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The Royal Yacht Britannia, Ocean Drive, Leith, Edinburgh EH6 6JJ

Tel: 0131 555 5566 Email us: [email protected]

Britannia will be closed 11-23 March and 25-28 June due to the redevelopment of Ocean Terminal Shopping Centre

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On the Royal Yacht

Famous faces

Dinner in the State Dining Room

HRH The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge

Boarding the Royal Yacht

HRH Prince Charles and Princess Diana

Smiling on board the Royal Yacht

With the Boys

Princess Diana with William & Harry

Working out on board

Prince Philip with Yotties

In the Engine Room

A performance for the Royal Family

Celebrations

The Yotties

An iconic journey

On the deck

Concorde flies over Britannia

Heading to Gibraltar

Commonwealth Tour, May 1954

Arrive in style

Setting the table

State Dining Room

Take your place

Exquisite Cuisine

The Finest Champagne

Fingal, our 23-cabin floating hotel permanently berthed in the historic Port of Leith.

Stay aboard in one of our luxury cabins, Hyskeir.

Ornsay, a luxury duplex cabin set over two floors, united by a spiral staircase.

Fingal’s spectacular Ballroom, with sweeping staircases and a removable skylight, is the perfect venue for any occasion.

The Lighthouse Bar serves afternoon tea, light evening supper and cocktails.

Each of Fingal's 23 stunning cabins are named after Stevenson lighthouses.

Walk through Fingal’s Engine Room with glass flooring and side panels over the industrial engines.

Visiting Britannia

Tripadvisor’s No.1 UK Attraction 2023

Due to upcoming construction work at Ocean Terminal Shopping Centre , Britannia will be closed 11 - 23 March and 25-28 June.

Click on the Visit page  for all you need to know before you visit.

Step aboard to enjoy a great day out!

Fingal Hotel

Get away from the everyday aboard Britannia’s sister ship, Fingal.  Extend your visit with a stay in one of Fingal’s luxurious cabins, your own oasis by the sea. 

AA Hotel of the Year Scotland, AA five-star hotel and 2 AA Rosettes

Learn more: fingal.co.uk

Photo tour: Inside the Royal Yacht Britannia

Inside The Royal Yacht Britannia - incredible rare photos

The royal family's yacht is now decommissioned and here's a chance to see inside.

The Royal Yacht Britannia is a hit tourist attraction in Edinburgh, but it used to be a commissioned vessel frequently used by the royal family. Many royal fans may remember it from a Netflix episode of The Crown , and the late Queen Elizabeth II was so fond of it that she even shed a tear when it was decommissioned in 1997.

Take a look inside the amazing boat that has a fascinating history, checking out everything from the late Queen's bedroom to the awe-inspiring engine room…

The Queen's bedroom

A photograph from 1998, reveals the room Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II used to sleep in. The modest-sized bed and simple in-room desk are a far cry from the grand palaces the family are used to.

The royal dining room

An archived picture shows what the boat's dining room used to look like when dressed for special dinners. There are multiple oval, wooden tables, matching wooden chairs and flowers and lamps add to the decadent atmosphere.

A lovely sun room

One of the yacht's sitting rooms has two floral sofas which wouldn't look out of place in an actual royal residence. A collection of other furniture ranges from outdoor-style chairs to antique-looking side tables.

A top deck perfect for hosting

Zara and Mike Tindall used the boat to host a pre-wedding party, and pictures from the event show many members of the royal family on the top deck enjoying conversations and drinks.

READ:  Prince William and Princess Kate reveal how many staff they actually have

The engine room

A picture inside the engine room shows the inner workings of the ship. The Herald Scotland explains that there was reportedly a doormat at the edge of the engine room to ensure it was kept in immaculate condition.

Did you know, they may not have use of the royal yacht anymore, but they still use a royal train?

The royal train has been used by the royal family since 1840, and the nine-carriage Royal Train is equipped with multiple bedrooms and bathrooms, a dining room that seats 12 people, and even an office.

SEE:  Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's bittersweet moment packing up Frogmore Cottage caught on camera

It is the source of much fascination and has previously been featured in Channel 5 documentary, Secrets of the Royal Train.

In January this year, King Charles took his first ride on it since becoming monarch, travelling from Scotland to Manchester.

Queen Elizabeth II 's last journey on the locomotive was in June 2022 when she travelled to Edinburgh . 

In 2018, the then-newlywed Duchess of Sussex   travelled on the royal train to Cheshire with Her Majesty.

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Inside ‘Britannia,’ Queen Elizabeth II’s Floating Palace

The Royal Yacht, according to Her Majesty, was “the one place where I can truly relax.”

But Britannia was far more than a posh royal cruise liner. She was a showcase for cutting-edge naval engineering and the first royal yacht that could do double duty as a floating hospital in wartime, if necessary. In 1986, for instance, she rescued more than 1,000 refugees from South Yemen. Over the course of her 44 years in service, Britannia facilitated 968 official visits and traveled over one million nautical miles.

She was also, of course, a time capsule of the best British design of the time, in terms of both technological prowess and decoration. Read on for more about the ship’s history, and where the Royal Yacht Britannia is now (hint: You can visit !).

What’s the backstory of Britannia ?

This history of royal liners goes back centuries. In fact, Britannia was the 83rd royal yacht; the first, HMY Mary, was constructed in 1660 by the Dutch East India Company and given as a gift to Charles II. Britannia ’s predecessor, Victoria & Albert III, was completed in 1901 and used by Edward II up through George VI, but was decommissioned in 1939 and eventually broken up as scrap. A new yacht was commissioned on February 4, 1952, in an effort to help King George VI’s health, according to the Royal Yacht Britannia museum, but the king died just two days later. The task to oversee the construction of the new yacht, then, fell on the young Queen Elizabeth II.

Who Built the Royal Yacht Britannia ?

Britannia was designed by John Brown & Co., the same marine engineering firm that built the RMS Lusitania and the Queen Mary. Construction on Britannia began in June 1952, and she was launched in a ceremony on April 16, 1953. The young queen didn’t reveal the name of the liner until her televised address in which she proudly stated before roaring crowds, “I name this ship Britannia .” Notably, a bottle of wine as opposed to the more traditional Champagne, was smashed across the ship’s bow during the christening—Champagne would have been much too ostentatious amid postwar austerity.

Who designed the Royal Yacht Britannia ’s interiors?

According to a technical paper presented to the Institution of Naval Architects in the spring of 1954, the royal and state apartments were to be on par with those of a first-class ocean liner. “The suitability of the decorative design and the furnishing of the Royal and State apartments has, of course, been very important,” the paper noted.

At first, Patrick McBride of the Glasgow, Scotland–based firm, McInnes Gardner & Partners, was selected to design the interiors, but the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh rejected those plans, deeming them too lavish, according to the Royal Yacht Britannia museum. Sir Hugh Casson, the director of architecture at the 1951 Festival of Britain, was the perfect candidate, with his modern eye and lack of ostentation. The design, the architect later wrote in his diary, “was really running a lawn mower over the Louis XVIl adornments. I was going to concentrate on one-color carpet throughout, which was sort of lilac/gray, and all the walls would be white. The only enrichments would be a bit of gilding in grand places.”

Working with Casson, Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip were highly involved, giving input for everything ranging from the furniture (much of it salvaged from the vessel’s predecessor, Victoria & Albert III , as another way to appear thrifty) to the ship’s blue exterior paint, inspired by the Duke of Edinburgh’s racing yacht, Bluebottle. Apartments featured a design like an elegant-yet-muted English country house, filled with floral sofas and antiques. The state drawing room could accommodate up to 250 guests. The Queen’s favorite room was the sun lounge, with its warm teak walls and rattan furnishings, and views across the veranda deck.

“I suppose Britannia was rather special as far as we were concerned because we were involved from the very beginning in organizing the design and furnishing and equipping and hanging the pictures and everything else,” Prince Philip said in a 1995 documentary film about the yacht. “For us it was rather special because all the other places we live in have been built by our predecessors. They started building Windsor 1,000 years ago, and they built Balmoral 100 years ago, and they built Sandringham 70 or 90 years ago. So we, in a sense, had our own.”

So successful was the partnership that Casson would go on to become a dear friend of the royal family and design interiors for Buckingham Palace, Balmoral , and Windsor Castle

Britannia was also a second home for the royal children. Each was given a member of the crew or “sea daddy” to look after them. “We found as children that there was so much to do, we expended so much energy that we couldn’t describe our time on the yacht as a rest,” Princess Anne said. Milk was delivered fresh from a farmer each day for the royal children, according to letters from the ship’s Acting Captain J. S. Dalglish. Later, the yacht would become the venue for numerous royal honeymoons and vacations, including Princess Diana and Prince Charles’s infamous 1981 Mediterranean cruise.

Where is the Royal Yacht Britannia Now?

As documented in season 5 of The Crown , the Royal Yacht was decommissioned on December 11, 1997, at a ceremony in Portsmouth, U.K., after nearly half a century in service and having traveled more than one million nautical miles. In addition to Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Charles, Princess Anne, Prince Andrew, and Prince Edward all attended the ceremony. As the British ensign was lowered to the tune of a navy band, Her Majesty was photographed blinking back tears .

Britannia was retired to Port of Leith in Edinburgh. Today, as one of the most popular tourist sites in the U.K., she serves as a museum and receives some 350,000 visitors per year who can tour the State dining room, the Queen’s bedroom, and sun lounge, as well as view the engine room and crew’s cabins. Visitors can even have tea and scones on the royal deck. The majority of the items on display are original to the yacht and are on loan from the Royal Collection.

In a bizarre 21st-century twist, former British prime minister Boris Johnson announced plans to build a Britannia successor, a £250 million yet-to-be-named, taxpayer-funded superyacht to operate as a “floating embassy.” The new British prime minister, Rishi Sunak, recently torpedoed those plans in favor of building a surveillance ship.

Anna Fixsen, Deputy Digital Editor at ELLE DECOR, focuses on how to share the best of the design world through in-depth reportage and online storytelling. Prior to joining the staff, she has held positions at Architectural Digest, Metropolis, and Architectural Record magazines. elledecor.com 

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royal yacht britannia

Edinburgh castle, 10,283 royal yacht stock photos and high-res pictures, browse 10,283 authentic royal yacht stock photos, high-res images, and pictures, or explore additional royal yacht britannia or edinburgh castle stock images to find the right photo at the right size and resolution for your project..

Ship shape: 5 of the world’s most spectacular royal yachts

By Dora Davies-Evitt

The Dannebrog

This Danish royal yacht serves as an official and private residence for the Danish Queen and other members of the royal family when they are on summer cruises in home waters or on official visits overseas. Made in the naval work yard Orlogsvaerftet, Copenhagen, in 1931, the ship was baptised by Queen Alexandrine, the wife of King Christian X. The yacht has a rich history, with many decades of royalty aboard. King Frederick IX is known to have taken his showers on the boat's bridge, hosed down by a member of his team. It has been anchored in almost every port in Denmark, as well as Greenland, the Faroe Islands, the Mediterranean, the Caribbean and all the way to the coastline of the US; training around 30 Danish naval conscripts every year. Based on the design of the floating palaces of the XIX century, the Dannebrog is more than just a boat.

By Harriet Johnston

By Isaac Zamet

The largest privately owned super yacht in the world, this 180-metre vessel was built for Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed al-Nahyan of Abu Dhabi’s royal family, for use as a day boat to reach his favourite diving grounds. The boat can hold 36 guests and as many as 80 crew members - it also includes a gym, pool and a special ‘golf training room’. It is reported to have cost the sovereign approximately 600 million dollars. Filled with luxury, the engineers apparently worked to ensure that there is as little turbulence as possible, so that the chandeliers don’t tinkle at sea. Its record is soon to be beaten by a new yacht: the REV Ocean. A vessel which, at 183 metres, was designed by Norwegian millionaire Kjell Inge Rokke, and has been created to clean the ocean floors.

A New Royal Yacht Is Coming

• By Phil Draper
• January 7, 2022

There are yachts, and there are superyachts, but royal yachts tend to be something else again. The United Kingdom hasn’t had a royal yacht for almost 25 years, but the British government just announced its intention to replace Her Majesty’s Yacht Britannia .

No firm details have been released of what this replacement could be, but design proposals were recently invited. Time is of the essence, given that the official policy statement came with a proposed launch date just three years away.

The open brief suggests that what is needed now is less yacht, more national ship—a world-first build. Prime Minister Boris Johnson says he sees the vessel as more of a floating embassy to support royals and government ministers alike.

That concept is broadly familiar. During its 44-year service life as a ship of state, Britannia racked up more than 1 million nautical miles and 696 foreign visits. Every itinerary was about promoting the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth, and trade promotion was always a part of the job description. For instance, Britannia made several trips to the United States, including both coasts and Chicago via the St. Lawrence Seaway. Various presidents and their wives were guests aboard, including Dwight D. Eisenhower, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton.

But what defines a royal yacht?

It’s not just about scale, although the eight-deck, all-steel Britannia was one of the biggest yachts in the world when it launched. It was built at Scotland’s John Brown and Co. of Clydebank, the same yard that built the ocean liners RMS Queen Elizabeth and RMS Queen Mary . Britannia entered service in January 1954, one year after Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation. Her late husband, Prince Philip, was a former naval officer and enthusiastically oversaw Britannia’s specification and construction.

The yacht, beyond its routine duties, could rapidly convert to a 200-bed hospital ship or an offshore refuge for the royal family in case of nuclear war. Britannia is 412 feet length overall, has a 55-foot beam and measures 5,862 gross tons. Thanks to two turbine sets producing up to 12,000 hp, Britannia was capable of a continuous 21 knots throughout its service years.

Those were the days when a yacht of that size was unusual: There are now almost 30 giga-yachts afloat with more gross tonnage than Britannia . Only a quarter of them have any obvious royal affiliations.

But in its day, Britannia was an operation to behold. The yacht was home to 21 officers and 256 sailors of the British Royal Navy and could host functions with 250 guests. The staterooms and staff quarters were aft, and the crew were forward. The yacht’s complement included a Royal Marines guard detachment in separate onboard barracks, a 26-strong military band, and a full general surgery team with an operating theater. The permanent noncommissioned crew were known affectionately as the “yotties.”

Britannia was where the most senior members of the royal family stayed when on suitable official visits. It was not where they would normally spend vacations, although Prince Charles and Princess Diana famously used Britannia for a honeymoon cruise in the Mediterranean. They had the yacht’s only double bed installed aboard.

As for Britannia’s successor, various sources have quoted ballpark figures for the build in the low hundreds of millions of dollars. The final specification will depend on how much space is practical for conference and entertainment areas, the number of guest staterooms, the crew complement, helicopter use, tenders, provisions, technology, and security. Johnson also says he wants the vessel to incorporate cutting-edge green technologies and showcase best practices with regard to sustainability.

The new yacht is expected to have a service life of at least 30 years. Given that trillions of dollars’ worth of trade deals were reportedly secured aboard Britannia , the cost for that lifespan is not expected to be a concern.

Construction could start as early as next year, following consultations with the royal family, the Royal Navy and various government departments. The vessel will officially be the responsibility of the Ministry of Defense and classified as if it were a warship.

Floating History

Now retired, royal yacht Britannia lies permanently in Edinburgh, Scotland. This vessel has been one of the Scottish capital’s most popular tourist draws for more than 25 years. It is open daily and sees more than 1,000 visitors a day. Guided tours take in all areas, including a view into the queen’s bedroom, private sitting rooms, state dining room and drawing rooms, sun lounge and veranda, bridge, crew decks, and engine room.

The First Royal Yacht

The wooden wheel aboard Britannia came from the only other royal yacht to bear the name, the much older 122-foot gaff-rigged cutter Britannia . Built for Prince Albert Edward, who later became King Edward VII, it was famously campaigned at big-boat

regattas by him and his son, King George V. The yacht launched in spring 1893 and was a near-sister to Valkyrie II , which unsuccessfully challenged the Nathanael Greene Herreshoff-built Vigilant for the America’s Cup that same year. Both Valkyrie II and Britannia

were designed by George Lennox Watson and built at the D&W Henderson Shipyard in Scotland. Following George V’s death and per his wishes, the vessel was stripped of its spars and fitting, and scuttled in deep water off England’s South Coast on July 10, 1936.

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5 photos of the royal family that people have said look edited

• Kate Middleton admitted to editing an official royal photo of her and her children for Mother's Day.
• It's not the first time the royals have been called out for images that appeared tweaked.
• From missing fingers to odd lines, here are five times people thought royal pictures were altered.

The royal family is in hot water — again — after Kate Middleton confessed to digitally editing an official royal portrait on Monday.

The photo in question was of Kate surrounded by her three children, released by Kensington Palace to celebrate Mother's Day on Sunday. As rumors continue to swirl about the Princess of Wales' absence from the public eye following an abdominal surgery in January, it didn't take eagle-eyed social media users long to notice that a few details weren't quite right.

Their suspicions were proven right when major agencies, including the Associated Press and Reuters, announced that they removed the photo on Monday because they believed it was digitally manipulated . Kate then shared a statement admitting she edited the image on Kensington Palace's social-media platforms.

Confirming a photo-editing failure is a new development for the royal family — but it's far from the first time the public has suspected them of being the subject of digitally-altered images.

Buckingham Palace declined to comment, and Kensington Palace didn't immediately return a request for comment.

Take a look.

Prince Louis appeared to be missing a finger in the Wales' 2023 Christmas card photo.

In December 2023, Kensington Palace released a black-and-white photograph of Kate, William, and their three children, Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis, ahead of Christmas.

The most contentious aspect was that 5-year-old Louis appeared to be missing the middle finger on his left hand. A few people pointed out that it could've been the result of him tucking it in, but most online commenters maintained that it was a botched photo-editing job.

A photograph of Queen Elizabeth II surrounded by her great-grandchildren fueled photo editing rumors in 2022.

Months before Queen Elizabeth II died, a photograph taken by Kate Middleton of almost all her great-grandchildren at Balmoral Castle sparked online chatter.

Tech entrepreneur Christopher Bouzy said in April 2023 posts on X, formerly Twitter, that he suspected the image was digitally manipulated.

Bouzy wrote that parts of the sofa had been " spliced " together and that pixelation around some of the royals' faces was proof of photo editing.

The suspected editing wasn't necessarily a bad thing, added Bouzy, who was featured in Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's Netflix docuseries.

"It isn't easy to get the perfect photo with 10 children. It appears they took multiple shots and then edited the photo to make it perfect. I would've done the same," he wrote.

A line around the Queen's hand in an official portrait with Prince Philip made people think it might have been added in.

To celebrate Prince Philip's 99th birthday in 2020, Buckingham Palace released a photograph of the Duke of Edinburgh standing next to Queen Elizabeth II at Windsor Castle.

Royal fans quickly spotted two things about the photo that were a little off — the Queen's right hand was darker in tone than her left, and it also had an odd black line running across its edge.

Some said it was evidence that the Queen's hand had been edited in from another photo.

In 2014, people accused Vanity Fair of covering up Prince William's bald spot with extra hair.

In honor of George's first birthday in 2014, Vanity Fair shared a photo of the young prince with his parents that was snapped during their visit to a zoo in Sydney.

Unfortunately for William, people noticed that the first-time dad's hair looked slightly more luscious than in other photographs from the visit. As the Telegraph reported at the time, the outlet appeared to have "thickened" up William's hair to make his bald spot seem smaller.

"We did not Photoshop the cover to make Prince William appear to have more hair," a Vanity Fair spokesperson told E! News in July 2014.

People suspected Princess Charlotte's face was edited into Kate and William's Christmas card in 2015.

A new family photo - Merry Christmas from The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, Prince George and Princess Charlotte pic.twitter.com/8d472rlXFW — The Prince and Princess of Wales (@KensingtonRoyal) December 18, 2015

2023 wasn't the only year the Prince and Princess of Wales were accused of editing their Christmas card.

In 2015, when William and Kate still went by their Cambridge titles, Kensington Palace shared a photograph of the family ahead of the holidays. There was online debate about whether the image of Charlotte, who was less than a year old, had been digitally altered .

Social-media users noticed a discrepancy in how clear her face was compared to the blurriness around her neck and shoulders, leading some to believe her face was edited in from a different image.

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