Best Cheap Eats in Soho and Chinatown Under £15

The best cheap eats in Soho and Chinatown are not compromises. Within a few hundred metres of Gerrard Street you can eat hand-folded dumplings, Cantonese roast duck, a whole pizza, a bowl of udon or a plate of pork bun and still get change from £15, in kitchens that have been doing one thing for decades. This is the part of W1 where the money buys food rather than the room.

Two things make the maths work. Chinatown prices have stayed closer to reality than the rest of central London, and Soho's mid-range kitchens run set lunches that cut the evening price roughly in half. Below are the places worth walking to, and the timing that keeps the bill under the line.

Chinatown: Gerrard Street, Lisle Street and Wardour Street

Beijing Dumpling

23 Lisle Street. Dumplings folded to order in the window, pan-fried or in soup, alongside a short northern Chinese menu. Two portions and a plate of greens is a full meal and comfortably inside the budget. It is small, it is busy, and the turnover is fast, so a queue at the door moves.

Wong Kei

Wardour Street. The last of the old Cantonese canteens, famous for decades for brisk service and unbothered by its reputation. Roast duck, char siu, stuffed bean curd, rice and noodle plates. It is the cheapest proper sit-down meal in W1 and it is an institution rather than a discovery.

Four Seasons

Gerrard Street. Known specifically for its roast duck, which is what to order; the wider menu runs past a hundred dishes and the duck is why people queue. A quarter duck on rice is a single-plate lunch that sits at the value end of the street.

Dumplings' Legend

Gerrard Street. Larger and glossier than the Lisle Street places, with an open kitchen making xiao long bao. Dim sum ordered carefully keeps the bill down; the à la carte does not. Best used at lunch when the dim sum list is the main event.

Café TPT and the Lisle Street canteens

Lisle Street is the quieter parallel to Gerrard Street and the better one for a fast, cheap plate: Cantonese roast meats over rice, congee, and noodle soups. Nothing here is styled for photographs, which is rather the point.

Soho proper

ICCO Pizza, Greek Street

Turning out whole pizzas on Greek Street since 1999, at prices that have stayed stubbornly below what Soho charges for anything else. A whole margherita is the cheapest hot meal in the postcode and the pepperoni is not much more. It is a counter operation, not a restaurant, so take it away or eat on a stool.

Bao, Lexington Street

The original small Soho site that made the steamed bun a London staple. The classic braised pork with peanut powder and fermented greens is the one to order; two or three buns with a side is a meal under the line. Expect to queue at peak times, because it seats very few.

Koya, Frith Street

Hand-cut udon in hot or cold broth, made properly, at a counter. A bowl of kake or kitsune udon lands under £15 and the breakfast service is one of the better value meals in central London. Walk-in only for most of the day.

Busaba, Wardour Street

The Thai group that started in Soho, and the weekday lunch is where the value is: a set price for a main and rice that undercuts almost anything comparable on the same street. À la carte in the evening drifts above the budget, so go at midday.

Mildreds, Lexington Street

A vegetarian and vegan kitchen that predates the trend by decades. Not the cheapest entry here, but a full plate for under £15 at lunch, and the reference point for meat-free eating in Soho. No bookings at the Soho site, so time it.

Bar Italia, Frith Street

Not a meal, but the reason to know it: coffee and a panino at a counter that has been open since 1949 and runs very late. It is the cheapest way to sit down in Soho at one in the morning.

Berwick Street market

Weekday lunchtimes only. The stalls change, the quality does not, and a hot box from the market is the fastest sub-£10 lunch in W1. Cash is not usually needed any more, but the stalls do close in the mid-afternoon.

How to keep it under £15

Three habits do most of the work. Eat lunch rather than dinner, because the set menu is the same kitchen at half the price. Drink tap water, since a bottle of anything in Soho adds a quarter to a cheap bill. And remember the discretionary 12.5 per cent service charge when you are aiming at a hard ceiling, because it is what turns a £14 plate into a £16 meal.

One more piece of local knowledge: the closer you get to Leicester Square, the worse the value gets. The tourist pricing starts at Coventry Street and thins out about two streets north. Everything on this list is north or west of that line.

Where this sits in W1

Soho and Chinatown are the value end of a postcode that also contains some of the most expensive tables in Britain. If you want the other extreme, see our list of Michelin-starred restaurants in W1, and for the full picture across every price point read where to eat in W1. Planning a whole day around it? Try the perfect day in Soho itinerary or start from The W1 London.

For current openings and closures, Time Out's Chinatown list and the official Chinatown London site are the two sources worth checking before you walk over, because this is a fast-moving few streets.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where is the cheapest good food in Soho?

Chinatown, on and around Gerrard Street, Lisle Street and Wardour Street, is still the densest concentration of proper meals for under £15 in central London. Outside Chinatown, the reliable pattern in Soho is a weekday set lunch: kitchens that charge £25 or more in the evening frequently do a two-course lunch for around half that, and the food is the same.

Is Chinatown in Soho or is it separate?

Chinatown sits inside Soho, in the W1D block bounded roughly by Shaftesbury Avenue, Wardour Street, Charing Cross Road and Leicester Square. Londoners talk about them as two places because the food is so distinct, but you can walk from Gerrard Street to Berwick Street in under ten minutes. Both are in the W1 postcode.

What is the best value time to eat in Soho?

Between noon and 2.30pm on a weekday. Set lunch menus are the single biggest saving available in central London and almost every mid-range Soho kitchen runs one. The second best window is early evening, before 6.30pm, when pre-theatre menus run for the crowds heading to Shaftesbury Avenue.

Do Soho restaurants take walk-ins?

Many of the cheaper ones only take walk-ins, which is why the queues form. Chinatown restaurants generally seat you as tables come free and turn them quickly. The practical advice is to eat early or late: arrive at noon or after 8.30pm and you will usually walk straight in on a weekday.

Is there good vegetarian and vegan cheap food in Soho?

Yes, and more than there was. Soho has long-standing vegetarian kitchens on Lexington Street and around Berwick Street market, and most Chinatown menus have substantial tofu, aubergine and green vegetable dishes that are not afterthoughts. Ask about oyster sauce and shrimp paste if you are strictly vegan, because they turn up in dishes that read as vegetarian.

Is a service charge added in Soho restaurants?

Usually, at 12.5 per cent, and it is discretionary. Since 2024 employers must pass tips on to staff in full under the Employment (Allocation of Tips) Act, so the money reaches the people serving you. Factor it in when you are budgeting to a £15 ceiling, because it turns a £14 bill into nearly £16.