Automatic transmission vehicles

We bring the car to any address in London and to Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, Luton, London City and Southend airports, with the exact address, date and time agreed with a manager before the booking is fixed. Every car on this page is automatic, so you never have to think about a clutch in left-hand traffic.

Automatic car rental in London with 101 cars and no manual gearbox in sight

Every car on this page is automatic: 101 vehicles across 12 classes, from £23 to £3,300 a day. There is no manual gearbox on this page, so the choice comes down to size, seats and fuel rather than to how you change gear. Weekly bookings are priced at the daily rate times six and monthly at the daily rate times twenty-one.

Why every car on this page is automatic

All 101 cars on this page are automatic — there is no manual option on this page. On this page Rent-Trip runs automatic-transmission cars only, and the gearbox is listed on every model: the Seat Leon at £23 a day, the Toyota Yaris at £25, the Volkswagen ID.4 at £171, the BMW X5 at £96, the Lamborghini Aventador SVJ at £3,300. In our experience, the first hour in an unfamiliar city is where a manual costs the most attention — an automatic gives it back to the road signs. For a driver raised on a left-hand-drive manual, an automatic takes the gear change out of the left-hand-traffic problem: Highway Code rule 160 still puts you on the left of the road, and rule 185 has you give way to traffic from the right at roundabouts.

Twelve classes, from Economy to Exotic

• Economy and Comfort: the entry band of the fleet — Economy from £25 a day, Comfort from £23, with 2 and 6 cars respectively.
• SUV, Crossover and Sedan: the middle of the range, from £34, £30 and £36 a day, 8, 2 and 7 cars.
• Electric: 10 cars from £71 a day, the Volkswagen ID.4 and Mercedes-Benz EQA among them.
• Premium and Luxury: 16 cars from £55 and 15 cars from £294 a day, up to the Rolls-Royce Phantom VIII at £2,000.
• Sports, Convertibles and Exotic: the top of the page, from £404, £80 and £954 a day, topping out at the Aventador SVJ at £3,300.

The «from» figure of a class is its entry car, not its ceiling — the Premium band alone runs from £55 to £299 a day, so the class name tells you the segment, not the price you will pay.

What the fleet looks like in numbers

The cheapest car on the page is the Seat Leon at £23 a day and the most expensive is the Lamborghini Aventador SVJ at £3,300 — a spread wide enough that the class you pick matters more than the gearbox, which is the same on all 101.

Picking an automatic car rental in London by seats, fuel and body

Automatic car rental here comes down to three filters before anything else: how many people travel, what the car runs on, and what shape the boot is. Our fleet is a mix of hatchbacks, estates, SUVs and MPVs, and the right pick depends on the trip rather than on the badge.

Seats and body styles across the fleet

Seven-seat automatics are the scarcest group on this page, so book them first. The Kia Sorento is the entry point at £49 a day, and the Volkswagen Touran, Ford Galaxy, Mercedes-Benz GLS, Volvo XC90 and Mercedes-Benz V-Class sit further up the range.

Petrol, diesel, hybrid or electric

Most of the page runs on petrol — 63 cars — with 15 diesel, 13 hybrid and 10 electric. The electric class starts at £71 a day with the Nissan Leaf, and the £500 ceiling is the Porsche Taycan Turbo S.

Fuel type matters more here than in most cities, because the city charges for emissions. ULEZ applies £12.50 a day to cars that do not meet Euro 4 petrol or Euro 6 diesel, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, except 25 December. In our experience the hybrid group is the quiet compromise: the Toyota Corolla at £31 and the Toyota Prius at £31 both meet the emission rules without a charging stop. The Congestion Charge is a separate £18 a day inside the Inner Ring Road, 07:00–18:00 Monday to Friday and 12:00–18:00 at weekends and on bank holidays. Who pays road charges and penalties on a rental car is agreed when booking.

Matching the body to the trip

• Hatchback: the Seat Leon at £23 is the cheapest automatic on the page and fits two adults with cabin bags.
• Estate: the Toyota Corolla Touring Sports and Volkswagen Passat Variant, both £36, take four passengers and a full boot.
• SUV: the Toyota RAV4 at £40 is all-wheel drive and hybrid, the cheapest all-wheel-drive way into a high seating position.
• MPV: the Volkswagen Touran at £65 carries seven and luggage.
• Convertible: the Audi A3 Cabriolet at £80 seats four and works for a day along the Thames.

Body type decides more than price once the car is delivered to your address: an estate parks where an SUV will not, and a 2-seat convertible has no room for airport luggage.

Where we deliver an automatic car rental in London

Delivery is the whole point of how we work: the car comes to you, and nothing is collected from a counter.

To your address or to one of six airports

That covers every address inside the delivery area and all six airports, with the exact place, date and time fixed with a manager before the booking is confirmed. The same automatic fleet of 101 cars serves all of them, so the choice of class does not shrink because you land at a smaller airport. In our practice, arrivals at Stansted and Luton gain the most from a pre-agreed hand-over time — the car rental village at Stansted is a separate zone reached by a free bus from the terminal roughly every 10 minutes, and meeting a driver instead cuts that step out. Our pages for St Pancras & King's Cross, Euston, Paddington, Victoria, Waterloo, Canary Wharf, Wembley, ExCeL London and Mayfair all sit inside the delivery area, which helps if your trip starts at a station rather than a terminal. Delivery outside these places is arranged case by case and is not promised on the site, so tell the manager the postcode first and let them confirm.

What happens between booking and hand-over

• Address and timing: the delivery address, the date and the time are agreed with a manager before the booking is fixed, and changes go through the same manager.
• Rental agreement: the deposit, the insurance excess and the delivery fees are set out in the rental agreement, not quoted on this page.
• Fuel rule: a petrol, diesel or hybrid car is supplied with a full tank and must be returned with a full tank; otherwise the missing fuel and a refuelling service fee are charged as set out in the rental agreement. For the electric cars the return terms are set out in the rental agreement.
• Condition on arrival: the car comes clean with a full tank; the return terms are set out in the rental agreement.
• Anything not on the site: documents, payment and the rest of the paperwork are agreed when booking rather than published here.

Driving away from the hand-over

Rent-Trip hands the car over with the tank full and the delivery details already settled, so the first thing you do is drive, not queue. Every car on this page is automatic and right-hand drive, and traffic keeps to the left — Highway Code rule 160 puts you on the left unless signs or markings say otherwise, and rule 183 keeps you near the left edge when turning. That combination is why an automatic suits a driver arriving from a left-hand-drive, right-hand-traffic habit: there is no gear change to unlearn while you are also relearning which way to look at a roundabout.

Renting an automatic car in London for the trip you are actually making

An automatic gearbox changes the way a trip feels, but it does not change the rules you drive under.

City driving and the Congestion Charge

The Congestion Charge is £18 a day, charged 07:00–18:00 Monday to Friday and 12:00–18:00 on weekends and bank holidays, with no charge from 25 December through the New Year bank holiday. The zone sits inside the Inner Ring Road — Pentonville Road, City Road, Old Street, Commercial Street, Mansell Street, Tower Bridge Road, New Kent Road, Elephant & Castle, Kennington Lane, Vauxhall Bridge Road, Park Lane, Edgware Road, Marylebone Road and Euston Road, which themselves run along the boundary. The separate ULEZ charge is £12.50 a day for cars that do not meet the emission standard, runs 24 hours a day every day except 25 December and covers all 32 boroughs, while the M25 stays outside it. Who pays road charges and any penalty notice on a rental car is agreed when booking — we do not fix it on the site, so raise it with the manager before the car arrives. Petrol at £1.75 a litre and diesel at £1.99 are worth checking against your route before you choose a fuel type.

Day trips out of the city

• Dartford Crossing (Dart Charge): £3.50 per crossing for a car, or £2.80 if you prepay, usually chargeable 06:00–22:00 every day including weekends and holidays.
• Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels: £4.20 at peak for a car northbound 06:00–10:00 and southbound 16:00–19:00 on weekdays, £1.55 off-peak with Auto Pay.
• Motorway limits: 70 mph on a motorway and on dual carriageways, 60 mph on a single carriageway, 30 mph in built-up areas unless signs say otherwise.
• London signs: many zones in the capital are signed at 20 mph, and the sign always wins over the default — read them rather than assume.
• Left-hand traffic: Highway Code rule 160 keeps you on the left unless signs or markings say otherwise, and rule 185 gives way to traffic approaching from your right at a roundabout.

An automatic suits the first hour of a right-hand-traffic-to-left-hand-traffic switch best: no gear lever to reach for with the wrong hand while you are still learning where the lane edges sit. In our experience the drivers who struggle least are the ones who take the M25 route out of town rather than threading the centre on day one.

On a longer booking the arithmetic is simple — a week is charged at the daily rate times six, a month at the daily rate times twenty-one.

Family and group automatic car rental in London made easy

Automatic car rental in London for families starts with seat count first and everything else second. We hold 64 five-seat automatics, 7 seven-seat cars and 15 four-seat models, so the group that decides the shape of your trip is the seven-seat one — and it is the smallest pool on this page.

Seven-seat automatics

• Kia Sorento: seven seats, hybrid, all-wheel drive, 1.6 L, 230 hp, from £49 a day — the cheapest way to move seven people in one automatic.
• Volkswagen Touran: seven seats, diesel MPV, 2.0 L, 150 hp, from £65 a day, with the flat floor that makes loading children easier.
• Ford Galaxy: seven seats, diesel MPV, 2.0 L, 150 hp, from £79 a day.
• Volkswagen Multivan: seven seats, petrol passenger van, 1.5 L, 136 hp, from £77 a day.
• Volvo XC90 and Mercedes-Benz GLS: seven-seat premium and luxury options, from £102 and £424 a day respectively.

Only 7 cars on this page seat seven, against 64 that seat five — in our experience that is the group that sells out first around school holidays, so fix the dates with a manager early rather than leaving the model choice open. The Kia Sorento is also a seven-seater that combines all-wheel drive with hybrid running, which matters if the trip leaves the motorway for a wet country lane.

Child seats and the 135 cm rule

Children must travel in a child seat until they reach 135 cm tall or turn 12, whichever comes first, and the fine for getting this wrong runs up to £500. Booster cushions stop being a legal substitute at the same 135 cm mark, so a tall ten-year-old may legally use the adult belt while a short eleven-year-old may not. Seats themselves, and how many you need, are agreed when booking — we do not publish a seat inventory on the page. Bring the height of each child to that conversation; it decides the count faster than the ages do.

Five-seat estates and SUVs carry the pushchair and the luggage together; the Toyota Corolla Touring Sports and Volkswagen Passat Variant are the two estates on the page, both five-seat automatics from £36 a day. Four-seat cars — the Mini Cooper and the Audi A3 Cabriolet — are not a family choice: two adults in front and two children in the back leaves no room for a folded pushchair. Seven-seat automatics cover the airport run for a group of six with bags, and the same car handles a day trip out of the city without a second vehicle. In our practice, groups of five adults plus luggage are better served by a seven-seat MPV with the rear bench folded than by squeezing into a five-seat SUV.

Anything beyond seven people means two cars, and the second driver, the deposit and the excess are set out in the rental agreement rather than on this page. Ask the manager about both at the same time — splitting the booking across two hand-overs is the part that usually goes wrong on a group trip.

For business and premium trips choose automatic car rental in London

Business travel rewards a car that arrives clean, automatic and ready to work — and that is exactly what we hand over. Rent-Trip has 16 Premium cars, 15 Luxury, 12 Exotic and 11 Sports automatics on this page, so a client meeting in Mayfair and a weekend on the Cotswold roads can be covered by two very different cars in one booking agreed with a manager.

Sedans and Premium for work travel

• BMW X1: Premium SUV, 5 seats, petrol, 136 hp, front-wheel drive, £84 a day.
• Audi Q5: Premium SUV, 5 seats, 204 hp, all-wheel drive, £107 a day — quiet motorway mileages and four driven wheels.
• Mercedes-Benz E-Class: five-seat sedan, rear-wheel drive, 204 hp, £74 a day — the saloon shape most clients expect outside a hotel entrance.
• BMW 5 Series: sedan, 5 seats, petrol, £110 a day — the top of our sedan band.

Premium runs from £55 to £299 a day across its 16 cars, and the class floor is the first car, not the ceiling — the Porsche Cayenne at £281 and the Mercedes-Benz GLC at £299 sit in the same group as the BMW X1.

Luxury, Exotic and Sports when the trip is the statement

Luxury starts at £294 with the Mercedes-Benz S-Class and reaches £2,000 for the Rolls-Royce Phantom VIII; the class holds 15 cars, among them the Bentley Bentayga at £920 and the Rolls-Royce Cullinan at £1,400. Exotic is 12 cars from £954, with the Lamborghini Aventador SVJ at £3,300 a day the most expensive car on this page and the McLaren 570S the cheapest way into the class. Sports gives 11 automatics from £404, the BMW M5 and the Porsche 911 Turbo S among them.

Four-seat convertibles such as the Bentley Continental GT Convertible and the Aston Martin DB11 Volante cover the middle ground — roof down for the drive, two seats in the back for the people you are meeting.

I would flag one practical point from our own hand-overs: a two-seat exotic carries no luggage for a colleague, so a business trip that mixes a client visit with a track day usually needs a second, ordinary car booked alongside it.

What the booking covers, and what it does not

Delivery to any address in the city and to Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, Luton, London City and Southend is part of the service, and the address, date and time are agreed with a manager before the booking is fixed. The car comes clean with a full tank and must go back full — the full-to-full rule is the only fuel option we offer; for an electric car the return terms are set out in the rental agreement.

Who pays road charges and penalty notices on a rented car is not fixed on the site — settle it with the manager while the dates are still being arranged, because an £18 Congestion Charge charge or a £12.50 ULEZ charge added to a five-day business trip is easier to plan for than to dispute afterwards.

Driving rules and fuel for an automatic car rental in London

Every car on this page is automatic, but the road underneath it is not the one most visitors learned on. With two pedals and no clutch, the left-hand gear change disappears from the list of things to think about, which leaves your attention for lane position and mirrors. Traffic keeps left — Highway Code rule 160 puts you on the left unless signs or markings say otherwise, and rule 183 asks you to stay near the left edge when turning. Roundabouts run clockwise and you give way to traffic approaching from the right (rule 185).

Speed limits and the rules that catch visitors out

• Built-up areas: 30 mph in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland; on lit roads 30 mph applies by default unless signs say otherwise.
• Single carriageway: 60 mph. Dual carriageway and motorway: 70 mph — and many zones here post 20 mph signs, which override the default.
• Alcohol: England, Wales and Northern Ireland set 80 mg per 100 ml of blood, 35 µg per 100 ml of breath, 107 mg per 100 ml of urine; Scotland is lower at 50 / 22 / 67.
• Phones: holding a phone, satnav or tablet is banned even at traffic lights — £200 and 6 penalty points, and a driver who passed under 2 years ago loses the licence. Hands-free is allowed if the device does not block your view.
• Seat belts and child seats: a belt is compulsory where fitted; children need a child seat until they reach 135 cm or turn 12, whichever comes first — up to £500.

Fuel, charges and what is settled at booking

A petrol, diesel or hybrid car comes clean with a full tank and must go back full — full-to-full; for the electric cars the return terms are set out in the rental agreement. Anything missing, plus a refuelling service fee, is charged as set out in the rental agreement, and no pre-paid tank or full-to-empty option exists on our site. Fuel itself runs about £1.75 a litre for petrol and £1.99 for diesel. The Congestion Charge is £18 a day, 07:00–18:00 Monday to Friday and 12:00–18:00 weekends and bank holidays, and ULEZ takes £12.50 daily from non-compliant cars, 24 hours except 25 December. Who pays road charges, tolls and penalty notices is agreed when booking — we do not state it on the site, and a £180 PCN is not something we promise to absorb. Ask the manager at booking, not after the letter arrives.

Practical conclusion on automatic car rental in London

Automatic car rental in London comes down to a short list of decisions you can make before you ever leave home. With 101 automatic cars across 12 classes, from £23 to £3,300 a day, the range is wide enough that the choice is really about seats, fuel and body style rather than availability. Settle those three, then confirm the delivery address, date and time with a manager — that is the step that fixes the booking.

In our experience the bookings that go smoothly are the ones where the driver has thought about the trip, not just the car. A five-seat hatchback handles central streets and the Congestion Charge zone fine; a seven-seat MPV or a large SUV earns its keep on a family run to the airports or a week away. Only 7 cars here seat seven, so that group is the first to go.

• Seats: 64 cars seat five, 15 seat four, 15 seat two and 7 seat seven — match the count to the people travelling, not to the boot space you hope for.
• Fuel: 63 petrol, 15 diesel, 13 hybrid and 10 electric; the electric class starts at £71 daily, and a compliant car avoids the £12.50 ULEZ charge.
• Transmission: every car is automatic, so there is no manual to fall back on and no left-hand gear change to learn.
• Longer stays: weekly is priced at daily × 6 and monthly at daily × 21, which suits a stay of a week or more better than a string of single days.
• Charges: who pays road charges, tolls and penalty notices is agreed when booking, as are the deposit, excess and delivery fees in the rental agreement.

Two practical habits save trouble. Fuel is full-to-full for petrol, diesel and hybrid cars — the car arrives with a full tank and must go back the same way, or the missing fuel and a refuelling fee are charged under the agreement. And on the road, keep left, give way to traffic from the right at roundabouts, and watch for 20 mph signs in built-up areas where the default would otherwise be 30 mph.

Book the class you need early rather than the cheapest car on the page, and confirm every detail in writing with the manager before the date is fixed. That single conversation covers the address, the time, the documents and the charges — and leaves nothing to sort out at hand-over.