Racing Tickets: Cheltenham, Aintree and Royal Ascot

British racing’s three great festivals price access in completely different ways, and only one of them can be solved with money. Cheltenham Festival 2027 advance tickets are on sale now, from £30 a day, and several prices have actually fallen year on year. Royal Ascot’s Royal Enclosure cannot be bought at any price — it requires two existing members to sponsor you.

All prices below were checked on 28 August 2026. Cheltenham 2027 runs 16–19 March, Aintree 8–10 April, and Royal Ascot 15–19 June 2027.

Cheltenham Festival 2027: on sale, and cheaper in places

Advance prices for all four days, by enclosure:

Enclosure	Tue 16 Mar	Wed 17 Mar	Thu 18 Mar	Fri 19 Mar (Gold Cup)
Club	£86	£79 (−£4)	£86	£105
Tattersalls	£57	£55 (+£3)	£57	£69
Best Mate	£35	£30 (−£5)	£35	£50

The Gold Cup runs at 4pm on Friday 19 March 2027, and Friday is the dearest day in every enclosure.

What is genuinely unusual here is the direction of travel. The Club enclosure on Wednesday is down £4 and Best Mate on the same day down £5, while Tattersalls Wednesday is up £3 and Gold Cup pricing is unchanged. A premium sporting event cutting prices is rare enough to need explaining.

The explanation is not generosity. The Jockey Club has leaned into early-bird pricing and multi-day deals specifically to counter attendance lost to the cost of accommodation in the Cheltenham area during Festival week. The ticket is often the cheapest part of the trip, and the organisers are discounting the part they control to protect the gate.

The practical consequence: book accommodation before you book the ticket. The ticket price is stable and available; a bed within reach of the racecourse in March is neither.

Which Cheltenham enclosure is worth it

It is the same racing from all three, so this is a question about the day rather than the sport.

• Club — the premium option, with the best views of the finish and the parade ring, plus restaurant and bar access. The reason to pay for it is the parade ring, which is where a Festival day is actually made.
• Tattersalls — closer to the action, livelier and more informal, and the choice of most Festival regulars. The best balance of price and atmosphere.
• Best Mate — formerly called Course, the cheapest and most relaxed, with good views. At £30 on the Wednesday it is the outstanding value day in British sport.

For most first-timers, Tattersalls on a Tuesday or Wednesday is the right answer. For anyone who wants to see the horses up close before racing, pay for Club.

The Grand National 2027

The Randox Grand National Festival runs Thursday 8 to Saturday 10 April 2027, with the National itself on the Saturday.

Aintree divides its crowd differently from Cheltenham, into areas including the Festival Zone, West Tip, and the Earl of Derby Terrace and its seated tiers, rather than a simple three-tier enclosure ladder. Official prices for 2027 had not been fully published when we checked; as a reference point, resale listings for the 2026 meeting were running from around £119 for Grand National day and £138 for the Friday.

Two things matter more than the enclosure at Aintree. The Saturday is the day that sells out first, and the course is enormous — the National circuit is more than two miles round, so where you stand determines how much of the race you actually see rather than watch on a screen. Aintree is one of the largest racing venues in the world, a subject we cover in our ranking of the biggest horse racing venues by capacity.

Royal Ascot: the one you cannot buy

Royal Ascot 2027 runs Tuesday 15 to Saturday 19 June, with gates at 10:30am. Most of it is buyable — Queen Anne Enclosure tickets start around £99, and hospitality packages from roughly £400 per person.

The Royal Enclosure is different, and it is the most restrictive access system of any event on this site.

To become a member, a new applicant must be sponsored by two existing members who live at different addresses, be 18 or over, and be approved by His Majesty’s Representative at Ascot. A £150 joining fee applies, and a £25 annual membership fee is being introduced ahead of the 2027 meeting. There is no application form that money alone completes — the barrier is social, not financial.

The route most people miss: booking a table at one of the small number of designated Royal Enclosure restaurants comes with a personalised day badge, which gets you in for that day without membership or sponsors. It is expensive and reservations are limited, but it is open to anyone who can get one.

The dress code is a condition of entry, not advice. In the Royal Enclosure, gentlemen wear grey, black or navy morning dress with a black or grey top hat, and ladies formal daywear. Other enclosures are less formal but still enforced, and dress is the most common reason people are refused at the gate.

How racing compares with the rest

Event	How access is rationed	Cheapest genuine way in
Cheltenham Festival	Straight sale, early-bird pricing	£30 (Best Mate, Wednesday)
Grand National	Straight sale, Saturday sells first	~£119 (2026 resale reference)
Royal Ascot, Queen Anne	Straight sale	~£99
Royal Ascot, Royal Enclosure	Sponsorship + approval	Restaurant booking, day badge
Wimbledon	Ballot, plus the Queue	~£15 on-site resale
The Masters	Ballot only	$125, if drawn

For what these meetings pay out rather than charge — and why the Grand National’s entire fund equals one Royal Ascot race — see our guide to horse racing prize money.

Racing is the most accessible premium sport in Britain by price. A £30 ticket puts you at the best jumps meeting in the world — cheaper than a Premier League match and a fraction of a Ryder Cup match day at €499. And unlike Wimbledon or the Masters, there is no ballot to miss.

The exception proves how differently these systems work. Royal Ascot’s Royal Enclosure is the only access on this site that a willing buyer genuinely cannot purchase — not because it is expensive, but because it is not for sale. For every event that does run an application window, see our guide to sports ticket ballots.

What to do now

1. Buy Cheltenham advance tickets now if you intend to go. They are on sale, several are cheaper than last year, and early-bird pricing is the point at which they are cheapest.
2. Book Cheltenham accommodation first. It is the constraint and the real cost.
3. For Aintree, decide the day before the enclosure. Saturday sells out first; Thursday and Friday are far easier.
4. For Royal Ascot, start the Royal Enclosure route years ahead or book a Royal Enclosure restaurant instead. Queen Anne at about £99 is the sensible default.
5. Read the dress code before you travel. It is enforced.

How we checked these numbers

Cheltenham 2027 advance prices and the year-on-year comparisons are from Racing Post’s report on the advance on-sale, cross-checked against The Jockey Club’s own enclosure and ticketing pages. Festival dates and the Gold Cup time are from The Jockey Club. Royal Ascot dates, Royal Enclosure membership conditions, fees and dress code are from Ascot and Horse & Hound.

Aintree figures are a 2026 reference, not 2027 official pricing. The resale numbers quoted circulate against 2026 dates, and full official 2027 prices were not published when this page was written. They are included to indicate scale and are labelled accordingly.

This page will be revised when Aintree publishes 2027 pricing, and again when Cheltenham moves from advance to standard pricing.

Review class: event-driven. Recheck when Aintree publishes 2027 pricing, and again when Cheltenham moves from advance to standard pricing.