London is where UK ketamine treatment is bought and sold. Search for a clinic and the results are uniformly private: consultant-led services with published prices around £595 per infusion and considerably more for a full programme. What those results tend not to show is the shape of the whole menu — that no NHS route exists in England at any price, that an NHS foundation trust an hour away treats self-funded patients at less than half London rates, and that the city hosts more recruiting psychedelic and ketamine-adjacent trials than anywhere else in Europe. This guide puts the London options side by side, with what each costs and how to start.
TL;DR There is no NHS ketamine or esketamine pathway in England — NICE did not recommend Spravato in TA854 — so treatment in London is private and self-pay: roughly £300–800 per infusion, with £595 the published London benchmark and full ketamine-assisted psychotherapy programmes from about £6,000. Our directory lists four verified London providers. The value comparison worth making before you book is Oxford Health's self-funded NHS service at £265 per infusion, reachable by referral letter. Trials in London are recruiting and free.
The routes at a glance
| NHS (England) | Private ketamine or KAP in London | NHS trust, self-funded (Oxford) | Clinical trial | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| What it is | No routine pathway — esketamine not recommended by NICE, ketamine off-label and never appraised; limited pilots at Oxford Health and CNWL reached via NHS referral | Off-label IV ketamine infusions, sometimes with preparation and integration therapy | Off-label IV ketamine inside an NHS trust's own service | Study medicine under research protocol |
| Who can use it | Effectively no one outside pilots and existing secondary-care pathways | Self-referral is widely accepted, but suitability is established by a full clinical assessment — diagnosis and severity, previous treatment, comorbidity, current medicines and substance use, risk and consent — not by passing an initial screen | Anyone with a referral letter from a GP or psychiatrist, subject to the service's intake rules | Study-specific criteria; strict screening |
| Cost | — | £300–800 per infusion (£595 the published London figure); programmes from ~£6,000 | £265 per infusion and per initial assessment; budget ~£3,000/year | Free |
| How to start | Ask your psychiatrist if you are already in secondary care | Contact the clinic directly | GP or psychiatrist referral letter, then an assessment usually held online | Registry search plus screening |
The NHS position: closed in England, and why
Start with the honest baseline: there is no standard NHS ketamine pathway for depression in England. Racemic ketamine is licensed as an anaesthetic and used off-label as an antidepressant, so NICE has never appraised it for routine commissioning; the related nasal spray esketamine was appraised and not recommended in TA854 on cost-effectiveness grounds. Scotland's medicines body went the other way — the postcode detail is in our UK reimbursement guide — but for a Londoner the practical consequence is simple: NHS England will not fund this treatment, and even Spravato bought privately through an NHS trust's own price list runs £591–754 per administration, self-pay.
Two narrow exceptions are worth knowing before you spend privately. The NHS has begun piloting racemic ketamine within existing depression pathways at Oxford Health and Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trusts (Magnetar/Blossom reimbursement report, 2025) — CNWL is a London trust — but these are limited-capacity programmes reached through NHS referral, not booked directly. If you are already in secondary care, ask your psychiatrist before paying a pound. And whatever route you take, the written treatment history — every antidepressant tried in the current episode, with dose, duration and outcome — carries the case. Bring it; it counts for more than anything you say in the room.
The private market: the London clinics we list
London is the densest private ketamine market in the UK, and the four providers in our London directory show its range.
Save Minds is a CQC-registered ketamine infusion clinic in St John's Wood, founded in 2017 and led by a consultant anaesthetist, offering IV ketamine for treatment-resistant depression alongside talking therapies. It is the London clinic that publishes prices: £595 per infusion, with initial consultation packages of £890–1,340 depending on referral route (clinic fee guide page, checked July 2026).
Cognacity runs ketamine-assisted psychotherapy from Harley Street: ketamine taken at the clinic under clinician supervision, one to three times a week for two to six weeks, paired with psychotherapy after each session. It does not publish prices — ask for the full programme cost in writing.
Neuro Reset Clinic is a consultant-psychiatrist-led IV infusion service with locations in Hampstead and Knightsbridge, treating treatment-resistant depression, PTSD and selected other indications after a full psychiatric eligibility assessment. No published prices.
Aion Clinic in Islington sells a structured eight-week programme combining medically supervised ketamine sessions with ACT-based talking therapy; its CQC location was registered in July 2025 and had not yet been inspected at our last check. No published prices.
Whether the therapy layer in a KAP programme is worth the premium over bare infusions is a real clinical question, not a settled one: a 2026 systematic review found a heterogeneous evidence base with few randomised trials and few psychotherapy-control groups, so the added benefit of preparation and integration therapy remains uncertain, and it should not be treated as a required component of ketamine treatment. Our UK cost comparison sets the packages against each other in detail.
Before you pay. Verify the clinic's entry on the CQC register, check the prescriber on the GMC register, get the full course cost in writing, and ask what maintenance costs after the induction. Recent consensus describes roughly four to six infusions over two to four weeks as common practice rather than a licensed standard, so any continuation or maintenance is individualised — expect symptom measurement and an agreed decision point for stopping, continuing or reconsidering treatment, agreed before the course starts, not improvised at its end. The full checklist is in our clinic-choice guide. And plan the day: after a session you do not drive or do anything hazardous until the following day, after a restful sleep — our preparation checklist covers the practicalities.
The £265 alternative an hour from London
One comparison is worth making before you book anything in Zone 1. Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust runs a self-funded ketamine service inside the NHS at £265 per infusion and per initial psychiatrist assessment, with £125 per scheduled review, open to patients with a referral letter from a GP or psychiatrist subject to its intake rules — the assessment itself usually happens online, and the service suggests budgeting around £3,000 per year. Genuinely NHS-funded treatment there is limited to Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire patients referred by its own consultants, but the self-funded route is not catchment-limited, and Oxford is under an hour from Paddington. Oxford sells a bare infusion with psychiatric oversight rather than a programme with therapy wrapped in — an induction course of three to six infusions over three to six weeks, individualised on response — so compare course against course, not session against session.
The research route
If cost is the constraint, trials are free by definition — legitimate studies never charge, and many reimburse travel. London is the centre of gravity of one of Europe's busiest psychedelic research scenes. In our directory, King's College London, St Pancras Clinical Research, Re:Cognition Health and both Clerkenwell Health sites (Welbeck Street and Baker Street) are recruiting for NCT06793397, Cybin's Phase 3 study of the deuterated psilocin analogue CYB003 in major depressive disorder. Hammersmith Medicines Research and King's College London's Clinical Trials Facility are recruiting for NCT05660642, Beckley Psytech's intranasal 5-MeO-DMT (BPL-003) study in treatment-resistant depression. Imperial College London is recruiting for the early-phase PsiloIMAGINE psilocybin study, and University College London for a psychedelic-preparation study (DIPP). Across the UK, 67 studies are tracked and 12 are active, spanning psilocybin, ketamine, DMT and esketamine.
Screening is strict and enrolment is never guaranteed, so treat trials as an option to check rather than a plan to rely on. Our trials guide explains how phases, placebo and consent work and how to search the registries. Every legal route in the country — including what is not legal — is in our UK access guide, and the full list of UK ketamine clinics shows the picture beyond the capital.
Frequently asked questions
Can I get ketamine therapy on the NHS in London?
No — there is no routine NHS pathway for ketamine or esketamine in England. NICE did not recommend esketamine (TA854), and racemic ketamine is off-label and has never been appraised. The exceptions are limited-capacity NHS pilots at Oxford Health and CNWL reached through NHS referral, and NHS-funded treatment at Oxford Health restricted to Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire patients referred by its own consultants.
How much does ketamine therapy cost in London?
The published London figure is £595 per infusion at Save Minds, with initial consultation packages of £890–1,340; the broad UK range is £300–800 per infusion, and full ketamine-assisted psychotherapy programmes start from around £6,000. Most London clinics do not publish prices — get the full course cost in writing before committing. The self-funded NHS trust service in Oxford charges £265 per infusion.
Which London ketamine clinic should I choose?
We list providers rather than rank them. What separates a good clinic is process, not branding: a full clinical assessment before any dosing, a CQC registration you have checked yourself, a GMC-registered prescriber, symptom measurement through the course, written full-course pricing, and a defined plan for what happens after the induction. Our clinic-choice guide turns that into a checklist.
Is Spravato available in London?
Not on the NHS — NICE's TA854 decision applies in England. Privately, esketamine is prescribable within its licence; as a price anchor, Oxford Health's own list puts self-pay Spravato at £591–754 per administration. Spravato and ketamine infusions are not interchangeable — dosing schedules, evidence, monitoring and maintenance pathways differ; see our side-by-side comparison.
Can I do the sessions remotely?
The dosing itself is an in-clinic, supervised event at every provider we list — at-home ketamine models on the US pattern are not part of the UK picture our directory records. What is often remote is the assessment: several services, including Oxford's, hold the initial consultation online. If travel is the constraint, ask a clinic whether it runs remote consultations with in-person dosing.
Are London trials worth trying before paying privately?
If you fit a study's criteria, yes — participation is free, and London has recruiting studies across CYB003 (Phase 3, depression), BPL-003 (5-MeO-DMT, treatment-resistant depression) and psilocybin research. But screening is strict, enrolment is never guaranteed, and a trial may involve placebo. Check the registries first; it costs nothing but time.
Sources
- NICE TA854: Esketamine nasal spray for treatment-resistant depression — recommendations
- Oxford Health NHS FT: Interventional Psychiatry Service pricing
- Oxford Health NHS FT: Ketamine TRD service
- Save Minds — clinic site and fee guide
- The Burlington Clinic: ketamine therapy cost in London
- Reimbursement Pathways for Psychedelic Therapies in Europe — Magnetar Access × Blossom (2025)
- Spravato — UK Summary of Product Characteristics (SmPC), sections 4.1–4.8
- ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT06793397 — CYB003 Phase 3 in major depressive disorder
- ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT05660642 — BPL-003 (intranasal 5-MeO-DMT) in treatment-resistant depression
- ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT06798636 — PsiloIMAGINE, Imperial College London
- Blossom: United Kingdom country report
- Mathai et al. (2026), Journal of Affective Disorders — ASKP3 consensus guidelines on intravenous ketamine for depressive disorders
- Veraart et al. (2026), Clinical Psychology Review — ketamine-assisted psychotherapies: historical overview and systematic review
- CQC: Care Quality Commission register
This guide is for general information only and is not medical advice, a diagnosis, or a recommendation of any treatment. Regulations and prices change; always verify a provider's current registration with the relevant regulator, confirm fees in writing, and discuss your options with a licensed clinician who knows your history. If you are in crisis, contact your local emergency number or a crisis line immediately.
This guide awaits review by a licensed medical professional.