How much the cost of a night out in London has changed over 30 years

To millennials and Gen Zs, London in the ’90s sounds like the promised land, full of cheap drinks, pubs that stayed open late and 50p tube rides. 

We know that things in 2025 are a lot more expensive than they were 30 years ago. But by exactly how much? Time Out wanted to find out precisely how much the price of a night out in London has risen since the 1990s, so with the help of old Time Out issues, we dug into the archive and compared the costs of going out in the Big Smoke from 1995 and 2025. 

To break it down, we compared the prices of drinks, public transport, taxis, club entries, cigarettes and drugs (because let’s be honest, these are a big part of a night out for many of you). We also looked into how the quantity of pubs, clubs and bars has changed in the capital over the past 30 years. 

Here’s what we worked out. 

If you had two pints at a pub, got the tube, paid entry to the club, had two more pints, got a Maccies and then took a 20 minute taxi home, in 1995 that would set you back £22.03, which is equivalent to £44.41 in today’s money. In 2025 this would cost you £66.48, so we are paying at leat £20 more than what Londoners were paying in the ’90s. 

Not surprisingly, most of the nightclubs that were open in 1995 are no longer operating today, but there are a few still standing. The entry cost to Koko (FKA Camden Palace) was £6 in the ’90s, equivalent to £12.50 today. Today its median ticket price is £29.50, an increase of 136 percent. 

Back in the day a pint would set you back £1.60, worth £4 now. Today the average London pint cost has risen by 63 percent, costing £6.50. The average price of a 20-pack of cigarettes has risen from £2.59 (£6 today) to £16.48, an increase of 175 percent. 

The prices of drugs were one of the things that actually hasn’t changed that much, and in some instances have even become cheaper. According to the 1994 Time Out Guide To Drugs, in the ’90s one ecstasy pill cost £15, roughly the same as it does today. Weed was £25-35 per quarter ounce, while today it costs roughly £40 for four grams. Cocaine was £50-70 per gram, while today it is around £60-100. 

As for the number of drinking spots. There were 61,000 pubs in the UK in 1995, while there were 38,989 British pubs open recorded at the end of 2024 – a loss of 22,011 pubs and a decrease of 36 percent. At the end of 2024 London had 3,470 open pubs. We can estimate that in 1995 London would have had around 5,421 boozers.

The figures speak for themselves, but it’s not all bad. Read here about how to have an almost free night out in London. And here’s everywhere in the city centre where you can get a pint for £6 or less. 

Iconic New York jazz club Blue Note is officially opening a venue in London next year. 

The V&A is planning a display about London’s lost music venues – and it needs your help. 

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