I would see what it’s like.

I’ll be up front here – it is reassuringly boring ….

Elizabeth Line Crossrail roundel

After a quick breakfast in the Virgin Atlantic Revivals arrivals lounge at Heathrow (review here) I made my way down to the Heathrow T2 & T3 train station downstairs. The platforms are really deep, which means you either have to wait for the bizarrely slow lifts or take multiple escalators down.

I opted for the former as I had a larger suitcase with me. This turned out to be a mistake, as I ended up missing an Elizabeth Line train by about 10 seconds. I had to wait 15 minutes for the next one, which was slightly frustrating.

I’m not sure where the train had come from (either T4 or T5) but it was fairly empty and I managed to get a seat. Unlike Heathrow Express trains there are no luggage storage racks, so you need to hold on to your suitcase if it has spinner wheels. I always sit in a group of four seats which helps to stop it rolling around quite so much!

The train did start to fill up as we headed towards central London but it was never busy with plenty of seating always available.

Just before Paddington, we ended up waiting for a couple of minutes before entering the central tunnels as apparently we were ahead of schedule. At the moment, the Elizabeth Line and National Rail schedules are not fully aligned so the final service pattern might be a bit tighter come next Spring.

I stayed on for a few more stops until I got off at Liverpool Street. If I was going into the office I would have taken the short walk from here, but with Rob and Sinead out at World Travel Market I headed home. I changed to the Northern Line via the station connection to Moorgate. In total, it took about 45 minutes from Heathrow to this point.

Interestingly, despite the multiple stops, it is now showing via Citymapper as one of the fastest options home for me. It seems to be often as fast (or even faster) than the Heathrow Express to Paddington before changing onto a longer tube journey.

It is also far more pleasant of course, as I can spend more time in the spacious, air conditioned Elizabeth Line trains.

In total, my journey took just under an hour plus the short walk from the tube station to my flat. It cost £12.80, which would be reduced to £8.50 with a Railcard. It’s good to have another option for getting to Heathrow.

Category

General

Comments (217)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Phil G says:
    8 Nov8 November 07:09

    How do you get a discount with a railcard ?
    Can I add my railcard to my TFL account ?

    • Paul says:
      8 Nov8 November 07:20

      Good question. You can buy his Trainline but on Sunday Trainline stated that Bond Street didn’t exists

    • Lou says:
      8 Nov8 November 07:26

      You can add one of the following to your Oyster card:
      – Network Gold Card
      – Over 60 Railcard
      – 18-25 Railcard
      – 25-30 Railcard
      – Disabled Railcard
      – Armed forces Railcard

      • Lou says:
        8 Nov8 November 07:27

        As I make a lot of off-peak journeys on TFL, it made sense for me to buy the cheapest season ticket with a good card and load it into my Oyster

        • Lou says:
          8 Nov8 November 07:27

          *Gold

        • Johnny5a says:
          8 Nov8 November 08:07

          Cheapest Gold use to be Isle of Wight, not sure what is it now

        • BuildBackBetter says:
          8 Nov8 November 08:57

          Only makes sense if you aren’t eligible for any of the other railcards?

          • Michael Jennings says:
            8 Nov8 November 20:28

            The Network Card has a £13 minimum fare Monday-Friday. The Gold Card doesn’t. So if you are of normal adult age, travel by yourself, and don’t have any special entitlements, this is going to be the best option.

      • RussellH says:
        8 Nov8 November 10:10

        Unless things have changed recently, you need to find a member of TFL staff at a station and ask them to link your railcard to your oyster card. They need both cards to do it.

        • jjoohhnn says:
          8 Nov8 November 12:38

          Everyone is eligible for the Network Railcard

          • Lou says:
            8 Nov8 November 17:48

            You can’t add a network Railcard to your Oyster.

            Re: adding, it’s easy. Took less than 5 min in Waterloo underground station

  • Geoggy says:
    8 Nov8 November 07:17

    As an ex Northfields resident that had to suffer tourists blocking doors with spinner cases, and seeing them roll around Picc line carriages, I always wondered why people didn’t lie them on the edge with the very obvious small feet for that very purpose.

  • Paul says:
    8 Nov8 November 07:19

    I live to the west of Heathrow so the benefits of the Elizabeth line are very limited. A change at Hayes and Harlington is required and if two of us are travelling the cost, even with a railcard, exceeds the cost of a taxi and it takes forever.
    We simply don’t do public transport right in this country. It is inefficient, never in the right place and is prohibitively expensive.
    There are now 3 different types of rail service serving LHR from central London but still you cannot access the airport by train directly from any other place in the entire country

    • Lou says:
      8 Nov8 November 07:28

      Au least you’re not in South West London. Great for getting into London, not so great for getting into West London!

      • Rob says:
        8 Nov8 November 09:03

        It is bizarre, I agree. To get from Custom House to South Ken last night required a huge walk at Bond Street to the Jubilee, one stop, then another huge walk at Green Park to Piccadilly. Lack of a Piccadilly connection is an issue.

        • lumma says:
          8 Nov8 November 09:39

          Why wouldn’t you just switch to the district line at Whitechapel?

        • George K says:
          8 Nov8 November 10:24

          Anything at WTM worth seeing?

          (I also did the Whitechapel connection, which I found very good)

          • Rob says:
            8 Nov8 November 10:35

            The Middle East countries have ludicrously expensive and expansive stands, the biggest I have ever seen.

            In general, though, if you want to play around in business class airline seats then the Business Travel Show is the one for you, not World Travel Market. Airlines are very much third or fourth fiddle behind the tourist boards.

        • MarkH says:
          8 Nov8 November 10:57

          Following the signs for the Piccadilly line when changing at Green Park is an amateur move.

          Much quicker to go up to the ticket hall and then down the Piccadilly line escalator.
          Switching between Jubilee and Victoria is fine though.

        • Michael Jennings says:
          8 Nov8 November 20:32

          Yes. To get from Heathrow to where I live in Bermondsey, it looked like a switch from Elizabeth to Jubilee at Bond Street was going to be the best option, but that’s a long walk at Bond Street, alas. It might be that I end up changing to the Overground at Whitechapel and then either get off at Canada Water or do another change there to get to Bermondsey. At least those are both easy changes.

      • ChasP says:
        8 Nov8 November 09:04

        For me the recommended route is 15 mins drive to station (£8.50 daily parking charge) an hour on the train to Guildford then an hour and a half on a coach. Or I can drive the whole way in an hour and a half.
        Oh and theres only one coach an hour

    • BuildBackBetter says:
      8 Nov8 November 09:03

      It’s a London airport. What do you expect? Can you access Manchester or Edinburgh airports directly from your place? Is it government fault you choose to live at a specific place where you know there are no direct trains?
      Who pays for direct trains in all directions?

      • The Savage Squirrel says:
        8 Nov8 November 10:30

        Yes you can access Manchester airport directly from Edinburgh, Glasgow, Newcastle, Durham, Darlington, York, Leeds, Hull Sheffield, Chester, North Wales, The Lake District and lots of places in between – without changing trains. Just sayin’ 😉

        Given its location and key strategic role, Heathrow’s lack of rail links to anywhere but London is quite surprising.

        • memesweeper says:
          8 Nov8 November 11:58

          Equally there are more UK cities directly linked to Stansted than Heathrow.

        • Will-h says:
          9 Nov9 November 22:24

          You can no longer teach Manchester Airport directly from Sheffield/Hull, that rail service has been “levelled up”. Have to change trains at Manchester Piccadilly. (But also Transpennine doesn’t really exist right now; cancellations are through the roof)

  • Nick says:
    8 Nov8 November 07:22

    How do you get from Heathrow to Reading? Do you have to change?

    • ChasP says:
      8 Nov8 November 09:08

      Railair coach Heathrow to Reading

      • Londonsteve says:
        8 Nov8 November 10:35

        Is there any point in this service going forward? Surely an EL train to Hayes and changing to a Heathrow service is now faster than the bus? Or, stay on the fast service that got you to Reading to begin with until Paddington or Ealing Broadway and change there.

        • tony says:
          8 Nov8 November 11:12

          The connection times from the West at Hayes certainly were hopeless, especially for T5 which required a second change at Heathrow central.

          The rail air bus, even in rush hour, has been fast. Time wise, it was invariably better to go all the way into London then back out to T5 on the hex. Or get off at slough and hop in a taxi.

  • ianM says:
    8 Nov8 November 07:36

    I guess there’s no way to get the senior railcard discount if you just use contactless?

    • Lou says:
      8 Nov8 November 07:44

      You can load a senior Railcard into your Oyster. Ask one of the gate attendants at a tube station to add it on for you

    • Margaret says:
      8 Nov8 November 07:48

      And the over 60 and senior oyster cards will mean that the journey is free as it’s part of the network.

    • lumma says:
      8 Nov8 November 08:47

      No, you need to get an oyster card to get the discount

  • Mark says:
    8 Nov8 November 07:39

    Will (hopefully) be trying this out tomorrow, from Liverpool St to T4.

    I see this morning however that the 8am to T5 and the 818am to T4 (ex Liverpool St) are both cancelled. The HEX seems to be running fine so not sure what the issue is. My fear is that the Elizabeth Line outside of the central tunnels will be prone to delay and cancellation which will quickly erode confidence in it for time-critical journeys to the airport, especially while there are only 4 services an hour in any case.

    • Ben says:
      8 Nov8 November 07:49

      It’s a bit early to write the whole thing off as unreliable only 2 days into full through-running…

      • Mark says:
        8 Nov8 November 08:19

        Well I’ve been using it daily in the central section since it opened and it’s been amazing. But I also check the TfL app every morning before leaving home, and it’s not an exaggeration to say that about twice a week there is massive disruption on the above ground sections, especially Shenfueld. As the lines connect up it is inevitably going to be less reliable, and my concern is LHR services will be the easy give as there are many other alternatives. But hardly writing it off just yet 😉

        • John says:
          8 Nov8 November 08:35

          I guess as seen from this morning if there is an issue they will try to split it up into three sections again to recover. There are more alternatives to get to Reading and Stratford and even Abbey Wood than Heathrow! T4 passengers suffer the most though which is a shame as it could be the most convenient terminal

    • John says:
      8 Nov8 November 08:33

      A train has broken down in the central tunneled section meaning that trains arriving from the west were turned around at / before Paddington. So HEx is OK.

      The train meant to be operating the 0806 Liv St to T4 didn’t make it to Abbey Wood to turn around; the train operating the 0818 Liv St to T5 is 17 minutes late.

  • Ian says:
    8 Nov8 November 07:42

    Would be nice to have the Internet.

    WiFi is still not working – or wasn’t on my last trip.

    • Mark says:
      8 Nov8 November 07:44

      Yes I use the EL central section every day, and have still not been able to connect though the TfL system works fine for me on all other tube lines.

      • lumma says:
        8 Nov8 November 08:49

        The station WiFi works fine, same network as the tube stations, the on-board WiFi doesn’t yet

    • Rhys says:
      8 Nov8 November 09:43

      4G/5G eventually too I believe…

      • riku says:
        8 Nov8 November 10:08

        When I moved to Finland in 1999 the Helsinki metro had full mobile coverage for all mobile networks throughout the tunnels. In London they are still to implement mobile networks in the tunnels!

        • Londonsteve says:
          8 Nov8 November 10:39

          The had full mobile coverage in the tunnels of the Budapest metro in 2001.

        • jjoohhnn says:
          8 Nov8 November 12:42

          Jubilee Line has it in tunnels going east.

          • Rob says:
            8 Nov8 November 15:07

            It does (on the extension, not the original bit). Annoyingly I always forget because I’m only on it occasionally. In fact, thinking about it, I should probably have come home from Excel last night on the Jubilee, ignoring the Elizabeth line, purely to get 20 minutes of ’email answering time’.

  • Ben says:
    8 Nov8 November 07:47

    You chose to take multiple escalators because you had a large suitcase? Surely the lift is a better option, although I agree they can be very slow!

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

New to Head for Points?

Welcome!  We’re the UK’s most-read source of business travel, Avios, frequent flyer and hotel loyalty news. Let us improve how you travel. Got any questions? Ask them in our forums.

Get 25,000 Avios with the Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

GET A SIGN-UP BONUS OF 18,000 VIRGIN POINTS!

Latest Forum Posts

Get 80,000 bonus points (worth 80,000 Avios) and £400 of dining credit with The Platinum Card (Offer ends 27th May)

Check reward flight availability instantly for free!

See a whole year of reward seat availability on one page at SeatSpy.com

Get up to 10,000 bonus Hilton Honors points

Booking a luxury hotel?

Our luxury hotel booking service offers you GUARANTEED extra benefits over booking direct. Works with Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, The Ritz Carlton, St Regis and more. We've booked £1.7 million of rooms to date. Click for details.

SME? GET THE ONLY FREE SMALL BUSINESS CREDIT CARD WHICH CAN EARN AVIOS

Get points worth 30,000 Avios with 'first year free' American Express Gold (ends 27th May)

The UK's biggest frequent flyer website uses cookies, which you can block via your browser settings. Continuing implies your consent to this policy. Our privacy policy is here.

Got it!