The most popular comedy shows in London

Nigerian standup Bamgboye took the best newcomer award at the 2025 Edinburgh Festival Fringe with her debut show Swings and Roundabouts which charted her move to the UK in her twenties, and showcased her often disorientating mastery of accents. Critics praised her confidence, poise and original, outsider-ish eye on British culture and it bagged her a place in the starting line up for Saturday Night Live UK, with this latest Soho Theatre run meaning she is possibly the first member of the line-up to return to liver perfomance (it’s also not 100% clear if the Saturday night show will actually happen, given the live sketch show has extended beyond its original run and is due to be on that night).

Ania Magliano has been working up to A-lister stand-up status throughout her twenties, which are still very much an ongoing concern. She might have made it anyway, but stints on Taskmaster and Saturday Night Live UK have made her veritably superstar adjacant as she returns with her first new show in a couple of years. Her schtick very much revolves around laidback anecdotes and observations, but it’s her gossipy, conspiratorial delivery and send up of Gen Z moralising that defines her brilliance.

Smart observational humour combined with a couple of sublime set-piece shaggy dog stories powers the most successful show to date from South African-born Brit stand-up Novellie.

This magic extravaganza is inspired by the improbably successful ‘white collar crime fighting magicians’ Now You See Me series of films, although rather than a play or musical it’s very much ‘some guys doing spectacular magic tricks in the loose guise of the films’ Four Horsemen’. It’s a big glitzy spectacle that’s wowed audiences in Sydney (where it originates) and Singapore and now it’s headed our way for a summer 2026 stint. ‘Our’ Horsemen will be illusionist Enzo Weyne, escapologist Andrew Basso, ‘dynamic rising star of modern magic’ Gabriella Lester and ‘award-winning British magician and master storyteller’ Matthew Pomeroy.

Existentialist Jewish-American comic Edelman finally follows up his glorious Just for Us – which documented his somewhat hamfisted infiltration of a white power group – with a brand new show that plays a few London dates before heading to the Fringe. We’re unclear if this one comes with any great concept but we’re told contents include ‘things like seashells, an amputee hospital in Jerusalem, various deities and our personal responsibilities amidst global conflict’.

Sir Lenny Henry has long since transcended being a ‘mere’ comedian – if he ever really was – with a career that has long leant more towards the stage, kids’ books and general elder statesman-ing. He’s still got it, though: aged 67 he heads out on his first stand-up tour in over a decade with Still at Large. His first since 2010, it’s billed as ‘part stand-up, part storytelling and part conversation’.

Thanks to the ongoing cult behemoth that is Taskmaster, its host Greg Davies finds his stand up career hitting new highs, with a month of shows at the Apollo for his new show Full Fat Legend to be followed in December with his debut at the O2 – his biggest show to date. Despite the immodest name, the new show is, in essence, an autobiographical exploration of what an idiot he is. 

15 acts compete in this heat of the 2013 Laughing Horse New Act of the Year competition, plus MC Lewis Bryan.