Photo: Chensiyuan (CC BY-SA 4.0), via Wikimedia Commons
Things to do in Sheffield
Wondering what to do in Sheffield? This guide lists the area's attractions — zoos, museums, theme parks and more — with distances, so you can plan every day of your trip. Highlights include The National Videogame Museum, Millennium Gallery and National Emergency Services Museum.
Showing museums, aquariums and attractions with indoor areas — the ones that work whatever the forecast.
🎟️ This weekend near Sheffield
Events from
Skiddle
Fri 13 Nov · 18:00
Sanctuary of Senses Ladies night
44 Water Royd Mirfield WF14 9SG, Mirfield · 22.9 mi
Tickets on Skiddle ↗
Fri 13 Nov · 19:00
Ultimate Rave Bingo // Mansfield // Friday 13th November
Civic Corner, Mansfield · 19.3 mi
Tickets on Skiddle ↗
Fri 13 Nov · 19:30
I Love The 90's feat Suki Soul
Canvas Mansfield, Mansfield · 19.9 mi
Tickets on Skiddle ↗
Fri 13 Nov · 10:00
Pattern Drafting Six Day BEGINNER Course (Womenswear)
The Burton Street Foundation, Sheffield · 1.6 mi
Tickets on Skiddle ↗
Aquariums
18.4 mi from Sheffield
Matlock Bath Aquarium
Matlock Bath Aquarium sits in a Victorian building in the centre of Matlock Bath, at the heart of the Peak District, and brings together a fascinating aquarium of over 50 fish spec...
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Museums & Galleries
0.1 mi from Sheffield
The National Videogame Museum
The National Videogame Museum in Sheffield is the UK's only museum dedicated solely to videogames, with over 100 playable exhibits ranging from retro arcade machines to modern cons...
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0.2 mi from Sheffield
Millennium Gallery
The Millennium Gallery sits in the heart of Sheffield, close to Sheffield station just 0.2 miles away, making it an easy stop whether you're visiting for the day or staying nearby....
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0.2 mi from Sheffield
National Emergency Services Museum
This is the UK's only Emergency Services Museum, set inside England's first purpose-built combined Police, Fire and Ambulance Station in Sheffield. Across three floors you'll find...
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0.4 mi from Sheffield
Turner Museum of Glass
The Turner Museum of Glass is housed in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Sheffield, in England. It is in the Sir Robert Hadfield Building wi... — Wikipedia
0.5 mi from Sheffield
Kelham Island Museum
Kelham Island Museum tells the story of Sheffield's industrial past, from master craftsmen to mass production, through the Industrial Revolution and Victorian era to the modern cit...
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0.5 mi from Sheffield
Ken Hawley Collection
Tool collection, now in Kelham Island Museum, Sheffield, England, United Kingdom
0.8 mi from Sheffield
Alfred Denny Museum
The Alfred Denny Museum is a biology teaching collection at the University of Sheffield, named after the department's first professor of biology and established in 1905. Many of it...
1 mi from Sheffield
Weston Park Museum
Weston Park Museum is a museum in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England. It is one mile west of Sheffield city centre within Weston Park. It is Sheffield's largest museum and is hou... — Wikipedia
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2 mi from Sheffield
Yorkshire Natural History Museum
Museum in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England, UK
2.2 mi from Sheffield
Bishop's House
Bishops' House is a museum in Sheffield, housed in the city's best preserved timber framed building, once a yeoman's farm surrounded by fields. You can explore the history of the b...
2.6 mi from Sheffield
Shepherd Wheel
Shepherd Wheel Workshop is a Grade II listed, Scheduled Monument water-powered grinding workshop set in the Porter Valley, close to Endcliffe Park. Dating back to the 1500s, it was...
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3.8 mi from Sheffield
Abbeydale Industrial Hamlet
Abbeydale Industrial Hamlet is a historic scythe and steelworks site in Sheffield dating back to the 1700s, where you can explore the Manager's House, Worker's Cottage and Counting...
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4.2 mi from Sheffield
Magna Science Adventure Centre
Magna Science Adventure Centre is a hands-on science museum set inside the former Templeborough Steelworks, where four themed pavilions — Air, Earth, Fire and Water — bring interac...
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6 mi from Sheffield
Clifton Park Museum
Municipal museum situated in Clifton House on the western edge of Clifton Park in Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England
6.9 mi from Sheffield
South Yorkshire Transport Museum
The South Yorkshire Transport Museum (SYTM) is a volunteer-owned museum of transport located in Rotherham, England. Established in 1995, it focuses on the transport history of Sout... — Wikipedia
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8 mi from Sheffield
Revolution House
Thatched cottage in Old Whittington, Chesterfield, Derbyshire, England, UK
8 mi from Sheffield
Elsecar Heritage Centre
Elsecar Heritage Centre is a museum and heritage site in Barnsley, described as an Earls Village of Iron and Coal. You can browse the shopping area, with its mix of independent sho...
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8.1 mi from Sheffield
Barrow Hill Roundhouse Museum
Barrow Hill Roundhouse is the last surviving operational railway roundhouse in the United Kingdom, set in Staveley near Chesterfield, Derbyshire. It's an amazing family-friendly mu...
8.6 mi from Sheffield
Wortley Top Forge
Wortley Top Forge is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and industrial museum in the Peak District, built around a working water-powered heavy iron forge with a history traced back to 16...
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9.9 mi from Sheffield
Worsbrough Mill Museum
Worsbrough Mill is a working watermill and country park in Barnsley, where you can explore industrial heritage alongside wildlife and nature. The 240-acre country park is open ever...
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Theme Parks
7 mi from Sheffield
Gulliver's Valley Resort
Gulliver's Valley Resort is a family-run theme park in Rotherham, South Yorkshire, designed especially for children aged 2 to 13. You'll find rides such as the Rocky Ridge Railway...
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23.5 mi from Sheffield
Diggerland Yorkshire
Diggerland Yorkshire is a theme park in Castleford, Wakefield, where visitors of all ages can ride, drive and operate real diggers in a family-friendly setting. There's also a two-...
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Zoos & Wildlife
11 mi from Sheffield
Tropical Butterfly House
Tropical Butterfly House is a family-friendly zoo and wildlife attraction in North Anston, near Rotherham, where wildlife conservation sits at the heart of everything on offer. You...
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19.6 mi from Sheffield
Yorkshire Wildlife Park
Yorkshire Wildlife Park is a walk-through wildlife attraction set across 150 acres on the outskirts of Doncaster, with reserves for lions, polar bears, tigers, leopards, cheetahs a...
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Where to stay near Sheffield
Places to stay within easy reach of these days out.
More around Sheffield
Itineraries
- A weekend in Yorkshire: an accessible itinerary · 2 days
- A weekend in Yorkshire with the kids · 2 days
- A weekend in Yorkshire · 2 days
Haunted Britain
Sheffield works best as a base rather than a tick-list. The city gives you somewhere to sleep, eat and shelter when the weather turns, and from there you can point the car in almost any direction and find something worth a morning. What follows is a practical way to group the options, whether you have one day or a long weekend.
Start with what's on the doorstep
Two Sheffield museums are worth building a day around. The Alfred Denny Museum is a small, specialist collection and the kind of place you look round properly rather than rush. Legends of the Lane is the one for anyone in your party with a soft spot for local sporting history — it's a focused collection rather than a half-day affair, which makes it easy to pair with something else.
Both suit a slow start. If you're travelling with people who don't share your enthusiasm for display cases, keep the city portion to the morning and head out afterwards.
Best for families
Yorkshire Wildlife Park, over in Nottinghamshire, is the obvious anchor for a family day out and the one attraction here that will reliably fill several hours. Children who've had enough of looking at things behind glass tend to perk up considerably.
For younger visitors who need variety rather than distance, the Vacuum Cleaner Museum and Repairer in Matlock is a genuine curiosity — it does exactly what the name suggests, and it tends to win over sceptics. Creswell Crags Museum and Heritage Centre in Nottinghamshire is another good family choice, combining indoor displays with the site itself.
Rainy-day options
Sheffield's weather does what Yorkshire weather does, so it pays to have a wet-day list ready. Leeds is the strongest single destination here, with four options close together:
- Royal Armouries — the biggest of the group and easily a half-day
- Leeds City Museum — broad enough to suit mixed ages
- Leeds Industrial Museum — good for anyone interested in how things were made
- Wagon Hoist Mini Musem — small, quick, and a neat add-on to any of the above
Further out, Stoke-on-Trent offers the V&A Wedgwood Collection and The Dudson Museum, both indoors and both pottery-focused, which makes them a sensible pairing on a day when the forecast is hopeless.
Heritage and the outdoors
The Peak District is the natural outdoor counterweight to the city, and Castleton Village Museum gives you a reason to stop in the village and a bit of context for what you've been walking through. In Matlock, the Peak District Mining Museum covers the industrial side of the landscape — useful background if you've spent the morning on the hills wondering about the old workings.
Staffordshire has two quieter heritage stops: Brindley Mill, and the Geological Gallery at Biddulph Grange Garden, which pairs an indoor collection with a garden to walk off lunch in. Nottinghamshire adds Flintham Museum, Wollaton Dovecote and the Judges Retiring Room — all small, all best treated as one stop within a larger day rather than a destination in themselves.
How to build a sensible day
The trick is one anchor plus one or two small stops, not four museums in a row. A few combinations that hold together:
- City and curiosity: Alfred Denny Museum in the morning, Legends of the Lane after lunch.
- Peak District day: a walk, then Castleton Village Museum, then the Peak District Mining Museum in Matlock if there's time.
- Wet-weather Leeds: Royal Armouries first, then Leeds City Museum or Leeds Industrial Museum, with the Wagon Hoist Mini Musem squeezed in.
- Family day: Yorkshire Wildlife Park and nothing else — don't over-plan it.
Where to eat
All of these hold a 5-star hygiene rating, which is a reasonable first filter. The Bakewell Tart Shop is the tea-room option and an easy mid-afternoon stop. For a proper sit-down lunch or an evening meal, the Red Lion Inn and The Smithy Pond are both pubs and both suit muddy boots better than a smart restaurant would. World of Icing is a bakery, so think morning pastries or something to take with you. The Lambton Larder is a deli and local produce shop — the one to raid if you'd rather eat on a hillside than in a dining room.
Making it a short break
Two or three nights is about right. There are two places to stay in this region listed on BritStays, so book early if your dates are fixed — school holidays and bank holiday weekends go first.
A workable shape: city museums on arrival day, the Peak District on your full day, and something further afield — Leeds, Nottinghamshire or Stoke-on-Trent — on the way home, so you're not doubling back.
Practical points: check opening days before you set off, as several of the smaller museums here keep limited hours and some open seasonally. Carry cash for the small sites. Pack boots and a waterproof even if the forecast looks settled, and if you're driving to the Peak District at a weekend, arrive early — parking fills fast.
Frequently asked questions
What is there to do in Sheffield itself?
Sheffield has two museums listed here: the Alfred Denny Museum and Legends of the Lane. Both are specialist collections rather than large all-day attractions, so they pair well together to make a single day in the city.
What's the best option for a family day out from Sheffield?
Yorkshire Wildlife Park in Nottinghamshire is the strongest family choice and will fill most of a day on its own. Creswell Crags Museum and Heritage Centre, also in Nottinghamshire, and the Vacuum Cleaner Museum and Repairer in Matlock are good alternatives for families who want something shorter.
Where should I go from Sheffield if it rains all day?
Leeds has the most indoor options in one place: the Royal Armouries, Leeds City Museum, Leeds Industrial Museum and the Wagon Hoist Mini Musem. Stoke-on-Trent is another wet-weather option, with the V&A Wedgwood Collection and The Dudson Museum.
Which attractions suit a Peak District day?
Castleton Village Museum in the Peak District is an easy stop to combine with a walk, and the Peak District Mining Museum in Matlock covers the area's mining heritage. The Vacuum Cleaner Museum and Repairer is also in Matlock if you want a second indoor stop.
Where can I eat with a 5-star hygiene rating?
The Bakewell Tart Shop for tea and cake, the Red Lion Inn and The Smithy Pond for pub meals, World of Icing for bakery items, and The Lambton Larder for deli goods and local produce if you'd rather picnic.
How many nights do I need, and where can I stay?
Two or three nights is enough to cover the Sheffield museums, a Peak District day and one trip further afield. There are two places to stay in this region listed on BritStays, so it's worth booking early if your dates can't move.
More ways to explore
Not booked yet? See the best places to stay in Sheffield.