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Last week Time Out revealed its 10th annual ranking of the world’s best cities for culture with Intrepid Travel. We asked tens of thousands of people across the globe about everything that makes up their city’s cultural landscape, from art to live music. London took the title for the best city for culture in the UK (and in the entire world). But other British cities excelled in individual cultural categories. And when it comes to bookshops, another British spot stole first place.
The famously literary city of Oxford emerged as the UK’s best city for bookshops. Given that Oxford is home to a university that has been named the greatest on the planet for the past 10 years, it should hardly come as a surprise that it has a massively bookish community. A whopping 60 percent of our survey respondents told us that Oxford’s literary scene is either ‘good’ or ‘amazing’.
Oxford is the birthplace of Blackwell’s, an academic bookseller that now has 18 branches across the country. Blackwell’s opened on Broad Street in 1879 and is now considered a landmark of the city. Its famous Norrington Room is the single largest room selling books in the world, with 5km worth of shelving holding more than 160,000 volumes.
That’s far from the only place you can browse books in Oxford, though. There’s Gulp Fiction in the historic covered market, which hosts book clubs, jazz nights and author talks (most recently with Zadie Smith). There’s Bookstop and the Last Bookshop by Bill and Ben Books, which stock titles that have been saved from being pulped or thrown into landfill, giving remainders, returns, samples and the overstocks from publishers a second life. And there’s Arcadia, a whimsical little shop on St Michael’s Street selling second-hand texts. Daunt Books in Summertown also boasts a tonne of titles and regular literary events.
As for the rest of the city’s cultural offerings, 77 percent of locals said that it’s great for art, 69 percent agreed that it’s good for movies and 76 percent said it was historic (that’s the second highest rating in the UK after Edinburgh). From the perusing the Ashmolean to catching an indie film at the Ultimate Picture Palace, explore all of the best things to do in Oxford here.
After Oxford, the next best place in the UK for all your literary needs is Cambridge – 56 percent of respondents rated its bookshops and literary scene highly.
📍 See Time Out’s Best Cities for Culture with Intrepid Travel 2026 here.
Ready to see the world’s best cities for yourself? Book your next trip with Intrepid Travel and start planning the ultimate adventure today. Renowned for the ‘best small group trips’ around, Intrepid is all about locally led adventures that find the sweet spot between authentic cultural experiences and responsible tourism. Trips span more than 100 destinations – from trekking the Inca Trail in Peru to street-food discoveries in Japan and desert camping beneath the stars in Morocco.
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