Track any UK train live: a tour of what this map can do
Most people meet a train delay the same way: a vague announcement, a platform screen that says "delayed", and no idea where the train actually is. This site exists to answer that question — and quite a few others — for every train running in Britain, updated every few seconds.
Here's a tour of what it does.
Every train on the network, live
Open the live map and you're looking at the real thing: passenger services, freight workings, empty stock moves, sleepers, charters — each one an arrow pointing the way it's travelling, coloured by operator.
Positions come from Network Rail's own feeds. Trains report as they pass signals and stations, and where the signalling data is available they step along the track berth by berth, so movement is smooth rather than jumping from station to station.
Tap a train, get the full story
Click any train and its popup tells you:
- Headcode and operator — the four-character code staff use, like
1A34 - Origin and destination, and the time it departed
- How late it is, live, in minutes
- Its next stop, with the expected arrival time and platform
- How many coaches it's formed of, where the operator reports it
Tap the headcode and the map filters to that single train, draws the path it has taken today, and opens its full timetable: every calling point, the scheduled time, the actual time at stops it has already passed, and the projected time at stops still ahead. It's the clearest way to see where a delay was picked up.
Station departure boards — and arrivals
Zoom in and every station appears as a dot. Tap one (or search its name or three-letter code) and you get a live board with three tabs:
- Departures — the same Darwin data that drives the screens on the platform, including platform numbers, delay reasons and cancellations
- Arrivals — what's coming in and when
- Fastest to… — type a destination and it finds the quickest next train there, which is the question most people actually have
There's a station info panel too: staffing, ticket office hours, toilets, step-free access, WiFi, car parks — pulled from National Rail's station database.
"Where's my train?" — literally
Two buttons at the bottom of the map:
- 📍 Locate me — puts you on the map
- 🚆 Find my train — finds the nearest train to you and locks the map onto it, so it stays centred as the train moves
If you're on board and willing, you can share your position anonymously for a few minutes; it makes that train's location precise for everyone else watching — the people waiting at your next stop included. It stops automatically when you get off, and nothing is stored beyond a day.
Share exactly what you're looking at
Every view has its own address, so you can send someone a link to precisely the thing you mean:
- A station: /stations/leeds/
- An operator: /toc/lner/
- A single train: /train/1A34/
Handy for "I'm on this one" texts, and for bookmarking your usual station.
Works on your phone
The map is built mobile-first: the train list slides away behind a button, boards open as a bottom sheet, and the locate and find-my-train buttons are sized for thumbs. Add it to your home screen and it behaves like an app.
Planning a journey, not just watching one?
Once you know which train you want, our guides can help you pay less for it: split ticketing can cut a long fare substantially, and the right Railcard takes a third off almost everything (we've reviewed every railcard with the break-even maths).
Buy Train Tickets Buy a Railcard
And when the train isn't the answer
Trains are only half the network. If your journey involves a bus at either end — or instead — we've built bus.me.uk to do the same job for buses. There's a tour of that here.
Live data comes from Network Rail and National Rail open data feeds. Positions are as reported by the railway's own systems.