Edinburgh's Royal Mile named the UK's biggest tourist trap

The biggest tourist traps in the UK have been named - and Edinburgh's famous Royal Mile tops the list.

A new report from Casago has listed the world's biggest tourist traps, including the top 10 in Britain - compiled using reviews on TripAdvisor to discover how many times visitors referred to places or attractions as "tourist traps".

The Royal Mile in Edinburgh, a series of streets in the city's Old Town with Edinburgh Castle at one end and Holyrood at the other, contained 502 mentions of the phrase "tourist trap" - far outstripping any other place in the UK for the number one spot.

On Trip Advisor review of the area from April 2023 was simply titled "tourist trap". It said: "Except for the castle, the Royal Mile was mostly shops and restaurants offering the same overpriced souvenirs and food. It was crowded and dirty. Edinburgh was much better outside of this area. Would not recommend devoting much time there."

Another added: "The royal mile is an underwhelming tourist trap. All the stores sell the same thing, over and over wool, cashmere and shortbread... same products, no character. Overrated and it’s too bad because Edinburgh is a great city."

However, some visitors described it as "beautiful" and "historic", with one review stating: "Fantastic Architecture, clean and well kept. Lots of bars, cafes and places to eat - maybe a few too many tartan and gift shops all selling the same things, but worth a walk from the castle down to the parliament buildings."

Just behind the Royal Mile in second place was the London Eye, with 334 mentions of it being a "tourist trap" and some of the more scathing reviews describing it as overcrowded and expensive, as well as having long queues.

"So many people were in each pod that sometimes it was hard to enjoy the view as some patrons dominated windows and didn’t move," one review said, while another added: "Felt like herded cattle! They crammed about 30-40 people in our pod so you couldn’t move."

Coming in third place was London's Covent Garden, which 156 people described as a tourist trap, followed by Cornwall's Land's End landmark (140), York's Shambles (120), The Needles in Totland (97), Stonehenge (96), The Cavern Club in Liverpool (96), The Witchery by The Castle in Edinburgh (95) and in tenth place Sally Lunn's Historic Eating House and Museum in Bath.

Casago's global report suggested the number one tourist trap in the world was Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco, which had more mentions of the phrase than anywhere else rated by TripAdvisor, with a total of 1,049 mentions of the attraction being a tourist trap.