We enjoyed a fantastic guided tour of the Scottish Parliament building today; our guide was the very knowledgable Tom Hughes. He told us so much about the rich history of the building, and pointed out a range of interesting facts on route. A highlight was finding out that when the cameras are on at the stairs, people are munching away in the cafe beside the stairs! Amazing! And loved learning about the MSBees! 🐝😊

Excellent tour of a very interesting building. Our tour guide (lovely Spanish? lady) was really good. Was able to tell us all about the building and how the design represents different things and was happy to answer any questions. Really thought provoking. Enjoyed visiting the chamber and being able to picture where the MSPs sit. An excellent tour and so glad we have been.

We visited The Scottish Parliament on 18 November. This was a lovely, if short, visit. Incredibly informative, as guests from England who knew little about how the Scottish Parliament system works. They squeezed a lot of information into the 40-minute tour around the building. The building itself leaves something to be desired, it’s quite artistic but a little impractical. The main chamber was the real highlight, and we loved that you could take pictures inside this room (if nowhere else). We also tried the cafe and found this very pleasant.

We booked tickets (free), to go to 1st Minister's Questions, and it was well worth doing so, even though the First Minister was away at Cop 28! Arriving in good time we went through 'heavy' security and had a chance to look at the small exhibition before gaining access to the chamber itself. The architecture and layout is flamboyant in style, and a high quality finish throughout. The level of debate that we saw did not, however, match the quality of the surroundings, and the following day's report in The Times was excoriating in its criticisms! It was good to see the number of visitors in the public gallery, and we noted the casual use of mobile phones by members in the chamber, not setting a great example to the school children present, even whilst one question addressed the issue of banning of phones on school premises!!

Tremendous new building with lots of info on sale and design. Interior mostly wood is beautiful to behold. Lovely little cafe with very reasonable prices all situated in an area where there is plenty of other things to see locally.

First of all this legislative branch looks works differently than U.S. state legislative branches in the United States 🇺🇸 of America. Second it is a very modern parliament building. Third you get to see where the members of the Scottish parliament meet. Lastly, I would not mind working for the Conservative or Labor Party 🎉 in this building.

With friends we booked on the free tour of the building. It took around an hour and we stopped in the cafe for coffee too. The tour guide was so informative and friendly. You get to walk into the Assembly room where the MSPs meet and also the balcony above as well as other areas you see on Tv. You can access the public areas without doing a tour or you can opt for a shorter tour. This one was well worth the hour to understand more about the workings of the parliament and the symbolism behind the architecture.

We had a quick visit while walking to the bottom of the Royal Mile. It was a spur of the moment visit. I would suggest visiting after walking down the Royal Mile. Once we had passed through security, there was a small area talking about the history of the Scottish Parliament, and it's purpose for Scotland. I found it quite educational, learning about it all! We didn't book a tour, but did get to have a look at the Chamber from the public gallery. Not much happening on a saturday, but suspect more interesting when parliament is sitting! The staff were all very friendly, and patiently answered all the questions my kids asked.

Really interesting place to visit, we learned a lot about the Scottish Parliament that we didn’t know before. We tried to pre book a tour but they were full for weeks ahead. Found out when we got there that they were all school groups so you might be able to book a tour later in the day - I’d recommend doing as early as you can though. We had a talk which was interesting and then did a self-guided tour which actually worked quite well. Lovely light airy building with plenty of seating. There’s a nice little cafe there too.

The tour is easily-accessible, free and on-time. There is short informative slide show at the beginning of the tour. I give it three-stars as the tour was primaily focused on the architecture of the Parliament building, and I was far more interested to hear about the history of the Scottish parliament, devolution and the Scottish independence movement or relationship to the UK as a whole. This was only briefly touched on. There was insufficient time outside the tour to really inquire about all of this.