Roar can reveal that the average cost of a sports club membership for the 2025/26 academic year stands at £70, with 28 sports club memberships costing over £100.
The most expensive membership on offer is the ‘Royal Blackheath Membership’ for ‘specified’ King’s College London (KCL) Golf Club members. This costs £350. In reality, the figure is £385; members must also purchase the competitive membership at £35.
However, purchasing this does also provide student membership at The Royal Blackheath Golf Club (RBGC), the oldest golf club in England. At the RBGC, the ‘Introduction to Golf membership’ costs £899, making student membership look relatively cheap in comparison.
The second most expensive membership available for purchase on the KCLSU website is the ‘KCL Lions Competitive Two Team Membership’ at £270. The cheerleaders also take bronze with their ‘KCL Lions Competition Team and Duchess Membership’, costing £260. For those not wishing to compete, the KCL Lions recreational membership still costs £100.
KCL Lions is far from the only KCL sports club to charge those who wish to compete far more. In fact, whilst the average competitive membership stands at £96, the average non-competitive membership is £44.
This is not the only disparity Roar noticed when doing its analysis. The average cost of memberships explicitly for women was £33.62 cheaper than those explicitly for men: £54.55 against £88.17.
84% of students say they feel overwhelmed by managing their money in the capital. In such a climate, paying so much to play sports can be a tough choice to make.
Moreover, it is worth noting that membership is not the only cost you pay when you join a sports club. Getting to and from the venue every week can quickly add up under the world’s most expensive public transport system. Getting to King’s New Malden Sports Ground (Berrylands) from Strand campus can cost over £6 and takes close to an hour.
As covered by Roar in 2024, facilities at New Malden are unsatisfactory, with Mark Burgess, KCL’s Head of Sport and Wellness, telling Roar then that New Malden was an “ageing facility in need of improvement”.
Burgess’ comment followed Roar’s investigation that found significant under-investment in New Malden Park compared to Honour Oak Park (HOP).
While KCL spent £445,804 on HOP in 2022/23, investment was only £209,670 for New Malden.
To book fixtures at New Malden, KCL and GKT’s football and rugby teams pay £155 + VAT in the 2025/26 season. The cost for a training session is £55 + VAT.
The situation at New Malden forms part of a wider pattern of under-investment from the University itself in sport. KCL Sports and Wellness’ spend per student dropped from £74 per student in 2016/17 to £36 per student in 2022/23.
This drop constituted a significant drop in spending, even when not accounting for inflation. Expenditure by the University stood at £1,510,690 in 2016/17, but only £1,252,851 in 2022/23, a reduction of over £250,000.
With limited central investment, there is an increasing burden on members to pay the bill, as Niamh Cunningham, Women’s Vice Captain of the Boat Club, notes:
“From what I understand, our membership is necessary for funds in the club, and without it, we wouldn’t be able to function. We don’t have any spare money lying around, and we need it to pay our coaches.”
KCL Boat Club senior membership costs £210 annually.
Low-Cost Options Beyond Sports Clubs
A cheaper option for those wishing to participate in sports at KCL is the King’s BeActive membership. It provides King’s students and staff with access to various sporting activities throughout the week for £35 annually. Some sports clubs, such as Tennis, offer BeActive membership at a reduced rate of £20.
Joining an activity group at KCL is likely to put far less strain on the wallet. The average cost of an activity group membership is £5.62. What’s more, 113 of these groups cost nothing at all.
One of these free groups is the Exotic Pet Society. However, it is only their ‘freemium’ membership that is free. Like many societies, they employ a tiered membership system. The most expensive tier is the ‘Diamond Membership’ costing £199.99, the most expensive activity group membership available.
However, unlike the sports clubs, this is the only activity group membership costing more than £100. In fact, only 16 out of 346 activity group memberships cost £20 or more. That’s 4.62% of all activity groups. The same figure is 85.6% for sports clubs.
For those not wanting to spend this week’s budget on a sports club membership, you might want to take up skateboarding. The skateboarding club only charges £2 for membership – though you may still need to buy a board.
These statistics do not include the £4 Sports & Physical Activity Insurance required to buy many sports club memberships. In addition, termly and associate memberships were also excluded.
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