Hampton Court Palace from London Waterloo

You can also just use your Oyster Card for this trip. I wouldn’t worry about prebooking if you are going to use the ticket machines anyway.

There are no advance fares on this route, no need or even really point in pre-booking.

As Carol says just use your Oyster- it's in Zone 6 so included in the daily cap.

If you buy a physical point to point ticket you will pay a LOT more. That odd rule is common to National Rail routes covered by Oystercard.

Sorry to jump on your post but we are doing the same route and didn't know it accepted Oyster. Does that mean kids travel free like on the metro or is it different where I'd need to get them an oyster card with a kid's discount for that day?

One note...there are no ticket barriers at Hampton Court. If using Oyster or contacless, the machines will be on the wall beside the entrance to the track. Don't forget to tap out and in or you might just see a very large fee.

@ lindypope- that is an interesting question, which I have just looked up. Depending on the rail company there are 3 different answers.
But to keep it simple - on South Western Trains (which this route is) if your children are aged 5 to 10 then they travel free BUT you must get them a free '5-10 Zip Oyster Photocard'.
You do that on line from TfL- see this web page- scroll down for the application. Leave time for it to be mailed to you.

https://tfl.gov.uk/fares/free-and-discounted-travel/5-10-zip-oyster-photocard

You don't need to get the Child travel card if you're traveling with your child. That's for the child to be able to take the Tube by themselves.

"When you don't need a 5-10 Zip Oyster photocard:

Up to four children under 11 travel free with a fare-paying adult.

Your child doesn't need a photocard to:

Travel free on buses and trams (unless they look older than 10)
Buy child-rate paper tickets (unless they look older than 10)
Travel accompanied by an adult on these National Rail services:"

ETA: Nevermind, I see that it's the South Western Railway that gets you there and you would need the Zip photocard. Though it doesn't seem to be worth the hassle IMHO for just one journey under ten pounds.

If you open the pdf map below that simplistic statement my reading is there are three colours of line- green, blue and red.
That statement applies to the green lines, for the blue lines (which includes Hampton Court) the card is required and for the red lines there is no free travel . Or that's my reading of it after looking at it 3 times.
My attention was drawn to the 2nd paragraph under benefits which uses the word 'most', which rang alarm bells.
The whole thing is not well written, or has anyone actually done Hampton Court with children and has experienced photocards not being needed?
I could ask a friend down there who has children of that age, but she uses a Freedom Card for free travel due to health issues, so the rules for her children may be different again.

yep, sorry, I was editing while you were posting!

I think you would likely need the Zip card but honestly I don't know that the hassle is worth it for just one trip.

We just bought tickets at Waterloo station back in 2017. It so happened that by doing that there was a 2 for 1 on the HCP entrance, so it saved us some money getting into the palace.

Just checking back, we have Oyster Cards from a trip in 2019, not sure of the balance and we do not have an account. We can just check the balance at a Tube ticket station there by tapping on the yellow button and can top up by credit card as needed, correct? Also, traveling between London Waterloo and Hampton Court is £14.40 open return on Southwestern Railways and appears to be £4.80 single trip (£9.60 round trip), so a good savings for two people. Have I got those fares correct for late March, 2023?

If I choose to use a contactless credit card for my roundtrip between London Waterloo and Hampton Court Palace do I just tap on and off with it on the train like I would with an Oyster Card?
If I use a contactless credit card will I pay the same fare as I would with an Oyster Card?

Yes, you can just check your balance and top off the Oyster card. Easy to do, you can do it at Heathrow when you land or at any tube station.

Re- the Fares- Yes, it's £14.40 each (which is an Off Peak day travelcard)- 2 singles are actually £16.20 and an anytime Day Return is £16 if purchased on South Western trains website or on one of their machines or ticket offices, but is showing as £4.50 each way (£9) return, each, if done on PAYG Oyster/Credit Card according to the TfL journey planner. I think the £4.50 should read £4.80 as putting in todays date and a late March date on TfL journey planner doesn't show a fare increase.
If you put it in on TfL fare finder it bizarrely gives you a fare of £6.30 each way- that it because (and I scratched my head on this one) it puts you on a tube to Wimbledon, changing there to National Rail- which is not necessary, plain odd.
So £4.80 each, each way, is the right PAYG fare on a through South Western train from Waterloo.

It's easy enough to set up an account then top up at home. But you can only top up at home within 3 days of travel. In the UK that is easy enough to do, but coming from the US you would have to top up straight before you left home.
The benefit is you can view your journey history if you have an account, do refunds easier and recover your money if you lose the Oyster card. If you're travelling on business and you're claiming on an expense account the journey history is what you need. Also if you think the computer has got your fare wrong (it has happened to me twice, on longer cross zone journeys, changing trains) journey history is now you determine what went wrong. It's also how I worked out what happened when I was under charged once.
So, yes, easiest for you to top up on arrival at LHR.

So there is no fare difference using either a contactless credit card or an Oyster Card , it would be £4.80 each way and skip the online purchase or print out ticket machine, just go to the turnstile and tap on and exit with a tap off for the lowest fare?
I may not want to use my Oyster Card, but it would be easy to use my contactless credit card like I plan to do if I ride a bus..
The HCP trip and maybe once or twice on a bus will be our only use other than walking and Uber.

Yep, that's it.