Best campsites in the Cotswolds (2026 guide)
Honey-stone villages, gentle walking country, and some of the easiest camping in England to reach from London, Birmingham or Bristol. Here's where to pitch.
The Cotswolds are an unusual entry on a camping list — there's no dramatic peak or coastline, just rolling limestone hills, honey-coloured stone villages, and a landscape that's been gently farmed for centuries. It works precisely because it's gentle: easy walking, short drives between villages, and a genuinely different pace from the national parks further north and west.
Where to pitch
Bourton-on-the-Water and the villages around it (the Slaughters, Stow-on-the-Wold) sit at the heart of the classic Cotswolds postcard, with farm campsites nearby that put you within a short drive or cycle of several villages at once. Cirencester, the unofficial “capital of the Cotswolds,” has a good spread of sites and easy access to the Roman heritage and market town life. For something quieter, the country around Chipping Campden and Broadway in the north Cotswolds has smaller, farm-based sites with fewer day-trippers.
Beyond the tent
This is walking country more than climbing country — the Cotswold Way, a 102-mile National Trail, runs the length of the escarpment and can be picked up in short sections from most campsites. The market towns themselves are the attraction as much as any single sight: Stow-on-the-Wold, Chipping Campden, Burford and Tetbury are all worth an afternoon of wandering, and most have a genuinely good pub or two in the centre. Sudeley Castle near Winchcombe and the Roman villa remains near Cirencester give you a rainy-day option that doesn't feel like a fallback.
When to go
May and June, before the school summer holidays bring the day-trip coaches, are the sweet spot — gardens and hedgerows are at their best and the villages are walkable rather than crowded. September is a strong second choice, with harvest-time countryside and noticeably thinner crowds. This is one of the more reliable regions for a shoulder-season trip given its inland, lower-altitude position.
Booking ahead
Campsites near the most photographed villages — Bourton-on-the-Water, the Slaughters, Bibury — book out for summer weekends well in advance, driven partly by day-trippers from London and Birmingham rather than campers alone. The north Cotswolds around Chipping Campden and Broadway, and the area around Cirencester, have noticeably better late availability for the same landscape.