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The UK’s tourist hotspots are hotspots for a reason - they’re world-leading museums, hyped restaurants, centuries-old monuments and much more besides. But sometimes, it’s worth shunning the teeming crowds of London, Amsterdam or Paris and heading for a lesser-known part of the world instead.
That’s why Time Out’s travel team has put together a list of Europe’s most underrated destinations for 2026. The list features places flowing with history and culture, from Plovdiv in Bulgaria, one of Europe's oldest continuously inhabited cities, to Ghent in Belgium, home to the world’s most stolen piece of art. One UK city also made it into the top ten for 2026: Northern Ireland’s Derry.
If you’re a fan of the Channel 4 comedy Derry Girls, the city is probably already on your radar for its enormous mural of Erin, Orla, Clare, Michelle and James, and notable locations featured in the show (many of which are also attractions in themselves).
Derry’s two standout monuments are its city walls, which were completed in 1618 and are the only completely intact city walls in the county, and its nineteenth-century Guildhall, where Bill Clinton delivered his historic peace speech (as depicted in Derry Girls). Time Out contributor Richard Franks adds that ‘to really get under Derry’s skin’, visitors should take the one-hour walking tour led by Martin McCrossan City Tours. He also recommends the ‘excellent’ Walled City Brewery.
This year happens to be a particularly major one for the city. In April and May, it’s hosting the 25th anniversary edition of the City of Derry Jazz and Big Band Festival, with live music taking over the city across five days. Then in October, Derry Halloween, a carnival widely regarded as the largest Halloween festival in Europe, will mark its 40th birthday with four nights of costume parades, fireworks, storytelling and live music.
And if you visit the city in June, you may see a huge fleet of majestic ships lining the marina for the Foyle Maritime Festival. As part of that there’ll be circus performances, street art, live music, on-the-water activities, family friendly workshops, continental markets and food stalls. Suffice to say, Derry know how to throw a good knees-up (there’s its huge St Patrick’s Day revelries in March, too) .
See Time Out’s full guide to Europe’s most underrated destinations here.
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