Scotland for solo travelers: complete guide with tips and safety advice

Scotland’s overall safety

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 The trusty and reliable Travelsafe gives Scotland a safety rating of 71/100…

… and a user-generated safety rating of 83/100.

The overall risk is marked as ‘low,’ with the site specifying ‘Scotland is very safe to travel to.’ 👍

The United Kingdom (which Scotland is part of) is on Travelsafe’s list of ‘low risk countries;’ a collection of places that “score well across crime, healthcare quality, infrastructure reliability, and political stability,” and where “incidents affecting tourists […] are relatively uncommon.”

And even according to the official US State Department Travel Advisory website (which is notoriously hyper-wary), traveling to the UK is recommended (with some small precautions, related to the small risk of very-occasional terrorist attacks).

All of this matches up exactly with what I’ve experienced 🙏

Crime is low in Scotland (and continues to fall), there’s a very welcoming culture, pickpocketing isn’t really a thing, there’s no risk of fatal or major natural disasters, people don’t have guns, drivers are very safe and respectful, there are no mosquitoes or weird dangerous contagious diseases, and there are no common scams.

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Overall, the nation is very safe by international standards. For the majority of people, Scotland will be safer than where you come from.

Scotland is also very open-minded; so no matter what you look like, how you identify, what your politics are, and where you’re from; people will be friendly, welcoming, and tolerant 😇

Overall to sum up: you can visit Scotland without worrying about safety. You’ll likely be absolutely fine, you’ll likely have an excellent time, and you’ll likely want to come back right away. Good old Scotland! 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

Urban safety in Scotland

Like in literally any and all cities on the planet, it’s a good idea to avoid off-the-beaten-track dimly-lit residential neighborhoods in Scotland’s cities. 🏙️

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Broadly speaking, if you want some super-cautious advice: Glasgow is a little more edgy and sketchy than other Scottish cities, but all cities are safe (including Glasgow), and you can visit them without worrying.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 If you’re a solo traveler out at night, try to find a person or two to hang around with. You could find those people in a hostel, on Couchsurfing, in a pub, or on a walking tour. Scotland is safe, but hanging around alone in dark places you don’t know; that might not be so safe.

When you’re walking, try to choose well-lit places, and avoid isolated areas💡

When you’re drinking on a night out, make sure to watch your drink carefully. Drink spiking is very rare in Scotland, but it does sometimes happen. Sadly, this happens a lot more commonly to women than it does to men.

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You don’t have any scams to worry about in Scotland. They’re not really a thing here. I’ve never been scammed in the UK in my life… and I’ve never heard about any recurring scams 🤷

Again, all that said: Scotland is VERY safe, and you probably won’t have to worry about all the things I’ve just mentioned. All the above is super-cautious advice; not stuff that should actually impact your decision to visit Scotland solo.

Rural safety in Scotland

✅ Exploring rural Scotland is very safe in general:

• There are many waymarked hiking trails
• (and many of the unmarked trails are well-trodden)
• Mountain rescue services are 24-hours, well-organized, experienced, and reliable
• There are no bears or wolves or other dangerous animals (like snakes or scorpions)
• There are no unexploded landmines, & the border with England is safe and unmanned
• You get lots of great hiking (and cycling) infrastructure, and local people love respecting and exploring the outdoors

💻 It’s also important to note that Scotland has LOADS of good online resources for finding safe outdoor adventures.

In some less-developed and less-explored countries, hiking and cycling can be a bit tricky, cos it’s hard to find official routes (or good information on both official and unofficial routes).

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 … but for Scotland, some of those good resources include:

• Travelness (yep, that’s us!)
• Great Trails: an excellent collection of 29 Scottish long-distance walking trails
• WalkHighlands: the best hiking resource I’ve ever found, for anywhere on the planet
• The National Cycle Network map: with all the UK’s officially-maintained cycling routes
• VisitScotland: this site is a little superficial, but it’s managed by Scotland’s official tourism and events organisation

📲 In some of Scotland’s most rural areas, the mobile phone coverage can be a little spotty. But that’s obviously to be expected, and the remote-area mobile coverage in Scotland is better than the remote-area mobile coverage you’ll find in most places on the planet.

Public transport in Scotland

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Scotland’s public transport is GREAT 👍

You get trains, buses, ferries, AND long-distance coaches, and it’s very easy to find all timetables online.

… so, unlike in other countries, you won’t find yourself stranded with no help and no information in a bus station or a train station.

• To check ferry timetables (and buy ferry tickets), head to CalMac. As far as I know, they operate ALL of the regularly-timetabled public-transport ferries in Scotland ⛴️
• To find short-route bus timetables, you’ll need to check the website of whichever bus company manages the area you’re traveling in (different companies serve different regions, and some very-rural regions are operated by very small local bus companies). But the best places to start are First, Stagecoach, and Lothian Buses. If you want more centralized bus information, your best option is Traveline. And until you get very rural, the Google Maps real-time information is usually very accurate in Scotland 🚍
• To check timetables (and buy tickets) for long-distance coaches, head to Megabus, National Express, and Flixbus. In my experience, Megabus is the most affordable, reliable, and regular of the three… but all are good 🚏
• To check train timetables, and book tickets, head to the excellent Trainline (where all information and sellers are centralized) 🚂

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Note: Coaches are MUCH cheaper than trains. And, often, the travel times aren’t too much longer. While trains in the UK are a bit more comfortable and classy than coaches in the UK (and the views are usually much nicer), the coaches are actually quite a bit more reliable. Trains are often late and delayed—but long-distance coaches rarely are. So while I still prefer traveling by train in Scotland, they’re only marginally better than coaches. And coaches are absolutely a better option for budget travelers 💸

👍 For another option, here’s some leftfield advice for you: if you decide to hitchhike in Scotland, it’s SUPER safe. Drivers are respectful and kind, the driving culture is very safe, and traffic accidents here are relatively rare.

I know hitchhiking might sound a bit weird, but it’s a good way to save money, it’s a good way to meet people, and it’s a good way to see how generous, hospitable, and welcoming Scottish locals actually are 🫶

Driving in Scotland (and hiring cars in Scotland)

⬆️ If you’re heading north of Inverness (or to be honest, if you want to do any sort of Scottish rural travel AT ALL), you should hire a car 🚘

You see: as you head further north in Scotland (and if you go to ANY of the islands), public transport becomes much more rare, much more irregular, and much more unreliable.

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To hire cars in Scotland, you’ll find lots of well-known names, with offices around the country (like AVIS, Europcar, and Enterprise).

… but I recommend hiring a car from DiscoverCars.com. These guys compare 500+ different providers, they centralize all the names you’ve heard of (and lots you haven’t), they bring you the cheapest prices, and they have regular sales and discounts. Right now (at the time of writing this), for example, with DiscoverCars, you can hire a car for a week in Scotland for less than £100 🤯

🚘 Here are some top tips for driving in Scotland:

• As you head more north, more west, and into more rural areas, you’ll find LOTS of single-track roads. These single-track roads have enough width for only one car to pass through at any one time. So: when you’re driving down a single-track road and a car approaches, either you or the other driver will have to pull into one of the road’s very-frequent designated ‘passing places,’ to allow the other driver to pass.
• In the UK, we drive on the left. You don’t want to get that one wrong.
• The UK is famous for having lots of roundabouts (which, you might alternatively know as ‘traffic circles’ or ‘rotaries’). When you’re driving on these, you give priority to the right (or, on bigger roundabouts, the flow of traffic is instead dictated by stoplights).
• Drivers are very tolerant of cyclists, if you’re cycling, that’s good news!
• Driving in Scotland is very safe, for the most part, people follow the rules of the road, and are very courteous and careful.

(for much more, here’s our essential guide to driving in Scotland for first-timers).

🚖 Btw: Uber is very popular in and around Edinburgh and Glasgow, and you can use it quickly and conveniently. But if you’re in rural areas, you probably can’t use Uber (well, unless you wanna wait for 6 hours). In those cases, ask a local person (or pub or cafe or hotel) for the phone number of a local taxi company. Call them, and they’ll pick you up!

Organized tours in Scotland

ℹ️ Scotland has EXCELLENT tourist infrastructure.

… and that includes tours. You’ll find hiking tours, city-center walking tours, history tours, food tours, trips to underrated places (that you probably wouldn’t find without some local help), nightlife tours, tours to places you can’t access without your own car, multi-day trips to off-the-beaten track places, and loads more 🎉

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These tours are also a good way to meet other people (ideal when you’re traveling solo!).

✅ Whether you join tours to make friends or not, we DEFINITELY recommend taking some. Tours are some of the best ways to learn about Scotland, its history, its culture and its people (and an AMAZING way to explore its outdoors without having to do any prep or planning). For some of our favorites, here are:

• The top 18 best tours in (and from) Edinburgh
• The top 15 Inverness tours (inc. local experts)
• The 15 best day trips from Edinburgh
• The 15 best day trips from Glasgow

And for browsing tours in whichever places you’re visiting, the best sites are Viator and GetYourGuide. You’ll find LOADS of options on both sites.

Accommodation for solo travelers in Scotland

In Scotland, you have a HUGE range of accommodations (and types of accommodations) to choose from.

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🏨 It’s a touristy country, the tourist infrastructure is great, and the hospitality industry is super impressive. So: you’ll find guesthouses, bed-and-breakfasts, cabins in the woods, camping spots, static caravans, converted barns, converted sheds in people’s gardens, all sorts of other crazy and novel options, and boring ol’ standard hotels and hostels.

You also get the super-unique ‘bothies.’ These rural shacks sit in the middle of nowhere, and are usually former homes. Converted into (free-of-charge!) temporary overnight stays for hikers, cyclists and other outdoor adventurers, they’re very impressive. To be clear though: they’re not cute and cozy chalets; they’re functional, rudimentary converted shacks… and staying in a Scottish bothy is more like camping without a tent.

Talking to locals in Scotland (and meeting people and making friends)

👄 We’ve already covered this in our guide to Scottish slang & phrases.

… but Scottish folks are some of the friendliest people on the planet* 😇

(*you see: once you get over the very-dry, artificially-gruff, super-sardonic, poker-faced, mega-direct styles of anything-goes Scottish humor and communication, you’ll see that Scottish people are incredibly welcoming, open, and hospitable)

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🍻 To make friends with Scottish folk, your best bet is heading to a pub. In the UK, pubs are a huge part of the cultural fabric—and pub culture is much bigger than cafe culture, or any other type of social culture. Btw: in pubs, you don’t have to drink anything you don’t want to drink.

When you meet locals, you can ask for their recommendations—for restaurants, for hikes, for things to do, for museums, for galleries, even for other pubs (in fact, especially for other pubs). Scottish people love sharing recommendations for things to do, and they love helping visitors have the best possible time in their country 🤝

Aside from pub-hopping, some of your OTHER best resources for meeting people in Scotland are:

• Couchsurfing: this site isn’t quite as good as it once was, but it’s still a great hub for staying with local people, meeting local people, and finding a bunch of events with like-minded travel-lovers. I’ve used it 100s of times
• Walking tours in cities: yep, we’ve already covered these, but they’re worth mentioning again. If you take walking tours, you’ll meet other travelers. And the types of travelers who go to these tours are usually solo, and usually up for making friends and hanging around with other people. Don’t be shy. Again, you can find these on GetYourGuide and Viator… and in hostels and tourist information buildings. Some are free; some aren’t.
• Bumble BFF: this is the same app that you might know for dating… but this version is for making friends. It’s VERY good for traveling, because people on here are usually up for finding temporary friends.
• Staying in hostels: people in hostels ALWAYS want to make friends… especially hostel-dwellers in cities. If you stay in a hotel or a guesthouse, you’ll probably find it hard to avoid isolation.

Staying connected on your phone

• To get a UK SIM card, use AirAlo; they’re the best e-SIM provider I’ve ever found, anywhere. Their SIMs are outrageously easy to buy and install, the plans are relatively affordable, you can get SIMs for basically anywhere on the planet, and the live-chat customer service is excellent (if sometimes a bit slow). You can get SIM cards in other places, but they’ll be less convenient—and less easy to find, use, and install.
• WiFi in Scotland is fast, reliable, and found everywhere. You’ll have no WiFi problems. Data can be spotty in rural areas, but that’s the same literally everywhere on the planet.

Good safety practices (no matter where you are) for solo travel

• If you’re going to use dating apps, be very careful (whether it’s for finding friends or actual romantic reasons). People might not be who they say they are (although, obviously, 95% of people will be honest and good-intentioned).
• Don’t repeatedly tell social media that you’re traveling alone. You might make yourself an accidental target.
• Trust your instincts. If someone or something seems a bit dodgy, it probably is a bit dodgy. Remember: when you’re solo, you have no-one to bail you out.
• When you’re solo, you have to be more vigilant. If you’re traveling with a crowd, you can share all the safety responsibilities. But when you’re solo, that’s not the case. So, just be a bit more careful and mindful in general.

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• When you’re hiking, make sure you tell someone your plans. Because Scotland’s weather is very changeable (make sure you pack right for both the current weather, AND any potential weather), and because navigation can be surprisingly-tricky, there’s a chance that inexperienced hikers can get lost. If you get lost and no-one knows where you are, you could be in BIG trouble.
• Equally, when you’re hiking, know your limits. Because the highest mountain in Scotland (that’s Ben Nevis) measures in at a height of ‘only’ 1,345 metres/4,413 feet, some people think it’s super safe to hike throughout Scotland. But that’s not always the case—weather and visibility can change very quickly, much of Scotland is EXCEPTIONALLY remote, and on many hikes, you’ll see absolutely no-one else. If you think a specific hike might be too much for you, don’t bother doing it. You have many more safe options to choose from.
• The only emergency services number you’ll NEED to know is 999. When you call this number, you tell them whether you want the police, the ambulance service, the fire service, or mountain rescue. For non-emergency help, you should instead call 101.

Solo female travel in Scotland

It’s hard for me to write this section, because I’m not female 😬

… and I’m super aware that traveling solo as a male is (sadly) MUCH easier and safer than traveling solo as a female. So I’m really not best-placed to give advice here.

That said, I know MANY females who’ve traveled solo through Scotland, and been (and felt) perfectly safe. And many of these same females have returned to Scotland to travel solo again. So, you can’t take my advice… but you can follow their lead.

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If you’re female, the overall picture is still pretty reassuring—Scotland is generally considered a very safe country, locals aren’t intrusive, and there aren’t the horrid attitudes to women here that you might see in many other countries. You’ll also see plenty of other solo travelers (both female and male), which helps.

🚨 All that said: trust your instincts, be mindful at night, don’t overshare with strangers, and plan your transport carefully.

Scotland for Solo Travelers: Final Thoughts

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 So, in general, I MASSIVELY recommend solo travel in Scotland.

(and I massively recommend solo travel in general)

Scotland is super safe, local people are very friendly, there’s no risk of fatal natural disasters, and I’ve traveled solo here LOADS of times. If you haven’t ever before traveled solo, Scotland is the perfect place to start 😇

That said, you should still be logical and cautious—and I’m very aware that safety considerations are very different (and much bigger) for female solo travelers.

🚨 For more Scottish precautions, here are:

• 10 myths about Scotland that Americans can’t seem to shake
• 22 things you shouldn’t do while you’re in Scotland
• 20 things you shouldn’t say to Scottish people

Thanks for reading, thanks for coming to Travelness, and enjoy solo traveling in Scotland. Keep scrolling down this page! 👋