After the response to our heatwave guide, it felt like the right time to do the same thing for the other end of the year. If you've moved to the UK from somewhere with a proper winter, snow, deep cold, you might assume British winter will be easy by comparison. It isn't, and for slightly unexpected reasons.
The UK doesn't really do dramatic cold. What it does is grey, damp, short-day cold that wears people down slowly rather than all at once. Here's how to actually get through it, and enjoy more of it than you'd expect.
Why it feels worse than the thermometer suggests
British winter rarely dips far below freezing, but that's not really the problem. The problem is the damp. Cold combined with high humidity gets into your bones in a way that dry cold from a continental climate doesn't, and a raw, grey 4°C day in London can feel far more draining than a crisp, sunny minus 10 somewhere else.
Then there's the light, or the lack of it. By December, parts of the UK see barely eight hours of daylight, and it can feel like dusk by mid afternoon. That has a real effect on energy and mood, not just temperature, so it's worth planning around the light as much as the cold.
The clothes actually worth spending money on
You don't need to buy a whole new wardrobe, but a handful of decent pieces will do more for you than a pile of cheap ones. A properly waterproof, windproof coat is the single best investment you can make. Fashion coats that look warm but let the wind straight through won't get you through a wet January commute.
Thermal base layers are the next best thing, they're cheap, they pack down small, and wearing one under normal clothes makes a bigger difference than an extra jumper on top. Good wool socks matter more than people expect too, cold feet make the whole day feel colder than it is.
Waterproof boots or shoes are worth the spend if you're walking or using public transport regularly, wet feet in a British winter is a genuinely miserable, entirely avoidable experience. A proper hat, gloves and scarf finish it off, and you lose a surprising amount of heat through your head and hands, so don't treat these as an afterthought.
If money's tight, charity shops and secondhand marketplaces in the UK are excellent for coats and knitwear specifically, since British winter clothing is exactly what everyone here already owns and regularly clears out.
Keeping your home warm without the bill spiralling
Heating a British home properly is expensive, and a lot of people here underheat their homes for exactly that reason, so don't assume you're doing something wrong if your flat feels cooler than you'd like.
A few things help without costing much. Draught excluders on doors and letterboxes make a real difference for very little money. Keep internal doors closed so you're only heating the rooms you're using. Thick curtains, closed as soon as it gets dark, trap heat far better than people expect. And a timer on your heating, set to come on shortly before you wake up and switch off overnight, tends to be far more efficient than leaving it on low all day.
A hot water bottle is not just a novelty here, it's a genuinely effective, cheap way to stay warm in the evening without turning the heating up.
When home still isn't warm enough
Some days, no amount of layering fixes a cold flat, and that's when it's worth getting out and finding somewhere else to work. The UK does cosy, warm cafes extremely well, and plenty are quietly set up for people working on laptops for a few hours over one coffee.
This is also a genuinely good excuse to turn a grey, cold day into something social rather than something to push through alone. If your home office is uninviting, invite a few other founders from the community to work alongside you somewhere warm instead. Drop a message in the WhatsApp group and see who's free, London or wherever you're based, and turn it into an informal coworking session. A few hours somewhere warm with good coffee and other people building things is a far better way to spend a cold Tuesday than sitting alone under a blanket, and it's exactly the kind of thing this community exists for. Worth doing more of through the winter months, not just when the weather forces your hand.
Getting around when it's dark and grey
Commuting in winter means leaving and arriving in the dark for a good stretch of the year, so it's worth dressing for the platform, not just the office, the same layering advice applies here as anywhere else. Trains and buses can be disrupted by ice, frost or the occasional bit of snow, more than the actual severity of the weather would suggest, so build a little extra time into your journey during a cold snap.
If you're driving, keep a scraper in the car for frosty mornings, and check your tyres if temperatures are forecast to properly plummet. Pavements can turn icy well before roads do, so footwear with a decent grip matters more than people think during a cold spell.
Looking after yourself through the darker months
Shorter days genuinely affect energy and mood, so try to get outside during daylight hours where you can, even a short walk at lunchtime makes a difference. Vitamin D is worth thinking about too, since the UK gets very little useful winter sun. Colds and flu circulate more in winter simply because everyone's indoors together more, so it's worth registering with a GP if you haven't already, rather than waiting until you actually need one.
Checking the forecast
The Met Office issues cold weather alerts during particularly severe spells, worth knowing about if you're heat-sensitive to cold, have young children, or care for anyone elderly or vulnerable. Worth checking the app during any properly cold week rather than guessing.
A British winter changes the working rhythm here just as much as a heatwave does, just more quietly. Shorter days and greyer weather can slow things down, and that's normal, not a productivity problem to fix. If you're running a team or working with collaborators through the winter months, build in a bit more flexibility, and consider organising a few co-working days somewhere warm as a way of keeping momentum and connection through the darker stretch.
Once you've got the basics sorted, British winter has its own charm, log fires, proper Sunday roasts, Christmas markets, the particular pleasure of coming in from the cold to somewhere warm. You just need to be properly equipped to enjoy it rather than endure it.
