Paignton Zoo: A Family Day Out That Earns Its Place on the Itinerary
If you are putting together a Torbay holiday with kids in tow, Paignton Zoo is one of those days that quietly becomes the highlight everyone remembers. It is not a token zoo squeezed into a town centre. It is 80 acres of botanical gardens layered with lakes, woodland, savannah and tropical houses, sitting just inland from Paignton seafront. You can comfortably spend a full day here and not double back on yourself.
What Paignton Zoo actually is
Paignton Zoo opened in 1923 and was reimagined as an Environmental Park in the 1990s, which is a fancy way of saying the animals are grouped by habitat rather than by species. You walk through Savannah, then Forest, then Wetland, then Desert. It works. By the time you have wandered from the giraffe house past the Asian short-clawed otters and into the orangutan island, the children stop asking when the next thing is and just start looking.
The collection is genuinely strong. You will find Sumatran tigers, Western lowland gorillas, red pandas, Rothschild’s giraffes, Asiatic lions, Komodo dragons, and a flock of greater flamingos on the lake. The Crocodile Swamp is a steamy tropical house big enough that you forget you are still in Devon. There is also a strong botanical side to the site, with collections of cacti, palms and rare temperate plants, which is part of the charm if you visit on a grey day and want to duck inside.
Tickets, parking and how long to allow
Paignton Zoo is open daily from 10am, with last admission an hour before closing. Closing time shifts with the season, so check before you set off, especially if you are arriving late from a self-catering base. Booking online is recommended and saves you around 15% off the gate price, with tickets available until 10am on the day of your visit. There are family tickets, annual passes and concessions for carers.
The car park sits right next to the entrance on Totnes Road, and it is large, but it fills up properly on school holiday Saturdays. Aim to arrive by 10.30am in peak weeks. If you are staying central, the number 12 bus from Torquay and Brixham stops outside, and Paignton train station is around a 25-minute walk or a short taxi ride. Allow at least four to five hours for the visit. A full day with lunch and a slow lap is realistic.
Accessibility and pushchairs
The site is hilly in places. Paths are tarmac or compacted gravel and well signposted, but the route from the African plains up towards the gorillas is a genuine climb. Pushchair and wheelchair friendly routes are marked on the map, mobility scooters can be hired, and there are accessible toilets across the park.
Best ages and how to pace the day
Paignton Zoo works for everyone from toddlers through to grandparents, but it sings for the four-to-twelve range. Younger children love the Discovery Centre and the Crocodile Swamp because of the warmth and the close-up viewing windows. Older children get more from the daily keeper talks, which run throughout the day at the gorilla, lion, giraffe and penguin enclosures. The talks are short, informal, and a quiet way to learn what the keepers are actually working on.
Plan around the talks if you can. Pick up a printed schedule at the entrance and circle two or three. In between, the Jungle Express miniature railway (a small extra charge) is a sit-down break for tired legs, and there is a decent adventure playground in the woods near the Forest section.
Food, picnics and the gift shop trap
There are two main cafes on site, plus seasonal snack kiosks. Food is reasonable for a tourist attraction, with hot meals, sandwiches, ice cream and the usual children’s lunch boxes. You are welcome to bring your own picnic, and there are plenty of benches and grassy spots overlooking the lake. Most local parents will tell you to do exactly that. Then save the gift shop budget for the wooden animal in the entrance hall on the way out, which is the negotiation everyone ends up having.
What is no longer there, and what is
It is worth mentioning that Living Coasts, the smaller coastal zoo that used to sit on Torquay harbourside under the same trust, closed permanently in June 2020 during the pandemic. If you have an older guidebook, it will still be listed. The site is awaiting redevelopment. Paignton Zoo remains very much open and is the place the puffins and penguins of Living Coasts were rehomed from. The conservation work the trust does sits behind the scenes here too, and you will see it referenced in the signage.
Why it earns its place
There are bigger zoos in Britain, and there are flashier ones, but Paignton Zoo and Botanical Gardens has a settled, slightly old-fashioned warmth to it that suits a family day out in Torbay. You can walk in tired from a long week, lose four hours, and come out genuinely cheerful. That is the test, and it passes.
If you are building a wider itinerary, pair the zoo with a morning at Goodrington Sands or an evening on Paignton Pier. For more days out, explore our guide to family thrills at Splashdown Quaywest and the other rides on the Paignton seafront.