You’re rushing to make a train, and suddenly, nature calls. Or you’ve spilled coffee on yourself between platform changes and need to freshen up. We’ve all been there.
One way or another, station toilets are a pretty big part of any train journey, and could even make or break your travel experience. From long queues to not having the right change; needing to find a member of staff to unlock the disabled loo; having to parkour your way through unclean facilities or simply just having an offensive stench attack your nose upon entry… there’s a plethora of things to overcome. And that goes for whether you’re doing the weekly commute from Manchester Piccadilly, or spending a long weekend in Florence.
So where exactly in the UK and rest of Europe could you expect to find the least nightmarish loo situation? Well, we plunged into the data to see which train stations have received the worst reviews for their toilets on TripAdvisor over the past 15 years, purely so we could name and shame those who need to be better at ensuring comfort for their high-paying passengers.
First, the worst…
Italy’s Milano Centrale provides the worst toilet experience
Milan is known for many great things – the architecture; the fashion; the history. But its accomplishments sadly don’t extend to its station toilets, as the Italian city’s Milano Centrale has the worst-reviewed toilets of all 52 train stations we examined, with a painful 71% of reviews rating the facilities negatively.
The station’s worst crime? Not having enough cubicles for the volume of travellers that visit the station daily, along with a charge to get in.
Translated from Italian, one 2025 review asks: “Is it normal that one of the busiest stations in Italy has only ONE toilet – and closed at night?” Another, in January 2025, described the station as having “a shameful absence of toilets, with only paid ones in the basement”, while an April 2026 visitor hunting for the single facility near platform 21 simply ponders: “Will you make it to the toilet in time?” Note to self: opt for a loo whilst grabbing some no-doubt-incredible Italian espresso, before you head for the train.
Also with less than satisfactory toilet facilities is Paris Gare du Nord, which competes closely with its predecessor with 70% negative reviews. One visitor in June 2025 reported “no toilet paper in any of the stalls”, while a January 2025 review captures a frustration voiced by many French travellers (translated from French): “Still having to pay for the toilets, even with expensive train tickets, is a scandal and a disgrace.” We feel your pain, camarades.
Next up, it’s the UK’s overall worst station facilities – Glasgow Queen Street, which carries a 69% portion of negative reviews. Unsurprisingly, it’s cost and cleanliness once again that’s got Brits peed off, with one traveller writing “Expensive lavatories (50p for a pee!)” and another fuming “50p to use the dirtiest toilets in Glasgow. Disgusting.” Meanwhile, another unfortunate soul posted how it was “hard to believe that there are no toilets available in the station before a certain time”, which we can only imagine to be a real stinker.
The top 10 worst train station toilets in UK and Europe (% of negative reviews)
- Milano Centrale – Milan, Italy – 71%
- Paris Gare du Nord – Paris, France – 70%
- Glasgow Queen Street – Glasgow, UK – 69%
- Paris Gare de Lyon – Paris, France – 67%
- Napoli Centrale – Naples, Italy – 66%
- Marseille Saint-Charles – Marseille, France – 65%
- Manchester Victoria – Manchester, UK – 64%
- London Euston – London, UK – 63%
- Firenze Santa Maria Novella – Florence, Italy – 62%
- London Waterloo – London, UK – 52%
Manchester Victoria joins Glasgow Queen Street as one of UK’s worst stations for toilets
When it comes to the worst train station toilets exclusively in the UK, Manchester Victoria is up there with Glasgow Queen Street as one of the worst, with 64% of its reviews showing particular vitriol for the restrooms.
“Visited the ladies’ toilet on the way to the theatre to be confronted with overflowing bins and the disabled toilet being unavailable (a makeover),” one June 2024 passenger grumbled.
“The toilets are disgusting. Dirty, most of the door locks are broken. My family were visiting from Sweden and commented also on how disgusting they were. Helps to give Manchester a bad reputation,” seethed another in 2020.
Also in the UK’s worst five were London Euston, with 63% negative toilet reviews and London Waterloo, with 52%.
“If you can avoid using the toilets at London Euston station, then do so unless you’re desperate like my friend & I were. Absolutely disgusting,” one 2025 passenger raged. “There was excrement on the floor in one of the cubicles, to which my friend stood in it without realising, on the toilet seat in another, and full of it in a third. There was only one out of the 4 we could use, and that wasn’t the best. We felt sick to the stomach when we got out. Why are they not being regularly cleaned for starters, or just knock them down and build new ones. Avoid avoid avoid if you can.”
Meanwhile, Waterloo was criticised for not having enough toilets, particularly for those with disabilities or mobility challenges, with one 2023 passenger writing:
“Waterloo needs more toilets! I had to walk a long way to get to the toilets (ok if you’re fully able but not otherwise) and when I got there the queue for the ladies loo was massive. Not good enough, Waterloo.”
London Liverpool Street matches Waterloo for proportion of negative toilet reviews, at 52%, with complaints mainly centred around cleanliness and accessibility.
“The men’s toilets at Liverpool Street Station are ABSOLUTELY DISGUSTING. The minute I descended the stairs I was attacked by an OVERWHELMING STENCH OF URINE & FAECES. Everywhere I looked was DIRTY. The floor was DIRTY. The work surfaces were DIRTY. Cubicle doors are DISGUSTING – THICK WITH DIRT. Flies buzzing round the toilet bowl. A discarded newspaper left on top of the toilet bowl. The soap dispenser NOT WORKING. The taps – some working half heartedly, others not working at all, the hand dryers NOT WORKING. […] It’s SO insulting to visitors and tourists to this country. You should be ASHAMED of yourselves. You are not managing this place, you’re being dragged along in its wake. TAKE THE SCALES FROM YOUR EYES!”
The UK’s top 10 worst train station toilets (% of negative reviews)
- Glasgow Queen Street – 69%
- Manchester Victoria – 64%
- London Euston – 63%
- London Waterloo – 52%
- London Liverpool Street – 52%
- Birmingham New Street – 48%
- Inverness – 46%
- London Paddington – 45%
- Preston – 43%
- Manchester Piccadilly – 42%
York, UK, promises the best toilet experience while travelling
When it comes to where you can expect a half-decent comfort break, York appears to be most likely to provide the best restroom experience based on a net sentiment score of 24%, with 52% of its reviews being positive vs. just 28% negative.
Most positive reviews mention the toilets being clean and free to use – clearly two imperatives for the British public and their thrones. One 2021 review even mentions the toilets being recently refurbished. But there are still reports of slipping standards, particularly in 2018 (presumably pre-refurbishment), with one review complaining, “Filthy toilets that haven’t been cleaned in a long time, electronic monitor on wall states hygiene rating as zero. No paper in any cubicle and sanitary bins overflowing onto [the] floor. It’s a shame as the city is spotless, but the station lets it down.”
A more recent review in 2026 reveals: “Toilets are a disgrace. Absolutely stinking, door locks broken, seats broken, tissue everywhere, toilet roll holders broken. Tidy it up!” Looks like York will need to get it together if it wants to preserve its squeaky-clean record of best train toilets in the UK.
London Victoria also scored pretty highly with a 23% net sentiment score, thanks to its toilet reviews consisting of 46% positive and 23% negative sentiment. Of every station with enough reviews to be ranked, this station actually draws the fewest toilet complaints of all – the best record in the study. Reviewers praise clean, well-kept facilities that, they say, no longer charge for entry following a refurbishment, with one describing them as “spotless and cleaning all the time”.
Reading followed with a comparison of 51% positive reviews vs. 30% negative, while London St Pancras boasts 43% positive reviews vs. 39%.
Newcastle Central and London King’s Cross round out the top five equally, each securing a perfectly equal balance of positive and negative reviews (they’re just scraping by and will need to try harder to avoid being named in our worst toilets ranking next year).
Interestingly enough, the train stations with the highest net sentiment are all based in the UK, meaning you’re more likely to find the best toilet experience while travelling close to home.
Us Brits really do love a throne.
The top 5 best train station toilets in the UK and Europe (net sentiment %)
- York – 24%
- London Victoria – 23%
- Reading – 21%
- London St Pancras – 4%
- Newcastle Central / London King’s Cross – 0%
Finishing up…
Both the UK and the rest of Europe need to do better when it comes to serving our precious behinds, especially when on the move.
The most common grievance across both territories is the cost, with 65% of negative toilet reviews mentioning paying or being charged to use train station facilities. Many of the UK’s complaints in this area predate April 2019, when Network Rail scrapped charges at the large stations it manages. But paid-for toilets remain common on the continent, at €1 or more, and still apply at some UK stations outside that change, including Glasgow Queen Street, where ScotRail retains a 50p charge.
Reviews have also become more negative over time. In the mid-2010s, negative toilet reviews outnumbered positive ones by only 15% of the total each year, but between 2022 and 2026 that margin has widened to more than 50%, with paid entry, cleanliness and a shortage of facilities popping up time and time again
UK reviews were an exception around 2019 to 2021, becoming generally more positive due to both Network Rail scrapping toilet charges at its managed stations, and toilets being clean due to lockdown reducing footfall and the pandemic demanding more frequent cleaning. However, reviews later worsened again when standards didn’t improve.
All in all, we don’t believe there’s any point loo papering over a problem. Whether paid or not, train passengers expect a decent place to relieve themselves when enduring public transport, and we reckon this list of best and worst could be a good place to start.
Check our workings
- The source: TripAdvisor station reviews (collected June 2026); Office of Rail and Road, Estimates of Station Usage 2024-25 (used to select the UK stations); national rail passenger statistics as compiled on Wikipedia’s list of busiest railway stations (used to select the European stations); BBC News & ScotRail (background on charges at large stations from April 2019
- The process: 3,396 TripAdvisor reviews mentioning toilets were analysed across 52 of the busiest railway stations in the UK and continental Europe. Stations were selected by passenger volume – UK stations with at least 10 million annual entries/exits, and European stations with at least 35 million annual passengers – wherever a TripAdvisor listing exists. Each toilet mention was classified by whether it was positive, negative or neutral about the toilets specifically, rather than by the station’s overall star rating. Stations are ranked by the share of their negative toilet reviews, among those with 20 or more toilet reviews. All complaint quotes are verbatim.
- Definitions: “Negative toilet reviews” is the share of a station’s toilet-mentioning reviews that express a negative view of the toilets.
Need reading material for your next visit to the throne? Here’s all the data.