Heathrow Terminal 5 parking: every product, price, postcode, and how to choose

Heathrow Terminal 5 parking covers all six official Heathrow parking products. T5 is the only terminal where the full set runs: Park & Ride (cheapest, two miles north on the Northern Perimeter Road), Terminal Parking (the renamed Short Stay, attached to the T5 building), Meet & Greet (drop the keys at Level 4 of the Terminal Parking car park, with 360-degree damage cameras), Valet (drop on the forecourt, with the £7 drop-off charge waived), Priority Park & Ride (the only open Priority across the airport at the moment), and Pod Parking (a T5-only driverless electric pod system between the car park and the terminal). The September 2024 and 2025 renames (Long Stay to Park & Ride, Short Stay to Terminal Parking, Business to Priority Park & Ride) all apply at T5; airport signage still shows the old names in places.

Pre-booked rates are typically much lower than the drive-up gate rate on Park & Ride, Meet & Greet, Priority Park & Ride, and Pod Parking; pre-book on Heathrow's own site for the best price. Heathrow is inside the expanded ULEZ; a non-compliant vehicle pays £12.50 a day to drive to the airport regardless of where it parks. See ULEZ and Congestion Charge for the rules. Forecourt drop-off costs £7 per visit since 1 January 2026 (waived for Valet only); see Heathrow drop-off charges.

Park & Ride at Terminal 5 sits on the Northern Perimeter Road, postcode TW6 2RL. Unlike the T2/T3 Park & Ride (a single shared site on the Eastern Perimeter Road), the T5 Park & Ride is its own dedicated facility serving only T5 traffic. Park & Ride is the cheapest official Heathrow parking product and the right call for any trip of more than a day if convenience is not the priority.

Drive-up prices start at £46.80 for the first 24 hours and £37.40 for each additional 24 hours. Pre-booked online the daily rate drops to £11 to £15 a day depending on lead time. The free courtesy bus runs every 15 minutes between 04:00 and 23:30, with the door-to-door T5 transfer taking around 15 minutes. Outside the operating window, transfers run on request via 020 8745 6261. On return from your flight, leave the T5 arrivals hall and walk to the Park & Ride bus stop on the T5 forecourt, signed for the return shuttle.

The 29-minute free window is the answer to "where can I pick someone up at Terminal 5 for free", because forecourt pick-up is not permitted and the £7 charge applies to any forecourt entry. Drive into the Park & Ride, take a ticket, wait for your passenger, drive out within 29 minutes and you pay nothing. Beyond 29 minutes the charge is £9.40 for stays up to 1 hour 59 minutes. Detail and current prices on the Park & Ride page.

Terminal Parking, the renamed Short Stay (effective 29 September 2025), is the multi-storey car park attached to the Terminal 5 building, with a covered, step-free walk of 2 to 5 minutes to the check-in hall or the arrivals exit. The postcode is TW6 2GA and the same approach road serves both the car park and the kerbside drop-off forecourt. Heathrow's hourly tariff structure applies and matches the rate at the other terminals.

Stays of 9 hours or more can be pre-booked online up to 2 hours before arrival; pre-booked rates vary by lead time and dates but are typically lower than the gate equivalent. Stays under 9 hours pay the gate rate on exit at one of the ticket machines or the exit barrier.

Terminal Parking at T5 is the right call for short stops where the door matters more than the price, and the only product that lands you within walking distance of T5 if Pod and Priority do not appeal. A two-hour collection at the gate rate is £20; twenty-four hours at the gate is £98, which is materially more than two days pre-booked at Park & Ride. The price flips against Terminal Parking once you cross a day, the same as at the other terminals. Full picture on the Terminal Parking page.

Meet & Greet at Terminal 5 drops at the dedicated reception on Level 4 of the Terminal Parking car park, Row M, not on the forecourt. Follow the T5 roundabout signs, take the ramp up to Level 4, keep left, and follow signs for the Heathrow Meet & Greet reception. A valet meets you at the marked bay, takes the keys, takes 360-degree damage limitation photos of the car, and parks it at a secure on-airport compound. On your return, the car is brought back to the same reception at the time agreed at booking. The fixed 360-degree camera record is standard at every Meet & Greet reception (T2, T3, and T5); Terminal 4 has had no Meet & Greet since its multi-storey closed for redevelopment in June 2026.

Drive-up rates start from £138.60 a day on Heathrow's own service. Pre-booked through Heathrow's site, the starting advance band is £143.40, with shorter stays often cheaper per day; third-party Park Mark accredited operators can run lower on advance bookings. Detail on the meet and greet parking page.

The common confusion at T5 is between Meet & Greet (Level 4, Row M in the car park) and Valet (forecourt). Both are operational at T5; the choice between them is whether the £7 drop-off waiver and the forecourt convenience of Valet are worth the small extra cost over Meet & Greet on a like-for-like booking.

Valet at Terminal 5 is the forecourt-drop variant. Drive directly to the dedicated Valet lane on the T5 forecourt, hand the keys to the valet, and walk straight into the check-in hall. The car is parked at the airport's official secure parking facilities. The £7 forecourt drop-off charge is waived in full for Valet bookings; this is the meaningful financial advantage versus Meet & Greet on a like-for-like stay.

Terminal 5 is one of three Heathrow terminals where Valet operates (T2, T3, and T5). Terminal 4 does not run Valet. On shorter stays Valet and Meet & Greet are usually priced close together on Heathrow's online quote widget, with Valet a little higher because of the forecourt convenience. There is no flat from-price; Heathrow quotes per date and length of stay. On return the car is brought back to a dedicated area of the Terminal Parking car park rather than the forecourt itself.

Priority Park & Ride at Terminal 5, the renamed Business Parking, sits on the Northern Perimeter Road at TW6 2RP. It is currently the only Priority Park & Ride open across the airport. The Terminals 2 and 3 Priority site (a single shared facility) is closed for operational reasons; Terminal 4 has never had a Priority Park & Ride at all. So if you specifically want the Priority product, T5 is the only option until Heathrow reopens the T2/T3 site.

Drive-up rates start from £47.90 a day, paid on exit. Pre-booked through Heathrow's site, the daily rate is typically lower; the actual figure varies by lead time and dates and is quoted through the booking widget. The product is aimed at frequent travellers parking 1 to 5 nights, with slightly wider spaces than Terminal Parking and a dedicated business-class shuttle on an on-demand basis rather than a fixed schedule, taking as little as 10 minutes to the T5 doors. The shuttle operates 04:00 to 23:00 daily; outside those hours transfers run on request.

Compared with Pod Parking, Priority is slightly cheaper per day at the drive-up rate (£47.90 versus £59.60) but lacks the novelty value of the driverless pod. The walk from Priority through the covered footbridge takes 5 to 7 minutes to the T5 check-in hall; the Pod transit takes 6 minutes plus the wait at either end. Detail on the business parking page.

Pod Parking is unique to Terminal 5 and exists at no other Heathrow terminal. The car park sits on the Northern Perimeter Road at TW6 2GX, connected to the T5 station by the Heathrow Pod: 21 driverless electric four-seater vehicles running on 3.8 km of one-way guideway between two stations in the Pod Parking car park and one at T5. The journey takes about six minutes and the published maximum wait at any station is 30 seconds. Pods carry up to four passengers and luggage.

The pods operate from 04:00 to 00:30 daily. Outside those hours a courtesy shuttle bus replaces the pod service between the car park and the terminal; the schedule and journey time are similar to the Park & Ride transfer. Drive-up rates are £59.60 a day; pre-booked online the rate drops, with a typical advance from-price of £375.20 a week (around £53.60 a day on the headline weekly figure, often cheaper still with longer lead times).

The Heathrow Pod has been in continuous commercial service since May 2011, the world's first personal rapid transit (PRT) in commercial use. On a drive-up day Pod Parking is a small premium over both Park & Ride and Priority Park & Ride, which run a courtesy bus rather than the on-demand pod; the pod transfer is what the extra buys. For a return T5 trip where the novelty of the pod or the always-waiting pod service appeals more than a bus, Pod is a sound choice. For a longer trip where price matters most, Park & Ride still wins on the bottom line. Full detail on the Pod Parking page.

Terminal 5 sits on the western edge of the airport with its own dedicated access road, the T5 spur off the M25. Access is from M25 Junction 14 via the T5 spur road, or from the M4 via Junction 4 then west to the M25 anti-clockwise to Junction 14. There are no tolls on any Heathrow approach. The T5 spur road approach is signed clearly from the M25 in either direction.

The four T5 sat nav postcodes you need:

• TW6 2GA for the Terminal Parking car park, the kerbside drop-off forecourt, the Meet & Greet reception on Level 4, and the Valet lane. The same approach road serves all four. Follow signs for Terminal 5 Departures from the T5 spur.
• TW6 2RL for the Park & Ride on the Northern Perimeter Road. The car park sits two miles north of T5. Take the courtesy bus to T5 from there.
• TW6 2RP for the Priority Park & Ride on the Northern Perimeter Road (separate facility from the Park & Ride). On-demand business shuttle to T5.
• TW6 2GX for the Pod Parking on the Northern Perimeter Road. Take the driverless pod to T5.

All three of the Park & Ride, Priority Park & Ride, and Pod Parking sites sit on the Northern Perimeter Road within a few minutes of each other; the choice between them is the product (price, walking distance, transfer type), not the geography. Terminal Parking, Meet & Greet, and Valet all share the central T5 forecourt approach. The Heathrow postcode page covers every car park postcode at the airport.

T5 has the most parking products of any Heathrow terminal, so the decision rule has more branches. Expressed as a sequence of questions:

Are you collecting someone, or parking a car? For a collection, use the Park & Ride 29-minute free window: drive in, wait for your passenger to take the free bus from T5, drive out within 29 minutes for no charge. For anything longer than a quick hand-off, pick a product below.

How long is the stay? Under two hours, Terminal Parking at the gate rate (from £8 for 29 minutes, £20 for two hours). Two hours to a day, Terminal Parking if the door matters more than the price. One day to a week, pre-booked Park & Ride is significantly cheaper than any other on-airport T5 product. Over a week, pre-booked Park & Ride still wins; for the closer walk or the pod novelty, Priority or Pod start to make sense if you can spend more.

How much does convenience matter? If you would rather hand the keys over than walk to a bus, Meet & Greet on Level 4 of Terminal Parking. If you want the absolute fastest entry and the £7 drop-off waived, Valet on the forecourt. If you want the airport novelty and a regular transit rather than waiting for a bus, Pod Parking. If you want a covered walk closer than Park & Ride but not the higher cost of handing the keys over, Priority Park & Ride is the right answer (and the only Priority currently open across Heathrow).

The T5-specific facts that change the answer for some readers:

• T5 has every Heathrow parking product. The other three terminals each lack at least one (T2 and T3 are missing Pod and have Priority closed; T4 is missing Pod, Priority, and Valet). If the product matters and your trip can flex, T5 is the only terminal with the full menu.
• Priority Park & Ride at T5 is the only Priority open across the airport. If you typically use Priority at T2 or T3 and your booking moved to T5, the product is still available; if your booking is still at T2 or T3, Priority is not currently bookable there.
• Pod Parking is T5 only. There is no equivalent product at the other terminals; if you want the pod experience specifically, you have to be flying from T5.
• Meet & Greet has damage cameras at T5; T4 does not. Meet & Greet on Level 4 Row M of Terminal Parking is the same product, with the same 360-degree fixed cameras, as the camera-equipped set at T2 and T3.
• Short-haul BA from T5B or T5C needs an extra 15 minutes from security to the gate via the free transit train. If your gate is in a satellite building, the parking choice does not change, but the door-to-gate time does. The gate number on the boarding pass tells you which building.

Are you driving a non-compliant car? Heathrow sits inside the expanded ULEZ zone. A non-compliant vehicle pays £12.50 a day to drive to the airport regardless of which T5 car park it ends up in. Check your plate on the TfL site before booking. For the by-type products and the cross-terminal comparison, see the Heathrow parking overview; for the matching terminal information, see Terminal 5. For the comparison with the other terminal parking pages, see Terminal 2 parking, Terminal 3 parking, and Terminal 4 parking; the hotel and parking packages page and the parking FAQs cover adjacent questions.