An open-top ticket is a gamble in bad weather, and the odds are rarely explained at the till. The fleets that still work in rain share a genuinely enclosed lower deck and a timetable that runs on after the light goes; the cities that punish you in July are the ones where the upper deck bakes from about 13:00 and the air-conditioned lower deck is the only sane seat. Both extremes are predictable once you know which numbers to check.
Rain is the harder test. On a wet loop in London I boarded at the Victoria stop, went straight upstairs and spent the whole circuit watching rain streak sideways past the glass while the lower deck fogged up underneath me; the same-day ticket had cost £32 booked online. The next time I sat downstairs as far as the Tower of London, waited out the worst of it over a coffee, and climbed back up on the Embankment stretch once the sky cleared. A 2 h 30 loop is long enough to wait out a shower below and still finish the circuit upstairs.
The three picks, by season
If you want one answer rather than the full comparison, start here.
- Cold and wet city break: Big Bus London, Red Route. The 2 h 30 loop runs every 15 to 20 minutes, the lower deck is enclosed, and the last full circuit leaves at 17:45, so a shower delays the ride without ending it.
- Short midwinter days on a budget: City Sightseeing Edinburgh. A 75-minute loop in a fully enclosed lower saloon, £20 for an adult and up to three children free with each paying adult, with the winter service running to just before 16:00.
- Heat and sudden downpours: Big Bus Singapore. The refrigerated lower deck is where you ride when the sky opens, the Yellow Line city loop takes 90 minutes, and the last bus leaves Suntec City at 17:20.
Rain, sleet and grey afternoons: the fleets that keep working
Three failures ruin a wet ride, and none of them shows up on a route map: lower-deck windows that mist over within minutes, stairwells that turn slick, and stops that quietly drop out of service for street works or a low branch. Only the third is published, and it is published badly, on service pages that few travellers open before they pay.
London: the Red Route in the rain
Big Bus London's Red Route takes about 2 hours 30 minutes and runs every 15 to 20 minutes, with the first bus at 08:30 and the last full circuit leaving the Hard Rock Cafe stop at 17:45. The Blue Route is a longer 3 hour 35 minute loop out to Kensington and the museums, running from 10:34 at the Victoria stop until 20:08, which makes it the better pick on a short winter afternoon. The Green Link is the one to leave alone late in the day, with a last departure at 15:15. My notes on the Big Bus London routes and where the traffic bites go into the loop stop by stop.
Stops move around far more than the printed timetable suggests, and the operator's own London service information page is the only reliable list. It currently shows Stop 1 at Green Park out of service until further notice, with boarding shifted to Stop 2 at the Hard Rock Cafe; Covent Garden boarding moved to a temporary TfL stop beside the Waldorf Hotel because of a low-hanging tree; and the Buckingham Palace stop suspended on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays between 10:00 and 12:30 while the Changing of the Guard closes the road.
Fares are tiered in a way that punishes late buying. The 24-hour Discover ticket adds a one-way Thames cruise from £36.99, the 48-hour Essential ticket throws in three guided walking tours from £46.99, and from 12 November to 30 December a separate 90-minute Christmas lights night tour runs from £29.99, the simplest way to see the centre lit up without walking it in the rain.
Edinburgh and Copenhagen: closed saloons and short days
Edinburgh's City Sightseeing tour is a 75-minute loop, and the operator's winter timetable tightens to a 20-minute frequency from 1 November to 20 March, finishing in the afternoon. Buses carry a canopy over the open deck and a fully enclosed lower saloon, which is where you want to sit from November through March. Adult tickets are £20 and children aged 5 to 15 travel free, up to three with each paying adult, so a family of four pays for one adult. The Edinburgh route and castle access walkthrough has the stop-by-stop detail.
Two recent changes catch people out. Since early September all tours leave from Stop GG on George Street, opposite the Assembly Rooms, and no longer serve Waterloo Place; the Palace of Holyroodhouse is closed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays until the end of May 2027. And the castle stop leaves you below the esplanade, with the last stretch a cobbled climb of roughly ten minutes on a dry day and longer in the wet.
Copenhagen gives you three lines on one ticket from DKK 279: the classic Red line through the centre, a Green line out to Frederiksberg and the Carlsberg brewery, and a Purple line to Christianshavn and Refshaleøen. Winter sightseeing here is a morning activity, because the last full circuits leave in the mid-afternoon. There is more operator detail in my Stromma Copenhagen fleet review.
The Green line is the one to plan around. It runs a couple of times a day, and I got it wrong: I finished the Red loop, walked back towards Tivoli past the Glyptotek gardens, and found the last brewery departure had already gone. I spent the afternoon on foot instead, which was pleasant enough in the dry but would have been miserable in rain, and I now book the brewery line first and fit the city loop around it.
Small print worth knowing before you board: a 24-hour ticket is valid on both the green hop-on buses and the red City Sightseeing buses carrying the Stromma logo, children under 6 ride free, 6 to 15-year-olds pay half, dogs up to 5 kg are welcome in a bag on the top deck, and a Companion Card is accepted for a companion travelling with a paying passenger.
Vienna: winter trims the network
Big Bus Vienna runs a Red line of roughly 1 hour 40 minutes with buses every 20 to 30 minutes, plus a Blue line out to Schönbrunn. In the winter season, as set out in the Wien Ticket Big Bus Vienna listing, stops 10 to 13 on the Red line come out of service and the last Red departure is at 16:00, with the Blue line finishing at 16:15. Ride Schönbrunn first and treat the rest of the city as a bonus.
Fares start at €37 for 24 hours, with 48 hours from €42.30 and 72 hours from €51.30. The evening tour costs €28 and departs at 18:00, and between 6 November 2026 and 3 January 2027 a Christmas Lights tour pairs a night ride with entry to the Imperial Lights at Schönbrunn.
Paris: the loop ends at 17:00 in winter
Tootbus runs one Blue route in Paris, departing every 7 to 10 minutes at the height of summer and about every 15 minutes in winter, when the last full loop leaves stop 1 at Opéra / Grands Magasins at 17:00 instead of 19:00. Late September is the crossover: the last departure is still 18:30 in the final week of the month, then the winter timetable takes over in early November, as set out in the Tootbus Paris timetable. Adults pay €44.10 online against €49 at the counter, children €24.30, the fleet is electric or gas-powered, and five self-guided walking tours come with the ticket in the app.
The night product disappears with the light: the Paris by Night tour closes from 23 November 2026 to 3 January 2027. On a rainy Paris evening that money is better spent on a bus day pass used between showers.
Amsterdam: one clock for bus and boat
City Sightseeing Amsterdam sells a combined bus and boat pass from €35 for adults, and both halves share the same validity clock. Buses run 10:00 to 17:00 from stop 1 and the glass-roofed boats run 09:30 to 17:45; the bus covers nine stops and the boat eight, with several places where you can switch between them. It is the most comfortable wet-day setup I have used here, because the boat keeps you dry and moving when the bridges look their best. There is a fuller comparison in my Amsterdam bus and boat review.
Two rules bite. The service stops entirely on King's Day, 27 April each year, and dogs are not allowed on the buses. Tickets stay usable for three months from purchase and can be cancelled free of charge up to 24 hours before your chosen date, so waiting for a dry window costs nothing.
Heat, monsoon and southern sun
Warm-weather failures look different: an unshaded top deck that bakes between 13:00 and 16:00, humidity that turns the bus into a greenhouse, and coastal wind that takes hats and headsets with it. In these cities the better seat is under the air conditioning, and the workable window is roughly 09:00 to 12:00, or after the rush thins out.
Madrid: the city that stopped being hop-on hop-off
Madrid is the exception in this guide, and it is the change most travellers have not caught up with. Madrid City Tour, City Sightseeing and Big Bus all now sell their Madrid routes as panoramic circuits: you board at the Neptune fountain start point near the Prado, ride the whole loop and come back to where you started, with no getting off in between. Booking pages still use the phrase hop-on hop-off, and the stops are still numbered on the maps, so the distinction only becomes obvious on the day. The Madrid ticket and Prado access review breaks down what each of the three lines actually reaches.
Treat the ticket as a 90-minute sightseeing ride rather than a transport pass. Madrid City Tour's Historic route is the longest and runs every 30 to 40 minutes with a 14-language audio guide, free Wi-Fi and wheelchair access; its published rates put a 24-hour adult ticket at €33. City Sightseeing runs three lines every 35 minutes and keeps its vouchers valid for three months, and Big Bus adds a bilingual live host. All three start near the Neptune fountain, and 24-hour adult tickets cluster between €29.70 and €33.
High summer is where the open deck loses. The top deck bakes with no awning, and the air-conditioned lower deck is where the commentary stays audible. I boarded just before 14:00, lasted two stops upstairs, and moved down for the rest of the loop, which turned the same route into an hour and a half of shade. Evening is no better for a different reason: the loops around Gran Vía slow to walking pace in the commuter rush, so start a full circuit by mid-afternoon if you want to finish it.
Singapore: downpours, haze and a relocated counter
Big Bus Singapore starts everything from Stop 0 at the Suntec City Tourist Hub, in the surface carpark. The Yellow Line is a 90-minute city loop and the Red Line a 60-minute heritage loop; the one-day Discover ticket starts at US$53 and the two-day Essential pass at US$55, which is how the operator prices Singapore on its own booking page. My notes on the Yellow and Red lines in Singapore cover which stops are worth leaving the bus for.
Equatorial rain arrives in ten-minute walls, and the refrigerated lower deck fills within seconds when it does, so board downstairs if the sky looks bruised. The practical trap is the boarding point: the information counter moved inside Suntec City Mall (Tower 2, #01-K8) while buses still leave from the surface carpark, and plenty of people queue on the wrong side of the mall. In autumn the Grand Prix street circuit closes roads around Marina Bay, and the operator posts stop-by-stop diversions, plus haze advisories, on its Singapore service updates page.
Sydney and Bondi: wind, and one wheelchair bay
Big Bus Sydney runs two daytime loops from Stop 1A on Phillip Street. The City Tour is 1 hour 30 and runs every 30 to 40 minutes; the Bondi and Bays Tour is 1 hour 20 and runs every 35 to 45 minutes, with the first return departure from Bondi Beach at 10:00. Tickets start at AU$75 for 24 hours, AU$99 for 48 hours and AU$133 with a harbour cruise and the night tour. The Sydney Bondi and harbour loop review compares the two lines in detail.
The coastal stretch towards Bondi is where the open deck turns uncomfortable: crosswinds on the cliff road are strong enough to carry off hats and audio headsets. A hood and a rain shell, plus a seat on the harbour side, are the difference between a scenic ride and a cold one. Winter here means June to August, when the last full circuits at 17:00 run in the dark.
Read the small print on the night tour: it is a panoramic 1 hour 20 minute circuit departing at 19:00 and 19:30 from AU$69, not a hop-on service, so it is no substitute for a day pass.
Timetables side by side
These are the figures I re-check the evening before travelling, straight from the operators' own pages.
| Route | Hours | Frequency | What to know |
|---|---|---|---|
| Big Bus London, Red Route | 08:30 to 17:45 (last full circuit) from Stop 2, Hard Rock Cafe | Every 15-20 min | 2 h 30 loop; Stop 1 Green Park out of service |
| Big Bus London, Blue Route | 10:34 to 20:08 from Stop 28, Victoria | Every 20 min | 3 h 35 loop to Kensington and the museums |
| Big Bus London, Green Link | Last departure 15:15 | Every 45 min | 1 h 10 loop; not for late afternoons |
| City Sightseeing Edinburgh, Red Route | 08:55 to 15:55 (1 November to 20 March) | Every 20 min in winter | 75-minute loop; enclosed lower saloon |
| Stromma Copenhagen, Red line | 09:30 from Tivoli; last full circuits 15:35 and 16:00 | Every 45 min | 1 h 30 loop |
| Stromma Copenhagen, Green line | 12:00 and 14:00 from Tivoli | Two departures a day | 45 min to the Carlsberg brewery |
| Big Bus Vienna, Red line | Last departure 16:00 | Every 20-30 min | 1 h 40 loop; winter drops stops 10-13 |
| Big Bus Vienna, Blue line | Last departure 16:15 | Every 20-30 min | 1 h 15 loop to Schönbrunn |
| Tootbus Paris, Blue route | 09:30 to 17:00 from Opéra / Grands Magasins (2 November to 3 January) | About every 15 min | Night tour closed 23 November to 3 January |
| City Sightseeing Amsterdam, bus and boat | Bus 10:00 to 17:00; boat 09:30 to 17:45 | Bus every 25 min; boat every 30-45 min | One validity clock for both halves |
| City Sightseeing Madrid, three lines | Historic route 09:30 to 19:42 | Every 30-40 min | Panoramic loop, no hop-off between stops |
| Big Bus Singapore, Yellow Line | 09:30 to 17:20 from Stop 0, Suntec City | Every 25-40 min | 90-minute city loop |
| Big Bus Singapore, Red Line | 09:40 to 17:10 | Every 25-35 min | 60-minute heritage loop |
| Big Bus Sydney, City Tour | 09:00 to 17:00 from Stop 1A, Phillip Street | Every 30-40 min | 1 h 30 loop |
| Big Bus Sydney, Bondi and Bays | 09:20 to 17:00; first return from Bondi Beach 10:00 | Every 35-45 min | 1 h 20 loop |
Dates that catch travellers out:
- London: the London Eye closes for annual maintenance from 11 to 24 January 2027.
- Edinburgh: the Palace of Holyroodhouse is closed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays until 31 May 2027, and the departure point stays at George Street (Stop GG) until 30 November; Christmas Day runs 10:00 to 15:00, New Year's Eve 09:00 to 15:00 and New Year's Day 11:00 to 16:00.
- Paris: the night tour closes from 23 November 2026 to 3 January 2027.
- Amsterdam: the network stops completely on King's Day, 27 April.
- Madrid: no service on 25 December and 1 January.
What a day costs, and when the city bus wins
The fares below are the operators' own starting prices for one adult, taken from their booking pages; they move with the season and with how far ahead you book. Big Bus quotes Singapore in US dollars and Sydney in Australian dollars, and the European operators price in their own currency, so the figures are not directly comparable line for line.
| Route | City | Adult fare from | Wet and cold weather protection | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Big Bus London, Red Route | London | £32 same-day; £36.99 for 24 h | Enclosed lower deck; 2 h 30 loop every 15-20 min | Last full circuit 17:45; several stops suspended for tree and street works |
| City Sightseeing Edinburgh, Red Route | Edinburgh | £20; up to three children free per adult | Canopy over the open deck and a fully enclosed lower saloon | Castle stop is a ten-minute climb over cobbles; winter service ends in the afternoon |
| Stromma Copenhagen, three lines | Copenhagen | DKK 279 | Buses covered and heated in winter | Red line every 45 min; the brewery line runs twice a day |
| Big Bus Vienna, Red and Blue lines | Vienna | €37 for 24 h | Enclosed lower deck on both lines | Winter cuts stops 10-13 and the last bus leaves at 16:00 |
| City Sightseeing Amsterdam, bus and boat | Amsterdam | €35 for the combined pass | Glass-roofed boats; wheelchair accessible buses, but not the boats | Closed on King's Day; no dogs on the buses |
| Tootbus Paris, Blue route | Paris | €44.10 online (€49 at the counter) | Enclosed lower deck; electric and gas fleet | Winter timetable ends at 17:00; night tour closed in winter |
| City Sightseeing Madrid, three lines | Madrid | €33 for 24 h; Big Bus from €29.70 | Air-conditioned lower deck, no awning upstairs | Closed 25 December and 1 January; panoramic loops with no hop-off |
| Big Bus Singapore, Yellow and Red lines | Singapore | US$53 for one day | Air-conditioned lower deck | Last bus 17:20; race-week road closures around Marina Bay |
| Big Bus Sydney, City and Bondi loops | Sydney | AU$75 for 24 h | Enclosed lower deck | One wheelchair bay per bus; the night tour is panoramic |
Per-stop arithmetic is where these tickets are won or lost, and London is the clearest case. An adult single on a TfL bus is £1.75 with a £5.25 daily cap, both rising to £1.85 and £5.55 on 1 November 2026 according to Transport for London bus and tram fares. Set against that, the £32 same-day sightseeing ticket is about six times the price of a whole day of capped bus travel, or the equivalent of eighteen single journeys; after the November rise the cap is £5.55, so the multiple slips to just under six. What the extra buys is a fixed 2 h 30 loop with commentary and an open deck rather than a route to a destination: if your day is half a dozen short hops between Tube stations, TfL wins on price and usually on time. The tourist bus earns its money on a first morning of orientation, or in a city where the sights are strung along one long loop. There is a fuller cost comparison in my sightseeing bus versus public transport breakdown.
Activation decides how much of the day you actually get. Big Bus asks you to add the booking in its app and press Activate on the day you travel, and the countdown starts there. Tootbus and Stromma start the clock the first time the ticket is scanned on board, so a 14:00 start gives you that afternoon plus the following morning. City Sightseeing vouchers bought online stay usable for months, which suits a trip where the forecast is still a lottery when you book.
Live vehicle maps are worth the battery as well: Big Bus, Tootbus and Stromma all publish real-time bus positions, and an offline map or a local SIM stops GPS tracking from eating your roaming data. Four checks I run before paying, in order:
- Loop time against the hours I actually have, including the walk to and from the stop.
- The last full circuit, which is earlier than the last bus on most routes.
- Whether the stop I want is being served, since service pages list suspensions and posters do not.
- How the ticket activates, and whether I need mobile data on the day to do it.
Edinburgh works the other way for families: up to three children ride free with each adult, which is hard for any public transport day ticket to match. In Copenhagen the value sits in the coverage, three lines and two branded fleets on one 24-hour clock, and if your plan is the centre and Nyhavn alone you are paying for routes you will never use.
Audio guides, umbrellas and refunds: the small print in bad weather
Commentary quality is the part of a bus ticket that no timetable reveals. City Sightseeing Amsterdam runs its GPS audio guide in 18 languages and hands out free earphones you keep for the next hop; CitySightseeing Edinburgh carries nine languages plus a Horrible Histories children's channel narrated by Terry Deary, with headphones provided on board; Madrid City Tour covers 14 languages and adds a children's guide in Spanish and English; Tootbus Paris runs ten languages on the bus devices and in its app, with free earphones and a separate kids' channel; Stromma's Copenhagen buses cover six.
Rain changes the equipment, not only the seat. Wired headsets work under a hood, but they tangle in a coat zip, and the jack sockets on older buses sit low on the seat back where they collect drips. Free earphones come with Tootbus, City Sightseeing Amsterdam and CitySightseeing Edinburgh; on the others you either bring 3.5 mm headphones or buy the ones sold on board. An open umbrella is a hazard on the top deck of a moving bus, so it belongs in your bag until you step off, and the working kit is a hood or a soft hat plus a rain shell.
Refund terms are where a wet forecast can be turned into a free option. Tootbus lets you amend or cancel free of charge up to 24 hours before your tour date, and City Sightseeing Amsterdam offers the same 24-hour window. Edinburgh Bus Tours tickets bought online can be used on any date up to six months after the chosen start date, and City Sightseeing Madrid vouchers stay valid for three months. Where a free cancellation window exists, it usually closes 24 hours before your chosen date, so the decision has to be made the day before, not on the morning.
Access and mobility: what to confirm before you buy
Wheelchair space is measured in single bays per bus, so what matters is what happens when the bay is taken. On Big Bus Sydney the lower deck has ramps and one wheelchair space; mobility scooters are not carried, larger chairs may be refused on weight and stability grounds, and the combined weight of the passenger, an assistant and the mobility aid must stay under 300 kg (660 lb), as set out in the Big Bus Sydney accessibility rules. The operator asks for the width and weight of the chair in advance so it can confirm boarding, which is worth doing before you pay for anything.
Edinburgh is the most accommodating of the group: every tour bus has ramped access, a Class 2 mobility scooter is welcome when a wheelchair space is free, wheelchair users have legal priority over those spaces, and dogs travel on all the buses. Stromma in Copenhagen is stricter: its buses cannot take passengers who are unable to transfer into a standard seat, and even a folded chair comes aboard at the driver's discretion.
City Sightseeing Amsterdam is the one to read carefully. Its buses are wheelchair accessible, but users must be able to get on and off independently for safety reasons, and the canal boat is not wheelchair accessible at all, so the bus and boat combination does not work for every chair. Amsterdam also caps group boarding: parties of ten or more may not all fit on the same bus or boat, because of the number of seats available.
If you travel with a Companion Card, Stromma accepts it on both the buses and the canal boats for a companion accompanying a paying passenger. On Madrid, all three operators run accessible buses. Both Stromma and Big Bus Sydney answer accessibility questions before travel, and a two-line message settles the matter long before you reach the kerb.
What I would skip
Four things I would not buy on these networks.
- Vienna's single-ride Panoramic Ticket at €30. It buys about 70 minutes with no hop-off rights, which is nearly the price of a 24-hour pass.
- The Sydney night tour. It is one continuous 1 h 20 circuit from AU$69, so anyone expecting to get on and off through the evening will be disappointed.
- Madrid 48-hour tickets. Since the routes became panoramic there is no re-boarding, so a second day buys little beyond a repeat of the same loop.
- Walk-up tickets at the stop in London. The operator's own online same-day fare is £32 against £39 at the counter, and the sellers at the stop charge the higher figure.