Category × County
8 Best Swimming Pools In Hampshire
Ratings on the eight Hampshire pools in our records run lower than you might expect, and the reason is worth understanding before you judge any single site. Leisure centre pools get reviewed on their worst afternoon, and their worst afternoon is a wet day in half term with every changing cubicle occupied and the shallow end full. The Quays Swimming and Diving Centre, Havant Leisure Centre and Taro Leisure Centre all sit low in our data. That does not make them bad pools; it makes them busy ones at exactly the moments families want them. Then there is Petersfield Pool, catalogued under water rather than pools: open air, and answering a quite different question from the other seven.
Top swimming pools in Hampshire
Showing 1–8 of 8
WaterPetersfield Pool
Swimming PoolsAndover Leisure Centre
Swimming PoolsAlton Sports Centre
Swimming PoolsRomsey Rapids Sports Complex
Swimming PoolsBasingstoke Aquadrome
Swimming PoolsHavant Leisure Centre
Swimming PoolsTaro Leisure Centre
Swimming PoolsThe Quays Swimming and Diving Centre
Two rules take most of the pain out of this category in Hampshire. Swim at the unfashionable end of the day, early or late, rather than the middle of a rainy afternoon. And settle first on the kind of swim: open air in warm weather and an indoor lane session in the dark months are not rivals for the same afternoon.
Swimming Pools in Hampshire: FAQs
Should we avoid the lower-rated pools?
Not automatically. A low score on a municipal pool usually reflects queues, changing rooms and crowding rather than the water, and all of those improve enormously outside peak sessions. If the pool is the closest one to you, try it on a term-time morning before writing it off on the strength of reviews written in August.
What does the outdoor pool add?
Petersfield Pool offers something none of the indoor sites can, which is swimming in open air with space around it, and children who dislike the noise and echo of an indoor pool often take to it immediately. The trade is season and temperature: it belongs to the warm half of the year and to days when nobody is going to be shivering by the side.
Which sites suit a child who wants slides rather than lengths?
Water that throws children about is what Romsey Rapids Sports Complex and Basingstoke Aquadrome deal in, a separate trade altogether from lanes and lessons, and children divide fairly sharply between the two. A child who wants to be thrown about by water will be bored in a rectangular pool, and a child working on their strokes will get nothing done in a wave session.
When is the worst time to turn up?
Mid-afternoon on a wet weekend day in a school holiday, which is when the entire county has the same idea at once. Sessions fill, the car park fills, and a family swim becomes a shuffle. Shift that by two hours, or go on a dry day, and it is effectively a different building at the same address.