Don't overpay for Heathrow Airport Terminal 3 parking. Compare prices from 8 leading sites plus independent operators in one search to find the best deal.

How to choose the cheapest Terminal 3 Heathrow Airport Parking?

Used to just rocking up to official Heathrow parking on the day and paying as you enter? Perfectly understandable as you just want to relax and enjoy your holiday; however, by using Airport Parking Shop and a tiny bit of planning, you can save money and perhaps find an option better suited to you.

A comparison: Turning up at official Terminal 3 Terminal Parking costs £98 for 12–24 hours (and £98 for each additional 24-hour period). Our lowest price last week was £49.16 for a 7-day stay.

Tempted? Then, whether it is the nearest car park or the cheapest, we give you the answers below in just five bite-sized chunks.

1 – Understand Your Parking Type Options (and what’s usually cheapest)

Quick Insights

Park & Ride is usually the cheapest (you park further away and take a bus), while Terminal Parking, right by the terminal, is usually the most expensive.

A Deeper Dive

(but don’t worry you will be back to the surface in no time)

The four main types of parking are Terminal Parking, Park & Ride, Meet & Greet and Valet Parking:

• Terminal Parking (formerly Short Stay) — the closest self-parking option. Terminal 3 has two official Terminal Parking car parks: Car Park 3 is around a 5-minute walk through a covered walkway, while Car Park 1A is less than a 10-minute walk from arrivals and departures. The standard height limit is 2.20m, with an overheight area at T3 for vehicles up to approximately 2.75m.
• Park & Ride (formerly Long Stay) — you park further away and take a shuttle. Heathrow's official T2&3 Park & Ride buses run every 15 minutes between 04:00 and 23:30 and the T3 journey is around 10–20 minutes. Third-party options can be closer, cheaper or both.
• Meet & Greet — you leave your car and keys close to the terminal and a driver parks it for you. Heathrow Terminal 3 has a particularly competitive market, with many third-party products using the designated Meet & Greet area of Terminal 3 Terminal Parking.
• Valet Parking — similar to Meet & Greet but Heathrow's official Valet lets you hand the vehicle over on the Terminal 3 departures forecourt and collect it from Terminal Parking when you return.

If you’re travelling with the family, you may find Meet & Greet best suited to you; if you’re not carrying huge amounts of luggage then a cheaper Park & Ride may be the best option.

Heathrow Terminal 3 Car Park Specifics

A quickie: Airport Parking Shop's Heathrow comparison currently returns third-party parking rather than Heathrow's official products. We still show the official T3 options below so you can compare properly, but you will need to check Heathrow Airport's own website for their live official prices.

Walkable (Official)

Terminal Parking T3 – Car Park 3 (formerly Short Stay) — Around a 5-minute walk from Terminal 3 via a covered walkway. You keep your keys.

Terminal Parking T3 – Car Park 1A (formerly Short Stay) — A second official Terminal 3 self-parking option, less than a 10-minute walk from arrivals and departures. You keep your keys.

Park & Ride (Official & third-party)

Park & Ride T2&3 (Official) — Free buses run every 15 minutes between 04:00 and 23:30, with the T3 journey around 10–20 minutes. Outside those hours Heathrow can arrange a transfer on request.

Green Heathrow Parking - Park & Go (T2, T3, T5) — Serves Terminal 3 as well as T2 and T5 and lets you keep your keys. The basic parking price does not include the operator transfer, so check the transfer option shown with your quote.

OnPark Heathrow Park & Ride / Self Park — Both operate from the Sheraton Skyline and serve all Heathrow terminals in around 5–10 minutes. Park & Ride requires a key handover; Self Park lets you keep your keys.

Purple Parking Park & Ride T2/3 — Around 12 minutes to T3 in current APS data. You leave your keys and use the courtesy bus.

Holiday Extras Express Park & Ride T2/3 — Around 10 minutes to T2/3, with transfers included. You leave your keys.

Maple Express Park & Ride T2/3 — Off-airport parking on Bath Road with transfers included; current APS data gives around 15 minutes to T2/3.

Allegiance Park & Ride — Serves Terminal 3 as part of its Heathrow operation. The transfer uses Hatton Cross rather than a conventional direct terminal shuttle, so check the current journey instructions carefully.

Elite Parking Park & Ride — Multi-storey parking in Staines with transfers to Heathrow terminals; current APS data gives around 5–15 minutes depending on terminal and traffic.

Heathrow Car Park Ltd — A multi-terminal Park & Ride option with current APS data showing around 10–15 minutes transfer time.

Terminals Parking Park & Ride — The T2/3 service uses an on-demand transfer and you leave your keys. Do not confuse it with terminal-specific variants for elsewhere at Heathrow.

Kwik Park Park & Ride — A multi-terminal Park & Ride option with current APS data showing around 5–12 minutes transfer time.

Priority Park & Ride T2&3 — Heathrow still lists this official product, but it is currently closed to passengers, so new bookings and drive-up stays are not available.

Meet & Greet (Official & third-party)

Official Meet & Greet T3 — Handover takes place in the designated Meet & Greet area of Terminal 3 Terminal Parking, followed by a short walk to the terminal.

Official Valet T3 — Drop the vehicle in the dedicated Valet area on the Terminal 3 departures forecourt; collect it from Terminal Parking on return.

Third Party — Heathrow Terminal 3 has a huge Meet & Greet market. Products currently shown as serving T3 include Aerodrome, Enjoy Parking T2/3, FastPark, 5 Star, APH, Edward Lloyd, Go Airport Parking, Happy Days T2/3/5, Maple Parking T2-5, MBW, Purple Parking, Star Parking T2-5, Terminals Parking, Triangle Parking, Kwik Park - All Terminals, Park Giant, Parkair247 and Platinum Parking T2/3/5. Most use a Terminal 3 handover area, but the precise level, row and call-ahead procedure varies, so follow the instructions for the product you actually book.

Which parking type is cheapest?

Expect to pay more for convenience. Terminal Parking is usually the most expensive because you are right beside the terminal and keep your keys, whereas Park & Ride is usually the cheapest.

Even though you hand your car over very close to the airport and have only a short walk, Meet & Greet can sometimes rival Park & Ride on price: the vehicle is normally stored off-airport where space is cheaper, and Heathrow has a lot of providers fighting for the same customer.

Using Airport Parking Shop

Tip: By default, Airport Parking Shop lists prices from low to high irrespective of the parking type. If you are sure what kind of parking you want, use Filter Results and select the relevant option under Parking Options.

2 – Plan to Book in Advance

Quick Insight

Start looking at least two weeks in advance.

(The Quick Dive-Down Part)

Turning up and paying at the barrier is the most expensive way to park (and you might find limited space). Not only will it cost more but they might not have spaces, leaving you with a lot more stress than having to remember to book!

Terminal Parking T3 currently costs £98 for 12–24 hours and £98 for each additional 24-hour period. Official Park & Ride T2&3 is £46.80 for the first day and £37.40 for each additional 24-hour period. Our lowest price last week was £49.16 for a 7-day stay.

You can save substantially by booking in advance, with the amount you save depending on how far in advance you book: aim for at least two weeks ahead.

Tip: Prices go up due to availability (or lack of) so at busier times of the year, like school and national holidays, you may want to start looking at prices even earlier.

3 – Don’t Rely Just on Heathrow Official Car Parks

Comparing like-for-like, third-party car parks are generally cheaper; however, Airport Parking Shop's Heathrow results currently do not include Heathrow's official products, so check Heathrow Airport's own Terminal 3 prices against the third-party prices you find here.

A Deeper Dive

(It is only snorkelling)

Heathrow, like most airports, has its own car parks — and, like most airports, it has third-party operators providing parking options. You may have read about rogue parking operators at airports and understandably that can be off-putting, but the reality is that lots of trusted, established providers run car parks all across the UK.

For Terminal 3, Heathrow's official options are Terminal Parking, Park & Ride, Meet & Greet and Valet. Priority Park & Ride T2&3 also exists as an official product but is currently closed to passengers. Our Heathrow search results currently only return third-party Park & Ride, self-parking and Meet & Greet.

Why no third-party Terminal Parking? – By virtue of Terminal Parking needing to offer a very short walk and therefore be on the airport estate, it is usually the preserve of the airport itself. Third-party operators focus mainly on Park & Ride and Meet & Greet.

Is official or third-party the cheapest?

Comparing like-for-like (for example Meet & Greet vs Meet & Greet or Park & Ride vs Park & Ride), official is more often than not pricier.

For most airports, Airport Parking Shop lets you compare official and third-party parking side-by-side. Heathrow is different: our live comparison currently returns third-party products, so you will have to go old school for the official comparison. Search your dates here, then check Heathrow Airport's own site for Terminal 3 official parking and compare the equivalent parking types.

4 – Compare Parking Features to Find the Best Value

There is very likely to be more than one provider of your chosen parking option — Heathrow Terminal 3 alone has a large Meet & Greet market. Once you’ve decided on a parking type, compare what they offer to get the right balance of price and convenience:

• Transfer time & frequency (walk minutes or shuttle interval)
• Distance from Terminal 3
• Keys (keep vs. leave)
• Opening hours (particularly important for very early or late flights)
• Security & reviews
• Height limits / vehicle rules
• Total price, including terminal access, late-return or out-of-hours charges where applicable

Terminal 3 - Car Parks Comparison Table

Using Airport Parking Shop

Tip: After doing a search the features above will be displayed in the tabs, or by hitting the More Info button. Availability varies by dates, so the live search is the final word on which third-party products you can actually book.

Different product, same parking site

Heathrow has plenty of examples where different product names do not mean different physical parking operations. That matters because two results can have almost identical transfers, security and parking arrangements but different prices, cancellation terms or booking conditions.

5 – Compare Sites to Find the Cheapest and Save More

Quick insight

Not every site sells every Terminal 3 car park, and the same space can be a different price elsewhere. Check more than one site — or save time by using Airport Parking Shop.

The Detail

(I ran out of deep dive riffs)

So, you are ready to save money – you’ve even planned out how many more drinks you can get at the pool bar. But then you google for Heathrow Terminal 3 parking, you see so many sites to choose from, and your head starts to hurt. Which one is best?

The world of airport parking is made up of lots of businesses:

• The official airport car parks run by Heathrow.
• National parking comparison and booking sites.
• Independent Park & Ride operators.
• Meet & Greet providers who collect at T3 and take the vehicle to a secure compound.

Use a comparison site to cut through the noise

This definitely helps but not every car park works with every comparison site and sometimes different sites charge different prices for the same underlying parking product. Ever been searching for car insurance and found a provider available on one comparison site and not another, or at a different price? Airport parking is no different, with the added complication that some booking sites also have their own branded rates.

Not every site sells the same Heathrow Terminal 3 car parks

The table below shows examples from the current advertised Heathrow ranges of the eight comparison sites we track. A tick means the site currently lists that product in its Heathrow catalogue; actual availability and price still depend on your dates.

Search more than one

The key therefore in finding the cheapest price is to check as many different sites as possible. As with anything else, there is a cost benefit ratio so you might set yourself a target of the top 3 or 4. Or you might just give up!

All the comparison sites have a lowest price guarantee – isn’t that great?

Checking multiple sites for lowest prices is a time-consuming exercise so why not just rely on the cheapest price guarantee of the first one? Cheapest price guarantees are fantastic, but it is down to you to go find a lower price elsewhere, often within a tight window, and then contact the original provider, send them the link, and wait for their refund. Something most of us don’t have time for.

How Airport Parking Shop Can Help

That is why Airport Parking Shop is here. We compare the car parks for you, and we even compare the comparison sites. We are independent, we don’t have any car parks of our own. Check the logos for our partners above and then look down the search results for airport parking and you can see we work with almost everyone (find one we don’t, let us know and we’ll get on it).

How we save time and money:

• See more options: both independent car parks and comparison sites.
• Compare providers: see prices for the same space, all next to each other in one search.
• See like-for-like: compare Park & Ride with Park & Ride, Meet & Greet with Meet & Greet.
• Quickly narrow down: filter by parking type, customer reviews, providers and distance to the terminal.
• Switch dates in a click to see the cheapest.
• Understand feature differences: check summary cards or tap through for full details.

Useful things to know when comparing Heathrow Terminal 3 Airport parking

Parking names can make the market look more complicated than it really is. It helps to separate the physical car park from the product name and the company actually selling the booking.

So what should you actually compare? First make sure the product genuinely serves Terminal 3. It does not need to be exclusive to Terminal 3. A product serving T2/T3, T2/T3/T5, T2–T5 or all terminals belongs in the comparison if it serves T3. Then compare the underlying parking operation, transfer or walk, whether you keep your keys, operating hours, booking flexibility and the final price. If two results use the same underlying site, don't pay more for a different badge unless the rate or features are genuinely better.

Heathrow Terminal 3 Terminal Parking Charges

At Terminal 3, you can of course use the official Terminal Parking option (formerly Short Stay). Current drive-up prices effective from 6 January 2026 are:

Remember, you can book in advance to save money on these drive-up prices.