Brighton 6 Day Itinerary (No Tourist Traps)
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Six days is the 5 day plan plus Eastbourne and Beachy Head, a direct 37-minute train and the easiest full-day trip on this list to actually execute. Days 1-5 keep the pier, Kemptown, Lewes, Devil’s Dyke, and Seven Sisters spine. One more day of runway, the 7 day plan adds Rye on top.
Book these before you go
- Six nights of hotel in one booking, prices climb hard toward any weekend and this is a long enough stay that a mid-week gap in your dates is worth checking for.
- Royal Pavilion tickets online, 5% off and no queue.
- A Seven Sisters day tour, if you’d rather not manage the Coaster bus schedule yourself.
- National Rail tickets to Lewes and Eastbourne ahead of Days 3 and 6.
Day 1: the pier, the Lanes, North Laine, and the Pavilion
Start at Brighton Palace Pier , £2 per person March through September 2026 (free the rest of the year, free year-round for BN1, BN2, BN3, BN41 postcodes). Walk it, skip the food stalls except the doughnuts. Through The Lanes, then into North Laine, 400-plus independent shops and none of The Lanes’ price tags. Afternoon: the Royal Pavilion , adult admission £21.50 (5% off online), no UNESCO listing attached. Compare hotel rates on Booking.com before the weekend rooms disappear. Dinner at Terre à Terre or The Chilli Pickle.
Day 2: Kemptown and the Undercliff Walk, not the i360 queue
East into Kemptown, St James’s Street’s roughly 400 metres of LGBTQ+ bars and antique shops. Coffee at Redroaster, then the Undercliff Walk toward Rottingdean and Saltdean, three flat paved miles under the chalk cliffs. The Brighton i360 is £20.50 for a 25-minute pod flight, the most-cited “overpriced” attraction in local forums, and the same view is free from the beach at its base. Spend the £20.50 on dinner instead: fish and chips at Bardsley’s on Baker Street, family-run since 1926.
Day 3: Lewes, the easy day trip
Direct trains to Lewes run roughly 17-20 minutes. Lewes Castle for the view, then the high street’s antiques and Anne of Cleves House, the Tudor property from her 1541 divorce settlement. Trains stop calling at Lewes from around 5pm on 5 November, Bonfire Night, so avoid that specific evening. Check nationalrail.co.uk .
Day 4: Devil’s Dyke, and the bus that trips people up
The Breeze 77 bus from near the Palace Pier climbs about 30 minutes to open downland with views over the Weald and the Channel. It runs weekends and bank holidays year-round, plus weekdays in summer only, not daily otherwise, check buses.co.uk before you plan around it. Walk the dry valley rim, or push toward Ditchling Beacon. Lunch at the Devil’s Dyke pub at the terminus.
Day 5: Seven Sisters, the full-day one
Coaster buses 12, 12A, and 12X run from central Brighton to Birling Gap and Beachy Head, 75 to 100 minutes each way. Book a Seven Sisters day tour on GetYourGuide if you’d rather not manage the bus schedule. Birling Gap alone, National Trust car park, café, cliff steps to the beach, is a workable half day; walking a real stretch of the chalk path toward Beachy Head turns it into a full one, exposed and shadeless the whole way.
Day 6: Eastbourne and Beachy Head, the direct-train day trip
A direct train from Brighton to Eastbourne takes 37 minutes, eight trains a day, the most straightforward full-day trip on this list precisely because it skips the bus-timetable planning Devil’s Dyke and Seven Sisters both demand. From Eastbourne station, reach Beachy Head via the 13X bus (hourly, about 20 minutes), a taxi (roughly £10), or on foot, about three miles and an hour each way if you want the walk. Beachy Head itself is England’s highest chalk sea cliff, and the same coastline you saw from the Seven Sisters side on Day 5, seen from the opposite end. Book an Eastbourne and Beachy Head tour on Viator if you’d rather have the connections sorted for you. Eastbourne’s own seafront, a more traditional English resort than Brighton’s, is worth an hour before the train back.
Is it worth doing both Seven Sisters and Eastbourne on the same trip?
Yes, they’re genuinely different angles on the same cliffs, not a repeat. Seven Sisters (Day 5) is the walk-the-clifftop version, reached by a slower bus from Brighton. Eastbourne (Day 6) is the fast, direct-train version, with Beachy Head itself, the tallest of the chalk cliffs, reachable by a short bus or taxi rather than a long walk. Doing both across two separate days, rather than trying to combine them, keeps each one from feeling rushed.
| Day | Focus | Rough cost, excl. hotel |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Pier, The Lanes, North Laine, Royal Pavilion | £25-40 |
| 2 | Kemptown, Undercliff Walk, dinner at Bardsley’s | £20-35 |
| 3 | Lewes: castle, high street, Anne of Cleves House | £15-30 plus rail fare |
| 4 | Devil’s Dyke: South Downs Way views | £10-20 plus bus fare |
| 5 | Seven Sisters: Birling Gap and the cliff path | £15-30 plus bus fare |
| 6 | Eastbourne and Beachy Head | £15-30 plus rail fare |
One concrete tip: put Day 6 before Day 5 if the weather forecast favours it. Eastbourne’s direct train has no schedule trap like bus 77 or the Coaster route, so it’s the easiest day to move around if a clearer day opens up mid-trip.